Whirlpool

Hi folks,

(those who don't care about usenet/nnp services should tune out now :) )

For some time in Australia, the quality and availability of high quality usenet/NNTP services has been on a path of steady decline.

The intrinsic economics of providing a 'full' Usenet news feed are punishing for anyone, and doubly so for ISP's in Australia at the long end of very long and expensive transit links.

Hence we've seen plenty of ISP's drop their usenet news ('news') services completely, and others remove the bandwidth-intensive 'binary' groups and pull back to providing only a text based news service.

As a response, those customers wanting access to a full news feed have really only had one option, that being a paid subscription to a usenet access service in the USA.

And those ISPs (including Internode) trying to run a 'full' newsfeed including binary groups have had an uphill battle with keeping the retention time and completion rates for that service tenable (and for quite some time, they haven't really been either). There is just too much data inherent in a full news feed to run one to Australia on an economically sensible basis. We're talking many Terabytes per day of... 'stuff'...

Until now :)

Internode has been working quietly on a solution to this problem, for our customers, for some time.

A solution that didn't involve shutting news down (which is the simplest answer), and which didn't involve making decsions on which groups to keep and which to drop.

That solution is now ready for testing, so I'm announcing it here in order to invite our customers to give it a try!

I'll post details on how to access the service in another 'FAQ' style thread shortly, and invite comments, here in this thread, about how it works.

Please note that this IS a BETA test right now. That means:

- NO support from the Internode helpdesk (yet - until its in production)

Got a problem? Post a comment here and we'll take a look at it :)

If it doesn't work, be patient, we're dealing with some new technology under the hood here.

- NO guarantee that it'll always be available - we expect to have to take the service down to tweak things here and there as we figure out how well it responds under real-world Whirlpool-generated load :)

- NO guarantee of download rates of news data; There may be periods where the chunk of capacty allocated to drive this service from the USA hits its designated limits during this test period.

All that said:

We believe this is a significant service launch in the context of the Australian broadband environment, as full news feeds available as a standard part of an Australian ISPs service offerings are few and far between!

Please note there is an FAQ about the beta test, and I'd strongly suggest reading it before posting questions here:

forum-replies.cfm?t=452626

Cheers,
Simon

OOOH. Nice. This will make a lot of people happy. Can't wait to try it out later today.

Edit: Downloading some headers now. It's very snappy so far, with a lot of content!

Wowee - this is fantastic, and so far seems to be quite quick.

I might be able to use Unison(Fantastic OSX Newsgroup reader) a lot more now.

Hmmm ... I think this is something that I'll have to poke around in a bit!

Sounds great, and the technology mentioned in the FAQ thread is certainly impressive :-) Just one more thing that makes Internode stand out from the crowd...

A nice and totally unexpected "value add" - well done!

This is great. I honestly expected that a premium nntp service was going to have to cost us extra, end of story.

Wow. Ok, I've set it all up, and it's maxing out my 512/128 connection. Thankyou node. I know this is only beta, but it seems pretty good so far.

I wonder how many people will be upgrading plans next month....

cool, node customers will be getting it for nix (yet another reason for me to churn - even in beta), but once it's stable and in production would you think about offering it to the rest of the public on a monthly fee basis? or do you think it would be more of an incentive for other users to churn?

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering? I'd love to think we're the first to do it, but I really don't know. I just can't think of anyone else who is, right now...

Michael P writes...

I might be able to use Unison(Fantastic OSX Newsgroup reader)

Wow. I hadn't used this before. *stops googling*. This is a fantastic one, and definitely worth paying for after the 15 day trial. So so simple. I think I'll set up my spare mac just for usenet now, headless with vnc.

rhom writes...

but once it's stable and in production would you think about offering it to the rest of the public on a monthly fee basis?

That is an interesting question.

I must admit when I first read over these 2 threads I immediately checked out the Node ADSL prices again (compared to my current ISP). Whilst I still see no benefit of churning back to Internode i'd still possibly be interested in paying to use the usenet service at a fee (if the fee was right).

I'm currently using www.newshosting.com and paying AU$20/mth (US$14.95) for unlimited data with 4 concurrent logins. If Internode could match (or better) this price i'd seriously think about using Nodes usenet instead so my money is staying in the country.

Simon Hackett writes...

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering?

None that I know of.

The subject of Usenet servers frequently comes up in the Peering & On the Internet forums [here on Whirlpool], and I've never once seen any Australian ISPs mentioned as offering anything like this.

RichardM writes...

Wow. I hadn't used this before. *stops googling*. This is a fantastic one, and definitely worth paying for after the 15 day trial. So so simple. I think I'll set up my spare mac just for usenet now, headless with vnc.

I certainly paid the shareware fee for Unison. In my view its the best Mac newsreader I've found, easily so. So theres another vote in favour of it :)

Simon

Thanks Simon, your my hero in a none stalker sort of way.

I'm hoping I can now save some green that I'm sourcing to the US atm.

Ben M writes...

I must admit when I first read over these 2 threads I immediately checked out the Node ADSL prices again (compared to my current ISP).

Whilst I still see no benefit of churning back to Internode i'd still possibly be interested in paying to use the usenet service at a fee (if the fee was right).

I'm currently using www.newshosting.com and paying AU$20/mth (US$14.95) for unlimited data with 4 concurrent logins. If Internode could match (or better) this price i'd seriously think about using Nodes usenet instead so my money is staying in the country.

Two answers to that.

First, yes, we could do that - its technically feasible, and its already occurred to us :)

We put measures into the design to make it possible for us to offer that service in the future if we decide to do so. No idea if we will - there are arguments both ways.

Second, and here's the real point in your current situation - if you are paying AUS$20/month for a premium newsfeed now, that translates to a $20/month saving if you did churn back to Internode, to put toward your Internode ADSL plan. For you, it makes the Internode plans, effectively, $20/month cheaper.

(oh, and 8 concurrent logins to the news server :) )

All that and free churn until the end of Jan :)

Regards,
Simon

EDIT: It's working.
:)

Simon Hackett writes...

For you, it makes the Internode plans, effectively, $20/month cheaper.

I've already done the sums and i'd still be $25-30/mth better off where I am. That is why I immediately checked the Node plans to see how it all works out.

Edit:
Exetel 1500k, 78gb, Usenet = $80 + $20 = $100/mth
Node 1500k, 80gb, Usenet = $130/mth

(oh, and 8 concurrent logins to the news server :) )

I'm unsure why anyone needs concurrent logins to the news server unless it offers slow speeds per/login.

Currently with Newshosting (USA) I can get around 120-130k/s per login. If I want to download at full 165k/s flat out speeds I use 2 of my 4 available concurrent logins which easily can max my connection. By changing my news service to Node based in SA, no doubt I could get 165k/s per login because of the routing meaning the other 6-7 would never be used.

Well done though with the implementation of this service, another product that separates Node from 'the rest'.

Ben M writes...

I'm unsure why anyone needs concurrent logins to the news server unless it offers slow speeds per/login.

I only mentioned the limit since you quoted one for the comparable service.

In regards to this in the FAQ thread:

Q: I access a new group and it says there are no postings in it, but I know there are. What is wrong?

All you should do if the group appears empty when you start accessing that group is... come back later!

What is the approximate wait? 1minute? 5minutes? 15minutes?

I ask because I've accessed a few groups about 5 minutes ago and they're still showing as having no messages.

What is the approximate wait? 1minute? 5minutes? 15minutes?

I ask because I've accessed a few groups about 5 minutes ago and they're still showing as having no messages.

Two possible answers :

1)
If they're big groups, come back in half an hour or an hour from now. The server is still in the process of catching up on a chunk of groups we already 'primed' which are busily feeding in at the moment.

We expect it'll be snappier at that 'pump priming' exercise once it streams in the consequence of 'initial demand'.

2) Its been my observation that Unison, which is otherwise excellent as a news reader, doesn't necessarily even *try* to access a newsgroup if it thinks there are zero posts in it now - meaning it won't prime the pump at all.

Now, I'm not 100% sure of that - its just been my own empirical observation.

You can help me test that - if the groups still show up empty in an hour, can you use another tool to access them (Thunderbird works fine), and see if they THEN start showing up normally (in Unison as well as in Thunderbird) a while after that?

Then I can update the FAQ accordingly :)

Simon Hackett writes...

If they're big groups, come back in half an hour or an hour from now.

Thanks, I'm actually seeing the reverse (probably due to someone already looking at them first). Big groups are loading quite quickly, even those which are showing in my reader as having no messages seem to catch up pretty quickly - but the little obscure one's are taking a tad extra time compared to the popular groups.

Thanks for the response, I'll give them a few hours to play catch up.

Simon Hackett writes...

2) Its been my observation that Unison, which is otherwise excellent as a news reader, doesn't necessarily even *try* to access a newsgroup if it thinks there are zero posts in it now - meaning it won't prime the pump at all.

You might be right here, I'll do some testing against Thunderbird and let you know.

Is the NNTP server down? I can't connect any more.

Yeah - thunderbird is showing connection refused after working for a bit. Must be a problem... :-)

This is what beta testing is for, after all :) (broken here too).

Yep, it is - looks like it just went 'pop' :)

(the news service process, not the machine).

Likely its a tuning parameter for the control process concerned - I'll have our guys take a look at it tomorrow.

Note that there is an auto-restart system in the software, so it'll re-start itself automatically within a few minutes, its just that until one of the appropriate guys takes a look at it tomorrow, it might do that again (i.e. break and re-start).

Sorry about that - I said it was a beta test :)

Simon, I don't think anyone is upset - worked good for the first beta test mate :-)

Restarted now :)

Does Internode have a group?

Russell writes...

Does Internode have a group?

I don't see one - see one for iinet and ihug both - but no internode that I can see.

Simon Hackett writes...

You can help me test that - if the groups still show up empty in an hour, can you use another tool to access them (Thunderbird works fine), and see if they THEN start showing up normally (in Unison as well as in Thunderbird) a while after that?

Michael P writes...

You might be right here, I'll do some testing against Thunderbird and let you know.

You've hit the nail on the head, Unison was showing my obscure group as having no postings, I've loaded Thunderbolt, pointed at my obscure group and clicked 'Get Mail' and al-presto, there they are. Then immediately after Unison follows and delivers the messages.

Being a fanatic supporter of Panic, I'll pass this onto the Panic team and see what their thoughts are on this.

Thanks Simon.

Michael P writes...

Being a fanatic supporter of Panic, I'll pass this onto the Panic team and see what their thoughts are on this.

That would be appreciated. I suspect its a simple change for them to make (to get their reader to make the attempt, even if the apparent message count is zero, when you enter a group).

The apparent message count is frequently wrong anyway, so just trying harder in this one edge case surely can't hurt.

I'll update the FAQ.

Thanks,
Simon

Best. News. Ever.

sorry, couldn't resist - nice work internode!

Damm it. Counts to download limit. No point using it

Thats a really curious point of view. Do you think any of this is free to provide?

Is it full speed after you go over your cap :P ( this is the real reason they got rid of flat rate plans )

Ive tweaked it a little, hopefully that crash wont happen again.

Its asking for username and password.

Fixed: Had to many windows open and was exceeding the connection limit.

bloodbob writes...

Its asking for username and password.

I'm not seeing that here.

Shran writes...
Damm it. Counts to download limit. No point using it

So does any other premium news service. In fact - most US based services charge for the privilege of an account as well.

Given it's effectively (as of this moment) the only full (less governmental stipulations) news service in Australia*, that's pretty darn good value for $0.

*I'm not aware of too many (if any) free premium news services in AU.

btw the server will take a bit of time to get up to date, it is currently trying to catch up with over 100 million messages, I fully expect it to be running very nicely within the next couple of weeks.

How many days retention for binaries should be expected?

Are my downloads of news from this server counted against my download quota?

I to wish the answer was no :) But I understand why.

98 million of which are no doubt spam/useless :)

Spero D. writes...

How many days retention for binaries should be expected?

Kingsley has a handle on that - I'll let him answer it :)

Its pretty good - especially considering that some of the binary groups have more than 1.5 million messages (each!) in them.

Ben M writes...

98 million of which are no doubt spam/useless :)

Actually, no - our upstream source provider has pretty good anti-spam technology.

Simon Hackett writes...
Kingsley has a handle on that - I'll let him answer it

You have to swing his attention away from alt.binaries.goatse... err, never mind. :)

retention is pretty good average from what I have seen is about 13days for binaries and over 500days for text. but this does depend on the group also.

an example our
alt.games.battlefield1942

current news server 378
new news server 8234

Kingsley

Kingsley writes...

current news server 378
new news server 8234

/me wonders how much more spam one needs to read.

Last time Simon came onto Whirlpool, to speculate over newsgroups, it took me all of about 1 minute before I fired off an email to node, saying that my reading of a few text based newsgroups is vital to my continued patronage.

I am glad to see that in the improvement, there doesn't 'yet' appear to be a downside to those of us who only use a few text based groups, and don't need the binaries groups or particularly long retention.

PlaneGuy writes...

I am glad to see that in the improvement, there doesn't 'yet' appear to be a downside to those of us who only use a few text based groups, and don't need the binaries groups or particularly long retention.

There shouldn't be a downside - quite the opposite.

Its quite the opposite because with the old server doing its best to handle binaries AND text, any failure to 'keep up' (and its impossible for the old server to 'keep up') means loss of articles randomly across all newsgroups - text or otherwise.

The new server is connected (as explained in the FAQ thread) to a server cluster with 'everything', and it has a very high retention period on text groups. Typically more than a year.

You ought to see a very good result on text group interactions using this new structure. We certainly do.

Simon

I haven't actually been able to download anything yet.

I'm using a not-yet-paid-for Unison, and I can't load text messages nor can I download files. Just get 'Error: No such article'.
Something temporary messing up or am I doing something wrong?

Edit: Wait... Just got a message. I'll try a file now.
Edit2: Ok kewl, getting a file now.

Thanks for this, Internode. Yet another reason to be with Internode. I'll certainly be bragging about this to everybody.

Edit3: This really shows off the power of ADSL2+
Having 8 concurrent 100kB/s downloads is pretty schweet.

This really rocks. Honestly, I'm stoked at just how useful this is. I'm subscribed to a few groups already and really enjoying reading through some of the content.

Thanks again Simon, Kingsley & Node team :)

Usenet is awesome. Thanks, Internode! =)

Some 'tard on usenet wrote...

Dude, if you are so much smarter then us...then wheres your long ass facts and statements? Oh! You don't have any pussy boy. Are you also a flapping catholic?

<3 Usenet

Michael P writes...

I've accessed a few groups about 5 minutes ago and they're still showing as having no messages.

I use Outlook Express and it's set so that it only downloads headers unless I subsequently click on a header of interest - it then grabs the message body. Response time for grabbing the body seems to be about 2 seconds, compared with about 1/2 second on news.internode.on.net. Is this because the body is coming from California rather than Adelaide?

I've tried accessing aus.comms and I can see that there are 7185 messages on the server. I've successfully downloaded 500 headers and can pick up the bodies if I wish.

I've also tried aus.comms.mobile where there are apparently 9596 messages on the server. However, I can only view 5 headers (and their bodies if I click on the headers). Is this a typical symptom of the delay while the mega-download from the USA news feed happens? The way the FAQ is phrased, I should see nothing - or everything.

OMGosh sooo cool, I <3 UsenET and nODE. OMG CAPS IS ON!!!

The server pulls article headers in as fast as it can, once it starts processing a given group.

They turn up as they arrive - i.e. come back later and you should see more messages.

That said, its a beta, we're learning too :)

(and yes, the longer article fetch delay suggests the articles you are selecting are being pulled in from the USA; Once that is done, they should re-fetch far more rapidly, and the more popular the group, the more likely the articles are already local).

Simon

The laws in this area require us to block the groups the government tells us to block and requires that we do not disclose the blocklist itself.

I completely understand the legal/responsibility situation but isn't this somewhat head-in-sand from the government?

Presumably anyone that wants to access the blocked newsgroups can subscribe to an o/s newsfeed or maybe just google for the rubbish that they so desire!

As for banning the distribution of the block list, that really is big brother stuff. I suppose it stops the blocklist becoming a first port of call for folk that want the nasty stuff. But how do we know that political censorship is not going on too?

I wonder if the blocklist can be prised out of the regulator by making an FOI request? I must ask my local MP!

Simon Hackett writes...

They turn up as they arrive - i.e. come back later and you should see more messages.

I'm noticing this with lots of older messages (i.e. back dated to 2004).

Also, the best thing about this is it only downloads messages you wish to read, so it's lighting fast when reading threads.

Be afraid, Whirlpool... be very afraid.

cable99 writes...

As for banning the distribution of the block list, that really is big brother stuff. I suppose it stops the blocklist becoming a first port of call for folk that want the nasty stuff. But how do we know that political censorship is not going on too?

It's stuff like kiddie porn, rape movies and films of people bashing and killing people for fun.

Uploads: I seem to have difficulties - anyone else having a problem?

Care to be more specific?

Newsreaders like (but not limited to) Unison are able to bring up a 'transcript'/log window that documents the actual dialogue with the news server - and would therefore disclose any applicable internal protocol error message(s) that might help us to work out wazzup.

Semi off-topic -- can anyone recommend a good nntp (news) client? Thunderbird is handy for a few things, news reading isn't actually one of them.. recommendations?

edit: helps to indicate O/S - yes, Windows.

I'm using Outlook Express.

Error message:

Outlook Express could not post your message. Subject 'xxxxx', Account: 'pnews.internode.on.net', Server: 'pnews.internode.on.net', Protocol: NNTP, Port: 119, Secure(SSL): No, Error Number: 0x800C006F

However, all is well when I use news.internode.on.net

EDIT: news.internode.on.net and pnews.internode.on.net both seem to be 'down' at present. I can't download from either server. Is someone tweaking things at the Internode end?

brendan. writes...

can anyone recommend a good nntp (news) client?

For windows? If so, Newsleecher is damned good.

Wow, I'm really having fun with this.
Just going through the artwork on alt.binaries.pictures.anime is really nice (no, not the porn, tards).

cable99 writes...
EDIT: news.internode.on.net and pnews.internode.on.net both seem to be 'down' at present. I can't download from either server. Is someone tweaking things at the Internode end?

When was that? pnews. is currently up.

brendan. writes...

When was that?

Right now - yet I have non-internode news servers like news.adelaide.pipenetworks.com working fine.

brendan. writes...

can anyone recommend a good nntp (news) client?

Opera also has an NNTP news reader.

The server is up:

yanis@kosh:~$ traceroute pnews.internode.on.net
traceroute to pnews.internode.on.net (203.16.214.243), 30 hops max, 38 byte packets
1 switch (192.168.1.1) 0.795 ms 0.582 ms 0.554 ms
2 loop0.lns2.adl2.internode.on.net (203.16.215.224) 22.557 ms 68.705 ms 11.554 ms
3 gi0-2-8.cor1.adl2.internode.on.net­ (203.16.212.161) 11.132 ms 46.128 ms 12.011 ms
4 gi0-2-2.cor2.adl2.internode.on.net­ (203.16.215.86) 11.187 ms 12.080 ms 11.991 ms
5 gi0-2-2.cor2.adl2.internode.on.net­ (203.16.215.86) 14.540 ms !A * 11.951 ms !A
yanis@kosh:~$

Suggest you check Outlook's settings and if possible increase the server timeout (or ditch it in favour of something else). It's [hardcoded] timeout value is hideously aggressive.

cable99 writes...

I can't download from either server. Is someone tweaking things at the Internode end?

It comes and goes. Presently I'm happily browsing through alt.binaries.fine-art (pnews.internode.on.net).

brendan. writes...

ditch it in favour of something else

I just tried Opera's newsreader - working fine.

I've never had a problem with OE+Internode before - now it won't work with news.internode.on.net on two different computers - and this is not a timeout issue.

Strange.

I do wonder whether Internode people are doing some tinkering right now and that this might have upset Outlook Express.

UPDATE: Working OK with Outlook Express now - no changes at my end.
But I still can't post messages using pnews.internode.on.net - can anyone else?

Q: What are the costs for using the service? Premium usenet services have monthly fees!
A: The service is available to all Internode customers at no extra cost, representing a substantial monthly cost saving for those customers currently paying subscription fees for premium news server access.

Is this some sort of sick joke? *_*

/falls off chair

I generally only look a couple of text based groups and use Thunderbird as my mail & news client.

There seems to be a date sorting issue when you group by thread. First I sort by date then click on sort by thread (on the current news server) and it all works beautifully for me.

With this new one, doing the same thing certainly groups things in to threads, but the date sort seems to be lost?

All logic points to my news client being the problem, but there is nothing I can see that I am doing incorrectly? Is it a MMDD .v. DDMM issue on the server side perhaps?

I tried to download some files (~1.2 days old) and the completion rate for that set was 0. But it's early days :)

Assuming this news server delivers as promised, I just want to say: well done Internode, you deserve high praise for innovation.

cable99 writes...

I do wonder whether Internode people are doing some tinkering right now and that this might have upset Outlook Express.

I think that this is a safe guess at the moment - we're still tweaking settings.

Simon

completion will be screwy atm....

I changed my priorities from grabbing everything to getting up to date.
once everything is upto date it will start streaming normally and happily
and with a good completion rate.

Kingsley

and I thought BT put a dent in my HDD space!

if you're a fan of image binaries, there is a cool little reader called Picture Patrol that works quite nicely.

www.brainchild.nl/picturepatrol/en

The nice thing is they on't spam you after you register, theres no ads etc, just a solid little program that is good at getting pics.

(and it's Windows, Max OS 9, and Mac OS X )

To anyone concerned; Panic who develop Unison are happily working with me to resolve the problem with the group postings not being downloaded if it thinks there is nothing to download.

The question I have is why can't I access the news server when outside the Internode network? I'm still an Internode customer just not at home :-)

Wouldn't it make sense to require authentication when accessing the news server from outside the network thus still allowing access to Internode customers? After all, this now happens with email at Internode (I think it does - I use someone else for my email).

if there wasnt such a thing as binary groups, it would make perfect sense to do that....

spunkarooney writes...

The question I have is why can't I access the news server when outside the Internode network? I'm still an Internode customer just not at home :-)

Because it's only ecominal to offer the service free to customers when the traffic transverses across the Internode network, i.e. the traffic is actually going all the way from California to your home via Internode transit (And no other 3rd parties) - if it wasn't for these private links Internode had to the west coast of USA, this service would not had been possible. (Unless it was an optional extra fee)

btw has anyone noticed the differance in the last half hour...

like all groups existing and being up to date?

Kingsley writes...

btw has anyone noticed the differance in the last half hour...

like all groups existing and being up to date?

I've noticed that the problem I was having a few pages pack with Unison (and what Simon touched on) now seems to be resolved.

Kingsley writes...

btw has anyone noticed the differance in the last half hour...

like all groups existing and being up to date?

I just retried the files from before, and they are there now (completion seems to be fine so far).

Lovely work :)

zac writes...
par example alt.*something*

Suggest you edit that - quick smart. It (the list, or examples) are not for public release (nor is any of the blocked content really suitable for discussion on WP).

kako writes...

... (no, not the porn, tards)

Then you're really missing out... ;o)

Came to my PC this morning, fired up Opera's News Reader and now I'm watching all my groups fill up (9500+ unread messages). This is gold.

// Edit: there is actually over 100,000 messages. =)

If people expect this to be a replacement for a paid service such as newshosting, you are going to be sorely disappointed (cue Internode fanboy whinging).

It is a free service to Internode customers - as such you get what you pay for. Binary retention of 13days is not premium - standard these days is around 30 days minimum.

The amount of data needed however to retain 30days+ of binary groups would be immense - I would not be surprised if Internode never went over the current 13days quoted.

It is a nice little service, but to me is in no way premium (as I already pay for Newshosting and can compare).

AJFox writes...

If people expect this to be a replacement for a paid service such as newshosting, you are going to be sorely disappointed (cue Internode fanboy whinging).

Did you bother to read the FAQ? This is a replacement for a paid premium service, such as newshosting, because it is! a preimum service, for free - with wholesale access to supernews, a premium and arguably very good service.

It is a free service to Internode customers - as such you get what you pay for. Binary retention of 13days is not premium - standard these days is around 30 days minimum.

I'm seeing some a lot of binaries with retentions upwards of 100+ days, most are 20-30 or higher.

It is a nice little service, but to me is in no way premium (as I already pay for Newshosting and can compare).

You may want to read the FAQ before you get pie on your keyboard.

@AJFox, a complete news service - as this is - is a first for any Australian ISP. 13 days retention is very acceptable for binaries under such conditions. If one is a regular internet user then typically they will be speedy in grabbing new content.

From my limited experience so far, this new service is awesome, and Internode deserves nothing but good words for achieving something no other ISP has seen fit to tackle. In fact they have tended to go the other way, ditching the binaries, or even the news server completely. And from what I've read, the US ISPs are about as bad as the Australian ISPs in this regard - and they don't have to transport the data half way across the planet either.

I'm certainly no 'fanboi' adept in lavishing praise on Internode, but they really really deserve it in this instance.

Simon,

I have to say your team is impressive.. you only barely get a system out of beta testing and you have a new one! or a new release about huge network expansion! It's great to see someone in the industry really getting into it! and not just sitting back and wait for other people to do the work!

I hope the people complaining about things don't get you down to much! Although I don't currently have a need for news groups I can see how some people do. I look forward to seeing what other innovations your team can come up with (fingers crossed on iBurst integration) Would also be nice to see how your Video over IP is going.

You guys never cease to amaze me :) top work on the news server

brendan. writes...

can anyone recommend a good nntp (news) client? Thunderbird is handy for a few things, news reading isn't actually one of them..

IMHO Agent is the best reader for reading. Some of the coolest things are customisable reply messages and tree like thread navigation. Free Agent is a scaled down version of Agent which is um.. free :)

www.forteinc.com/agent/index.php

PS: Agent is not really good with .binaries groups, it's just painfully manual.
PPS: For .binaries.images try News rover, or Nomad News.

AJFox writes...
It is a free service to Internode customers - as such you get what you pay for. Binary retention of 13days is not premium - standard these days is around 30 days minimum.

Where do you get '13' from? -- it's not in the FAQ.. irrc, it was an 'estimate' - not the expected actual retention when the news service rolls out of beta (for the record, the retention seems to be well above that thus far).

The service has just gone live and it has to 'catch up' a massive amount of data.. you might find you've been a bit premature in your comment imho.

Michael P writes...

Because it's only ecominal to offer the service free to customers when the traffic transverses across the Internode network

But why do you have to be on the network -- I can see why you have to be a customer.

Michael

Michael Murray writes...

But why do you have to be on the network -- I can see why you have to be a customer.

For example:

If you're at work on a Telstra connected service then it costs us quite a bit to deliver the News from our server in Adelaide to you.

Michael Murray writes...

But why do you have to be on the network

One example - let's say a customer accesses the premium news server from a bigpong cable connection. They download at 5mbps and the data has to come through an incredibly expensive link which Internode pay for entirely (and which Telstra then charge the cable customer to access also). Internode don't make any money out of the transfer and it's not counted in the customer's download quota so no cost is recovered that way, and Internode have to pay for both the data from the upstream news server and the data to Telstra.

I haven't tried it yet but will be sure to do so. The radio and this alone are great additions that really need more advertisting. I hate people thinking Telstra are the only option when there are companies such as Internode with such a personal knowledge of what the customer wants. Very impressive thanks.

Kingsley writes...

if there wasnt such a thing as binary groups, it would make perfect sense to do that....

I am new to this whole scene so can I ask what that actually means?

Offline writes...

I am new to this whole scene so can I ask what that actually means?

The so-called "binary groups" in usenet are the groups that tend to have messages with attachments such as images, sound files, movie files, etc. included. As a result the messages in those groups can have very large amounts of data. Matthew and Queeg both stated why the large amount of data is not a good thing to make available for access via certain other carriers.

That makes total sense then, it is great that we (customers) get it for free so I can see the point there. Why give away something that costs a lot of money? Wise move.

Hopefully I can get the bulk of data from this service now and just use an account on the best usenet service in the world (giganews) for the missing bits.

have to say interesting choice simon I expected it to be scraped (nodes news server) or just left as was rather than beefed up =)

Thanks Queeg and Mathew. I didn't realise that in the situation you describe Telstra would charge both internode and the user. I guess it shouldn't come as a great suprise that they would charge in both directions!

Michael

What speeds are ADSL2 customers getting? Better than from NewsHosting etc?

Spero D. writes...

What speeds are ADSL2 customers getting? Better than from NewsHosting etc?

I get about 100kB/s on each thread.

Simon Hackett writes...

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering? I'd love to think we're the first to do it, but I really don't know. I just can't think of anyone else who is, right now...

Unless iPrimus have done something since I stopped using their dialup over a year and a bit ago, their newsfeed was an exact copy of what Primus Canada has.

I'm not sure how 'US grade' can be defined but it was pretty good, I never came across any groups that people said existed and didn't.

edit: does/did carry binaries, time from post being submitted to appearing on google groups was low too.

This looks very good Internode.

I decided to pick a group, alt.binaries.cd.image.games, and it's great to see what appears to be 100% completion back to the 26th December in this group.

I did notice a couple of popular groups (albeit very large ones) missing like alt.binaries.cd.image, yet the .d discussion group is there. So my question is: was alt.binaries.cd.image group omitted because maybe you had a article limit filter on large groups, or was this group for some reason on the clueless government ban list and omitted (hahaha if you know usenet you'll know what i'm laughing at after seeing available groups;) , or is it a case of simply requesting to have a group be added if it doesn't appear on this list.

Impressive looking service so far Node. I may, after all these years, get to save myself $20 a month by not having to subscribe to a US news provider.

alt.binaries.cd.image is there with 898986 posts

Just a quick note to say that my experience with pnews tonight has been terrific.

Response time to pick up the body of a message is about 1.5s (cf news.internode.on.net where it is 0.5s) but other than that, all is brilliant.

Huge library of newsgroups, with massive backdating and all working fine.

Why go elsewhere?

(PS the hassles last night have all gone away now that the "massive" download and the settling in has all been done. My inability to upload has been resolved (no action taken at my end) and my client, Outlook Express, is working sweetly despite the aversion that some people have to anything MS!)

Thanks node! I'm not normally a big rap for so-called value-added services but a free, premium newserver is unheard of and will certainly get plenty of use here at least. I'm sure i'm not the only one that will be saving a few $$ a month in premium NS fees.

Cheers.

pnews is superb - thank you Internode.

I am using Thunderbird as a news client,I may change but it works.

GrabIt for me, and there goes all my quota lol

Kingsley writes...

alt.binaries.cd.image is there with 898986 posts

Sweet, found it. Had to refresh my group list for some reason.

Runey writes...

I decided to pick a group, alt.binaries.cd.image.games, and it's great to see what appears to be 100% completion back to the 26th December in this group.

I tried to download some 9.2 day old files in another group, and they weren't on the server. I didn't download all the headers to see what the retention was exactly. Will be interesting to what it 'settles' at after a few weeks.

catlover writes...

I tried to download some 9.2 day old files in another group, and they weren't on the server.

You HAVE actually read the announcement about how the server works, right?

FAQ writes ...
Q: I access a new group and it says there are no postings in it, but I know there are. What is wrong?

A: Our system commences the download of the contents of a newsgroup once the first Internode customer accesses that group. So if you are the first person to access a given group, our server then starts downloading the article data, immediately, from the USA.

All you should do if the group appears empty when you start accessing that group is... come back later!

Our server will download the entire article set for that newsgroup - if you visit the group again over time you will see the article count steadily rise until the group is completely populated, and it will then stay that way.

Matthew Moyle-Croft writes...

If you're at work on a Telstra connected service then it costs us quite a bit to deliver the News from our server in Adelaide to you.

Then why not just block access to the binaries groups from outside the Internode network?

You already provide access to email from outside the network and that allows for large attachments to be delivered to off-net Internode customers so I don't see why the newsgroups should be any different.

In the age of laptops and wireless connections the current set-up means that I have one news provider for when I'm on the Internode network and have to have another for when I'm roaming somewhere else.

spunkarooney writes...

Then why not just block access to the binaries groups from outside the Internode network?

Do you think that would be easy to do?

In the age of laptops and wireless connections the current set-up means that I have one news provider for when I'm on the Internode network and have to have another for when I'm roaming somewhere else.

WOW ... you have such a hard life!

The streaming radio and ftp mirror aren't available outside of the Internode network either, for much the same reason(s) I would imagine.

If you're outside the internode network, just use google groups (or similar). Simple.

Jaguar writes...

If you're outside the internode network, just use google groups (or similar). Simple.

Yes, if you only want [or need] text based groups, then there are plenty of [free] public servers which are still pretty good!

JustSomeGuy writes...

You HAVE actually read the announcement about how the server works, right?

Thank you for that enlightening reply.

To quote kingsley:
"btw has anyone noticed the differance in the last half hour...

like all groups existing and being up to date?"

Perhaps I misunderstood this statement. But that aside, I believe I tried to download the files last night too, which would act as a trigger.

In any event, I should note that my post was not a complaint.

.

I don't know, I took that as meaning getting up to date with current/new posts, rather than trying to backfill all of the older ones.

Kingsley writes...
completion will be screwy atm....

I changed my priorities from grabbing everything to getting up to date.

HI All,
Just to add a 'me too' post to this thread - can I just say that the new news-server ROCKS.

Nothing like a decent feed and the benefits of utilising the full amount of bandwidth available to retrieve messages.

I was previously using Individual.net - seems now I can save my 10 Euro/yr :)

Cheers,

Paul.

I'm getting asked for a username and password. Is something broken?

Russell writes...

I'm getting asked for a username and password. Is something broken?

You are probably exceeding the connection limit (8).

I just hope this doesn't end up getting dropped at the end of this year... same as the flatrate plans last year....

I can see this being another "not economical (we've made enough new customers)we have to drop it" product... I hope not...

I can see this being another "not economical (we've made enough new customers)we have to drop it" product... I hope not...

There are so many flaws with this that I don't even know where to begin.

1) Flatrate had been around since the end of 2002. It was hardly as you describe above.

2) Flatrate wasn't used to sucker in new customers and then pull the plug on them. One of the biggest reasons that Flatrate got removed was that it WASN'T attacting new customers.

3) There have been some serious investments made in this new service, I doubt that they'll be pulling the plug on it anytime soon.

Yay node! Been wanting to try one of these "premium" services for a long time.. and it's free!

This is why I stick around. :D

FLICK writes...

I just hope this doesn't end up getting dropped at the end of this year... same as the flatrate plans last year....

You have a leak in your glass. It seems that you think its half empty.

I'm having real fun with this. The only problem I'm having is my reader was getting stuck at reporting 65536 messages unread in some of the groups. Time to upgrade my reader to something that uses a long integer for that field I think... :)

FLICK writes...

I just hope this doesn't end up getting dropped at the end of this year... same as the flatrate plans last year....

Me drops the news server, mirror server, radio streams, and games network,

woops I just did myself out of a job....

Michael P writes...

You are probably exceeding the connection limit (8).

I've just been out for the past hour or so and my news reader was closed, came back to the same issue. No, there is only one socket connected at the time (sockstat -4).

Any ideas?

Russell writes...

Any ideas?

Has it been doing that the whole time, or did you ever have it working before this?

Which news reader are you using?

JustSomeGuy writes...

Has it been doing that the whole time, or did you ever have it working before this?

It's been working well up unitl this morning after I'd been using it for thirty or so minutes... it then just started asking for authentication.

I'm using slrn and I tried Opera's News Reader. Both no go.

Russell writes...

I'm using slrn and I tried Opera's News Reader. Both no go.

You definitely don't have a proxy enabled anywhere?

JustSomeGuy writes...

You definitely don't have a proxy enabled anywhere?

No. I can connect to the server, it gets some groups but asks for authentication.

// Edit: It's all fixed. Thanks, Kingsley. =)

hopefully that is fixed now.

Fairly new newsgroup user here.

I use grabit and subscribe to their search and newsgroup service, so I can do a search for what I want, then just right click the files and download them. Saves me having to download hundreds of megabytes of headers for the larger groups (or am I doing something wrong for an initial update to be 300 MB??).

When trying to use the Internode server after doing a GrabIt search and right clicking an article I get "article not found". However if I actually subscribe to the group that contains the article I can download it okay.

Can anyone say if this is likely a GrabIt or Internode problem??

im guessing grabit.

Very nice, you lucky Node buggers... For me Usenet is 95% of my monthly downloads. Unfortunately looking at Node plans I get 10GB more then the HOME-1500-Elite (80GB) for $45 cheaper.

Ah well, I can't complain for a total of just under $100 I get 90-100GB of Usenet per month.

I’d be interested in some figures on the amount of data that server sends / receives every day.

Tankc4 writes...

I use grabit

As do I

Saves me having to download hundreds of megabytes of headers for the larger groups

www.binsearch.info

Check that out I have been using since I started a few months ago.

If anyone is interested Im currently sitting at home testing downloads of the pnews server on ADSL2+ at 800Kbytes a sec.

Hey, now I know why "df -B T" is a useful command line option to df!

i rather like to use df -h

That works even better Kingsley!

Danielneo19 writes...

As do I

www.binsearch.info

Check that out I have been using since I started a few months ago.

Cool site, thanks. But can you get that working with GrabIt and Internode's newsgroups?

Tankc4 writes...

Cool site, thanks. But can you get that working with GrabIt and Internode's newsgroups?

Of course you can.

Just generate the NZB file and then load it in grabit [with the Internode server configured] and you're away!

JustSomeGuy writes...

Just generate the NZB file and then load it in grabit [with the Internode server configured] and you're away!

I know that's what should happen, but I keep on getting "article not found" when I try...

How fast does it propagate?

Tankc4 writes...

I know that's what should happen, but I keep on getting "article not found" when I try...

Then they probably haven't made their way onto the Internode server yet.

JustSomeGuy writes...

Then they probably haven't made their way onto the Internode server yet.

Exactly this system is working perfectly for me and a friend. Just be patient or get something more popular.

I tried it out [using Newsbin though] and it worked fine!

Kudos to Internode for providing Premium Usenet.

Like Kingsley, I can get at home 800 KB per second (8 connections x 100k rate limit). But elsewhere (eg. node ftp) I can get 1900 KB per second.

Any chance of Internode increasing the limit from 800 KB to 2000 KB or so, to let people on ADSL2+ run at full speed?

I don't think that the want to blow the server up in its first week of testing! ;)

getting newsgroups isn't the most effecient way to download things..it is much easier to get 1 1gig file then 10000 256k files. Im also sure it is much faster then if you were to download it from anywhere else.

Kingsley

Kingsley writes...

If anyone is interested Im currently sitting at home testing downloads of the pnews server on ADSL2+ at 800Kbytes a sec.

I've done a bit of testing and it isnt looking very good in the particular group I'm interested in, is node just not downloading anything in the binaries groups?

certainly isnt comparable to supernews yet...

Every binaries group I've look at has been full.

Could someone tell me a file that is already on internode's servers that I should be able to download directly using GrabIt search then please?

I subscribe to Astraweb using Newsbin Pro. Am I correct in assuming I can add the Internode server to access groups concurrently with Astraweb?

Yes you can.

JustSomeGuy writes...

Yes you can.

Thanks, seems to work although I had to remember to only access headers from one server. Astraweb don't charge for headers anyway :-)
Thanks Internode, this looks promising.

Bob B writes...

Astraweb don't charge for headers anyway :-)

Still counts towards your Internode limit though, so there's probably not much difference?

speed.

JustSomeGuy writes...

Still counts towards your Internode limit though, so there's probably not much difference?

As Kingsley said, speed. I was downloading double the headers required until I realised what was happening. What I meant by "don't charge" was Astraweb don't include them in your usage. I've set Internode's server as the slave until I can be certain it can supply every header with a retention of at least 25 days, this is what Astraweb guarantee. Until then I have Internode's server set as first priority to collect message bodies.

Can anyone recommend a good linux news reader and binary downloader?

Bob B writes...

As Kingsley said, speed. I was downloading double the headers required until I realised what was happening.

Yeah ... I wasn't suggesting that you used both.

What I meant by "don't charge" was Astraweb don't include them in your usage.

I know.

I've set Internode's server as the slave until I can be certain it can supply every header with a retention of at least 25 days, this is what Astraweb guarantee.

Fair enough.

As long as you downloaded the header list(s) from the Internode server at least every couple of weeks, then even even if the files weren't still on the [Node] server, [however many days later] then it would still try Astraweb sever as a backup, wouldn't it?

JustSomeGuy writes...

As long as you downloaded the header list(s) from the Internode server at least every couple of weeks,

But at this point I have no guarantee all of the headers are there, it is beta after all.

... it would still try Astraweb server as a backup, wouldn't it?

Yes. You can set the order of the servers to download message bodies. If one fails the next in line tries and so on.

Here's some preliminary feedback using Newsbin Pro V4.32.
The Newsbin FAQ says some NNTP servers won't work as slaves. Internodes works fine as a slave and I have it set as the first server to check for message bodies. I downloaded 13 file segments and all but three of them came from Internode's server. Both servers are set to four connections and I got max speed.
Looking good :-)

Bob B writes...

Here's some preliminary feedback using Newsbin Pro V4.32.

You're not using v5 yet?

JustSomeGuy writes...

You're not using v5 yet?

V5 is a complete rewrite which means a complete re-learning effort on my part. I only just learnt how to use this one :-) Besides V5 is still a work in progress, it doesn't even have the ability to send posts yet, oddly enough. The only real advantage I see is it uses less memory for headers but if Nodes server works out the money I save when I drop Astraweb I can use on something like Newzbin and bypass headers altogether.

Bob B writes...

V5 is a complete rewrite which means a complete re-learning effort on my part.

I just upgraded last night, and it's pretty straight forward. ;)

You can install [and run] it alongside v4, so it doesn't have to replace it. You should at least have a look! ;)

JustSomeGuy writes...

I just upgraded last night, and it's pretty straight forward. ;)

Maybe but at my age (56) I look for the easy way if possible. If it ain't broke don't fix it :-)

So you're still running Windows 3.1 then I take it? ;)

Windows 3.1 was broke, though. :p

Flickers writes...

Windows 3.1 was broke, though. :p

No ... it's probably still the most stable OS they've managed to create :P

You can install [and run] it alongside v4, so it doesn't have to replace it. You should at least have a look! ;)

I might try it then if they are completely independent.

Bob B writes...

I might try it then if they are completely independent.

They are, just make sure you read the installation options properly.

You can either import all your settings and overwrite v4, or install v5 seperately and use it as a completly independant program.

Darn, no alt.binaries.smallfurryanimals

Edit: UNISON errr "rocks"!

I prefer 4.32 over 5 as well.

The interface is much nicer IMO.

Phantom Clogger writes...
Darn, no alt.binaries.smallfurryanimals

.. darn, no quota left. :)

Simon (and Kingsley), you've just screwed a perfectly healthy low quota habit.. into a slightly less healthy higher usage habit. Thanks chaps. ;-)

Just letting you all know Im just doing some tweaking that requires me to shut the news server down for an hour...

It will be back shortly

Kingsley

haakon of the shadows writes...

Can anyone recommend a good linux news reader and binary downloader?

If you want a binary downloader and you'll be using .nzb files I recommend nzbperl from noisybox.net/computers/nzbperl

If headers are counting towards your Node download quota then get an account at Newzbin, it's better then the free ones for so many reasons.

Like Kingsley, I can get at home 800 KB per second (8 connections x 100k rate limit). But elsewhere (eg. node ftp) I can get 1900 KB per second.

Any chance of Internode increasing the limit from 800 KB to 2000 KB or so, to let people on ADSL2+ run at full speed?

800 Kb is great since it is free. That being said, wouldn't you get over that with NewsHosting as they don't limit your download speed per thead?

NewRover is my client of choice...every feature imaginable, interface is a bit ugly and might be scary for new users.

Damien

its back now.

Are you sure its capped @ 100K per connection? Im on ADSL2+ now and pulling in 2.6MB/sec, and about 1.8MB on average with 8 connections..probably dont need that many :)

Damien

Damien that is excellent news. (Can't wait until the St Marys Exchange is enabled so I can churn over :) )

who said anything about a 100k rate limit.......

I know I didn't

Just an assumption from post above :)

Fearme writes...

Are you sure its capped @ 100K per connection?

I'm sure it isn't :)

I think im even more sure :)

Kingsley

are we all hapy with how it is performing?

Kingsley writes...

are we all hapy with how it is performing?

I would think the lack of noise on this post, would be a good sign ;-)

Kingsley writes...

are we all hapy with how it is performing?

Are you asking that question holding a whip in one hand :P

I haven't delved into newgroups in the past, but after reading the last 10 odd pages, this service is a value-add I'm certain I'll make use of once I get the gist of it. :)

Thunderbird 1 writes...

I haven't delved into newgroups in the past, but after reading the last 10 odd pages, this service is a value-add I'm certain I'll make use of once I get the gist of it. :)

Just jump into your time machine and visit the 1980's/early 1990's - you'll pick up the whole thing quite easily.

And Kingsley, I'm not a binary user myself - but the groups I frequent and post are working exceptionally good, this is proving to be a fantastic service.

I must say that this is an excellent service,was using Astraweb before for binaries but nodes server has all the same binaries and always at full speed

Thumbs up Node

Simon Hackett writes...

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering? I'd love to think we're the first to do it, but I really don't know. I just can't think of anyone else who is, right now...

Before I was with Internode I had an account with Inspired (www.inspired.net.au) They used to offer all users free supernews ports as part of their accounts. We were connecting directly to Supernews though.

Don't know if they still do it.

Seeing as the subject matter is Usenet some might be interested in a free nzb search site. I use BinAge - www.binage.com
I may have just got lucky and managed to strike a time when I could invite myself to register but if you find you can't just whim me as I have three one invite left (for now). All I need is an email address.

Kingsley writes...

are we all hapy with how it is performing?

It's working well here.

I'm a little tooo happy with it's performance. I'm getting over 800KB/s and have downloaded over 2Gb in the past hour, while concurrently hitting Limewire and browsing the web with no noticable degradation on either!

I think this is all a big ploy to get people upgrading their accounts!! ;)

I'm going to blow my quota, and my hard drive in a day or two at this rate.

I'm still waiting for my ADSL2+ to be relocated, but am definitely looking forward to giving this service a good workout.

Thanks everyone who made this possible. It really is excellent.

I remember Simon saying something in another news server thread that people should not take out any long term premium news service contracts...

I didn't know what to expect, but could not have asked for more than this.

(apart from maybe non-shaped news data, even if it does count toward usage)

Got a Error from the Pnews Server

550 Login Failed - 1 already 9/8 users connected sorry, setting G_Con_PerIP

What does this mean?

Shibster writes...

550 Login Failed - 1 already 9/8 users connected sorry, setting G_Con_PerIP

It means you've already exceeded the 8 connection limit.

But "Grab It" the newsreader i use doesnt have the option for more than 8 connections?

Does it let you wind the connection limit *down*?

It might be that its actually not quite keeping to the 8 that it may think it is (potentially due to some connections taking a while to terminate fully after they're done with)

Its to technical for me.....I just needed a stanard newsreader..... I think it is the Program yes........

Anyone know any GOOD news readers out there?

Shibster writes...

Linux Iso's .....

Doesn't Node have these on their unmetered ftp mirrors?
mirror.internode.on.net

NewsBin
NewsLeecher

both good

Wow... I had been limiting GrabIt to 4 sessions.... upped it to the maximum 8 and my D/L speed hit 1200KB/s

When am I going to get a chance to WATCH all this educational, public domain video! (otherwise known as Pron .. LOL)

Edit... make that 1466KB/s thats the fastest I've seen it hit now. Ohh Kingsley, we are really going to hammer that poor server.

Edit again: 1757KB/s and hovering around the high 1400's to mid 1500's. I'll stop boasting now, surfice to say that both 'node ADSL2+ and the new node news server are performing VERY well. Love it.

Servers going along nicely, getting nice speed (1500KB/s+) with 8 threads.

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

... some of it should be banned

If you are serious then this isn't the place to be asking for bans. Read the last Q&A in the FAQ - forum-replies.cfm?t=452626
Contact your local MP or a government agency but don't ask me which one.

kako writes...

... I'm having fun downloading ...

Yeah they gives us a 33% download quota increase one month and a great way to use it all up the next :D

Bob B writes...

or a government agency but don't ask me which one.

ACMA - www.acma.gov.au/ACMAINTE...7632:pc=PC_90103

workin like a charm here, no troubles at all :)

as soon as this server is 'fully operational', i'll ditch the current, paid for, one :p

thanks 'node.

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

there are some weird things out there as i found when browsing ....... some of it should be banned
I agree that it'd be nice if Internode was proactive in regard to blocking some newsgroups, some binary newsgroups in particular. There's a lot of stuff that just shouldn't be seen by anyone.

Matthew Moyle-Croft writes...

ACMA

Thanks, a handy one to bookmark.

sickNtired writes...

I agree that it'd be nice if Internode was proactive in regard to blocking some newsgroups, some binary newsgroups in particular. There's a lot of stuff that just shouldn't be seen by anyone.

There is a correct path here, for very good legal reasons.

The path is a direct complaint to ACMA, who then act on it and (if appropriate) update the blocklist they distribute to ISP's.

Its essential it works this way, to avoid any individual ISP being liable for becoming a content editor, not just an information carrier. When you make editorial decisions, you start generating a liability argument for implicitly supporting what you don't block, and it gets really dangerous, really fast, if you 'miss' something. And not 'missing' something would involve reviewing terabytes of content per day. Nope, thats not smart.

The ACMA process is part of the law of the land - specifically the Broadcasting Services Acs (BSA) and its related IIA-authored binding ISP codes of conduct.

Check the ACMA site, under Internet, and you'll see the content hosting / ISP provisions of the BSA and the associated industry code explained in detail.

If we act in accordance with legal direction from ACMA under those codes, we, the ISP, are legally protected from liability in the process of applying the content blocks concerned.

So please, sincerely - found a nasty newsgroup? Report it to ACMA, which means it will be blocked by *all* Australian ISP's (if its genuinely a net nasty - which is up to them to decide). Then, also, its not blocked just by Internode alone, but by all complying ISP's in Australia with usenet news feeds.

(This is very much like the process when someone complains that the conduct of one of our customers is breaking the law - the way to handle that is to go to the police - sincerely - and the police then gather data, again using aspects of the law that protect the ISP as an carriage service provider, regardless of the ultimate outcome of the investigation; Innocent or guilty is NEVER a decision an ISP can, or should, take - its a decision for the law, the courts, and the police. Correctly so).

Simon

sickNtired writes...

it'd be nice if Internode was proactive in regard to blocking some newsgroups,

I don't, it's not their responsibility as outlined in the FAQ noted earlier. We can't have everyone being a censor otherwise we won't have an Internet.

There's a lot of stuff that just shouldn't be seen by anyone.

Don't look.

fnkychkn writes...

as soon as this server is 'fully operational', i'll ditch the current, paid for, one :p

I was thinking the same thing but as I only pay for the content I need and there is no time limit I might hang onto it as insurance if one goes down for maintenance or whatever. I just noticed my reader can be configured to turn any server on or off at will.

i guess that some people might not find beastality offensive but mp3's they do, most ISP's would only follow the AMCA to cover their asses and nothing else. I would think that most people would not miss that binary if it went. I guees it you oppinion on what and what not should be there.

Cheers

How quickly after a file is uploaded does it appear on Nodes News Server?

I just downloaded a 750MB file in about half an hour.

I really can't continue this... I'll use my quota up in the first week.

*goes to trash Unison*

Spero D. writes...

How quickly after a file is uploaded does it appear on Nodes News Server?

I sent three text based and they appeared immediately. Can't comment as to binaries though it shouldn't make any difference.

Simon Hackett writes...

There is a correct path here, for very good legal reasons.

OK. I appreciate that there's more to it than simply blocking the obvious as I'd suggested.

Hey Simon, just a question, whats its costing for node to provide something like this to us? Compared to just giving us a few more gigabytes of download a month, is this more cheaper or more expensive? They only reason i could possibly see it being cheaper as all the data is going via internode's private network (once its on the news server), but also does it cost much to get the news feed for the server?

Its just a question, the answers most likely highly complex, i was just curious to the costs of it thats all.

swarve writes...

but also does it cost much to get the news feed for the server?

If you read the FAQ, you'll read that they have direct, wholesale access to the Supernews server farm.

So the complete newsfeed is sent over Internode links or a direct Ethernet connection.

It would be because of this such setup that it allows to be economically posible to offer this service to customers for free.

i wish they would kill the DL mirror and give us unlim usenet acces.... it wont happen im lifetime tho

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

it wont happen im lifetime tho

And why should it? Apart from all the free content it hosts available for download - it would pretty much kick all the *Nix users out there in the nuts, directly.

Not having the download mirror would mean no more apt, portage, yum, or whatever management system us *Nix users and if the mirror was to be replaced with pure unmetered Usenet access I'll be one unhappy camper.

The way it works now is perfect.

usenet is much better than a DL mirror

*sigh*

I'm not even going to bother wasting my energy!

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

usenet is much better than a DL mirror

One sided views are so fantastic. So much better than diversity, and accepting that people have different needs.

JustSomeGuy writes...

*sigh*

I'm not even going to bother wasting my energy!

You just did :)

like i said it will never happen but i see usenet as a bigger and better resource

swarve writes...

whats its costing for node to provide something like this to us?

It's about twice as expensive as ordinary IP traffic when you add up the costs.

As long as we deliver at least two times as much traffic to customers as we bring into the country it's a win.

At the moment we're not seeing this so we're throwing money at it.

Enjoy.

jsl

John Lindsay writes...

As long as we deliver at least two times as much traffic to customers as we bring into the country it's a win.


show people how to use the inary news groups then you'll see some traffic.

I never bother too much with newsgroups other than the vendor news servers like Microsoft, and with every man and their dog blogging coupled with google I seem to find what I need fairly quickly, other than that I see them going the way of gopher etc.

John Lindsay writes...

At the moment we're not seeing this so we're throwing money at it.

I'm not surprised. I've been using Usenet since long before the WWW and only just stumbled onto the announcement of this beta server here on WP. You won't find many customers using it if they aren't aware of it :-)

You won't find many customers using it if they aren't aware of it :-)

You just gave yourself the answer.

I've been using Usenet since long before the WWW and only just stumbled onto the announcement of this beta server here on WP

Bob B writes...

I've been using Usenet since long before the WWW and only just stumbled onto the announcement of this beta server here on WP.

That is because it a beta test mate. Its only just been switched on, so of course you've only just stumbled across it. It wasn't here a week ago :)

Very surprised to see this offered. I have used the Usenet for years and have had to pay to get a decent service. If people use the service then they will discover a wealth of information, discussions and files. Well done Internode. I will be looking for a new provider in the next few months (new house) and I will most certainly shortlist the Node.

JustSomeGuy writes...

You just gave yourself the answer.

On the contrary. My point is I'm an easy sell because of my experience with Usenet, more so that I know what it is and it's potential and the fact I frequent these forums. Compare that with the average Joe who doesn't know what a news group is or how to access them.
Frankly I'm surprised of this development with a news server. It wasn't that long ago when the powers that be were saying that Usenet was a waste of resources and extremely inefficient in it's dissemination of data. Maybe I don't see the big picture where this may be the start of a local premium server available to all and sundry, at a price :-)

Simon Hackett writes...

That is because it a beta test mate.

Well 'mate', look up a few threads and ask JL what he means by the "throwing money at it" statement. That's what prompted my response.

Bob B writes...

That's what prompted my response.

Well you obviously misunderstood what he was saying!

John Lindsay writes...

At the moment we're not seeing this so we're throwing money at it.


Is there likely to be an advisory (I did check) about it, not everyone reads whirlpool.

pc9630 writes...

Is there likely to be an advisory (I did check) about it, not everyone reads whirlpool.

It will no doubt get a mention in the next Internode bulliten, after it goes into full production.

Forgive me for asking, what the hell is the point of this? newsgroups or downloading files? I think I'm missing the point.

Transending writes...

newsgroups or downloading files?

One, or the other, or both.

I think I'm missing the point.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet

I can't find the group alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows

Is it just me, or is this group missing?

I can see it fine. You might want to try just updating your groups list.

JustSomeGuy writes...

Well you obviously misunderstood what he was saying!

Obviously.

JustSomeGuy writes...

I can see it fine. You might want to try just updating your groups list.

Actually, I can't see it myself. And I just updated the list off pnews. Could it be that you are seeing it from a list drawn from a different server?

Flickers writes...

Could it be that you are seeing it from a list drawn from a different server?

He is. It's on Astraweb but not on Nodes.

Flickers writes...

Actually, I can't see it myself. And I just updated the list off pnews. Could it be that you are seeing it from a list drawn from a different server?

I too still cannot see it, and I have refreshed the list from the server.

Flickers writes...

Could it be that you are seeing it from a list drawn from a different server?

Internode is the only server which I've got configured.

EDIT - www.users.on.net/~nat_to...ol/talkshows.jpg

Bob B writes...

ask JL what he means by the "throwing money at it"

It's Simon's money mate.

What I mean by "throwing money at it" is that it's currently costing us more than normal traffic so by rights we should be charging a premium for it. We expect that in full production it will break even or even show a small profit.

You do realise we have been running a usenet server since forever. This new server is a test of taking premium quality news direct from the USA, buffering it and serving it to customers in Australia.

The old server is still running and serving news to everyone who doesn't read Whirlpool. i.e. 95% of our usenet users.

We've taken the best usenet feed we can get to for a sane cost and provided it to you, our customers, at no extra charge.

Right now you, the Whirlpool users, are giving it a good shakedown. You've managed to break it several different ways while Kingsley and the server gods got the settings right. It looks like it's close to baked now. :-)

We think this is pretty cool.

jsl

John Lindsay writes...

We think this is pretty cool

as do most of us :D i might give it a good bashing seeing as i have 10GB to use in 7 days :)

John Lindsay writes...

Right now you, the Whirlpool users, are giving it a good shakedown. You've managed to break it several different ways while Kingsley and the server gods got the settings right. It looks like it's close to baked now. :-)

We think this is pretty cool.

jsl

Maybe they can look at why manually grabing parts from one of the binaries works but if a nzb file is used all I get is text files?

<=Nick=> writes...

Maybe they can look at why manually grabing parts from one of the binaries works but if a nzb file is used all I get is text files?

I've used a couple of different nzb files so far and they've all worked perfectly.

HINT: You're probably doing something wrong! :P

JustSomeGuy writes...

HINT: You're probably doing something wrong! :P

Not likely because I can use the nzb file perfectly fine on another usenet service...

I've got 20GB to play with. Most of that would have gone to BT in the past but if I can get it off of Usenet I will be happy to. I guess that is the whole point of this, reduce international traffic.

edit - As a newbie to Usenet which forum should I direct any queries I may have? On The Internet?

CronoS writes...

On The Internet?

Yes.

forum-replies.cfm?t=452926

JustSomeGuy writes...

Internode is the only server which I've got configured.

Well that's weird. I can't get it on OE and I'm downloading some files from that group with NewsBin Pro and can't get a connection to Node's server (reports "Temporary Connection Problem") but I can to Astraweb. Must be a server fault somewhere.

EDIT: Logs show 01/09/2006 01:36:09 PROTOCOL=Download Engine, SERVER=Internode, MSG=Newsbin Says - Set Connection Limit Reached. Server: Internode
I'm only using four.
Logs show 01/09/2006 01:50:38 SERVER=Internode, MSG=SendCommand - failed response: 411 no such newsgroup (alt.binaries.multimedia.late-nigh­ t-talkshows)

Never thought I'd see a decent premium news feed in .au. Currently with EasyNews - AU$13 / 30gb or so, from memory.

Thanks 'node :)

.NZBs aren't working great at the moment, but I'll chalk that down to an unpopular group and server load.

time to sign up for newsbinz :P

Tim Smith writes...

.NZBs aren't working great at the moment, but I'll chalk that down to an unpopular group and server load.

see it isnt just me, have you tried manually grabbing the parts to see if it really is a prob with using nzb's?

Just had a look at the group in Outlook Express, and I could grab the parts fine. Weird. Seems to just be .NZBs.

edit: using GrabIt 1.5.3 and NZBs from newzbin.

Tim Smith writes...

Seems to just be .NZBs.

I just tried an nzb in NewsBin Pro and had no problem. FWIW I don't use auto download with them. I double-click an nzb and the headers are loaded then I select them for download.

EDIT: Note that I pull headers from the Astraweb server and the bodies off Node's so maybe Node's server is screwing something up but then again I thought the reader parses nzb's not the server.

Tim Smith writes...

Just had a look at the group in Outlook Express, and I could grab the parts fine. Weird. Seems to just be .NZBs.

edit: using GrabIt 1.5.3 and NZBs from newzbin.

exactly my point, hopefully kingsley or someone else can figure out why this is happening ...

<=Nick=> writes...

exactly my point, hopefully kingsley or someone else can figure out why this is happening ...

Working fine now. Same NZB, 30 minutes later, different client (NewsLeecher over GrabIt.)

Tim Smith writes...

Working fine now. Same NZB, 30 minutes later, different client (NewsLeecher over GrabIt.)

Interesting, maybe it is grabit related, pity newsleecher isnt freeware...

John Lindsay writes...

You do realise we have been running a usenet server since forever. This new server is a test of taking premium quality news direct from the USA, buffering it and serving it to customers in Australia.

I don't mean to throw stones, but what percentage of your userbase do you think will use this service?

Yup just tried newsleecher and it works, I wonder why grabit doesnt...

Thanks Internode Team for continuing to innovate .

Viper6 writes...

I don't mean to throw stones, but what percentage of your userbase do you think will use this service?

if the heavier users start to use this service then it may not matter if node don't get a large percentage of their customers using this. most of the binary users will be after a fair amount of the same data so over time it could turn out to break even since the popular "stuff" would be cached. at least that's how i understand it.

Bob B writes...

SERVER=Internode, MSG=Newsbin Says - Set Connection Limit Reached. Server: Internode
I'm only using four.
Logs show 01/09/2006 01:50:38 SERVER=Internode, MSG=SendCommand - failed response: 411 no such newsgroup (alt.binaries.multimedia.late-nigh­ t-talkshows)

Looks like you still had some open connections somewhere, if they dont close cleanly they take 5min to timeout.

Secondly alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows doesn't exist on 3 servers i checked.

Simon Hackett writes...

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering?

None, Internode then would be the first of its kind providing people a full service to Australians. I am d-e-l-i-g-h-t-e-d

Now, I am waiting for the discussion that we're all pirates by nature and therefore all music and movie binary groups remain switched off. The industry will work on this - sure bet!

Kingsley writes...

Secondly alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows doesn't exist on 3 servers i checked.

If you search for, say, "letterman" on binsearch.info or newzbin, you'll see it exists.

I'm subscribed to Giganews, and the newsgroup exists there. I have downloaded from alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows from Giganews several times in the past.

This is strange... any ideas what might be wrong?

This is the error I get when connecting with Newsbin Pro

01/09/2006 10:13:24 MSG=Processing Server: pnews.internode.on.net, Groups: whatever group I try it doesnt matter

01/09/2006 10:13:24 PROTOCOL= Engine Process, SERVER=pnews.internode.on.net, MSG=Unspecified network error

01/09/2006 10:13:22 SERVER=pnews.internode.on.net, MSG=Error
talking to server: 200 Welcome to Internode News Service

Well done Internode!

Just trying it now. I'm pretty fond of my Giganews account (70 day binary retention), but time will tell.

I know some people who have been considering a paid subscription to Giganews or similar who are on Internode. This should do them nicely. I know of one person who was about to change thier plan up with TPG and subscribe to a US based service. He is probably better off churning to Internode if all goes well with the Beta.

I don't think anyone should be expecting Internode to provide such a service without it counting to download quotas. They have pretty much already added value to your account as it is. I can't think of another way to get high quality complete newsfeeds without an extra monthly subscription. To provide such a service in aust costs.

Again.... well done.

your error message appears to be a welcome message.

what version of newsbin pro u using cause I think it is buggy.

ztank writes...

I'm subscribed to Giganews, and the newsgroup exists there. I have downloaded from alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows from Giganews several times in the past.

It isn't on google groups ether

Newsbin Pro, Version 4.32 Build 4964

Oh looks like I have NBpro v5.0.1 - b5807 here as well ill try install that.

im not getting that at all with 5.02...

what does it say in the logs.

has anyone got aus.* newsgroups downloading on the pnews server?

The server claims the headers are there but when my client (seamonkey/mozilla mail/news) tries downloading from an aus group it doesn't work.

I've got a few other groups in the comp. range subscribed and they work fine.

Tim Smith writes...

Working fine now. Same NZB, 30 minutes later, different client (NewsLeecher over GrabIt.)

nzb's weren't working for me either in Grabit, but do in Newsbin Pro..

I tried to download headers for alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ ­-talkshows in NewsBin Pro, and it failed. I then tried an nzb for this group in Newsbin and it failed. But I loaded the same nzb in NewsLeecher and it started transferring...

NZB's in alt.binaries.tv worked fine using NewsRover v11.1

Mathew McBride writes...

has anyone got aus.* newsgroups downloading on the pnews server?

I've grabbed stuff from a couple of aus.* groups last night, no probs at all, it just may be that you were the first to visit a particualr group.

Ohh and I totally trashed my quota yesterday. Gigabytes of data just flew down the pipe and I went a little crazy. I can see how this is much better being pulled from a local cache than leeched from overseas individually everytime, especially if it takes some traffic away from BT and other P2P sources.

Great work guys.

Just saw front page news on this.

Internode should send us an email about this service.

I never knew it existed until I saw Whirlpool front page.

Great news....

©£ONeST@® writes...

Internode should send us an email about this service.

Internode will do so when its out of being a whirlpool beta test.

The rest of our customer base expect to see a working, supported service. Thats the plan, but its in test right now, to make sure its smooth before we do the official launch.

©£ONeST@® writes...
I never knew it existed until I saw Whirlpool front page.

It's in beta right now - it didn't exist up until a few days ago.

Internode should send us an email about this service.

They will - when it goes live. :)

Consider doing a quick skim through the thread before you post - this has been answered 2 3 times :)

Mathew McBride writes...

has anyone got aus.* newsgroups downloading on the pnews server?

The server claims the headers are there but when my client (seamonkey/mozilla mail/news) tries downloading from an aus group it doesn't work.

I am also having this problem. Sometimes it works ok but it seems a bit hit and miss. I am only having this problem with the aus.* groups.

Fantastic beta testing results so far. Maxed out my connection speeds on this all the time.

Just one little point..... If all the users who subscribe to usenet servers overseas stop downloading from these servers, the bandwidth savings from the USA to Aus will surely help the costs of Internode.

For those who dont understand what i am getting at:-

2000 users pulling the same data from USA = lots of bandwidth
1 cache server pulling the same date = nowhere near as much bandwidth

May these costs savings take us to cheaper plans or higher downloads?

Mr Hackett you are one very good business man!

Over the last few days ive been playing with the aus groups try reseting them all.

This is fantastic news! And I was just about to subscribe to Astraweb too!

(This question probably belongs in another forum, but...) just out of interest, Simon, what newsreader client are you using on your Mac? Does Thunderbird handle the binaries OK? I was thinking about purchasing Unison...

The last few hours I have been getting error messages on nodes news server for binaries
(550 Proxy open failed (corp.supernews.net) (502 no permission for 203.16.214.246

If I access news server directly in USA not a problem

I think you'll find that this is/was Kingsley working on some configuration changes.

Tell us if its still doing that in about an hour - it shouldn't be.

espyrian writes...

Simon, what newsreader client are you using on your Mac?

Thunderbird and Unison (mostly Unison)

Does Thunderbird handle the binaries OK?

It doesn't seem to do multi-part binary handling. Unison is great at it.

I was thinking about purchasing Unison...

I did :)

550 Proxy open failed (corp.supernews.net) (502 no permission for 203.16.214.246)

is fixed now :)

Simon Hackett writes...

Thunderbird and Unison (mostly Unison)

The problem we'll discuessing back on the first few pages with Unison - has it cleared up?

I've talked with Panic, and they can't see any problems with Unison. And it's issuing the exact same commands as Thunderbird does (GROUP, XOVER).

Doing packet traces of both Unison and Thunderbird show they're essentially doing the exact same thing under the hood (Yo!).

My Unison seems to be playing sweet now, so I think it was maybe just a little bug in the news server that Kingsley as since resolved.

Great stuff Internode,

I was not very happy when Internode cancelled the excellent flatrate service, this new news service may keep me on board. Whilst the SOHO 1500 Elite has a low download quota, the saving of US$10 may offset it. May...

I will test the service for next 3 weeks, and if it is up to the same standard of astraweb's service I will cancel that account.

One of the most important statistics will be rertention.

Does anyone know how many days will be retained and what Supernews retention data is?

I just did a search of a popular newsgroup and the retention was only 13.2 days!

I think that the model as described here is good, but ALL will hinge on Retention and speed. So far so good.

paladin writes...

I just did a search of a popular newsgroup and the retention was only 13.2 days!


If messages are going to be cached locally, will this increase the retention rate or will it still mirror the US

Cujo1 writes...

If messages are going to be cached locally, will this increase the retention rate or will it still mirror the US

That depends almost entirely on the size of Internode's servers, and how much of the complete feed they'll actually have to store.

I'm comfortable that the retention is sufficient for the needs of most people, and Supernews was the right technical partner for us for a variety of reasons including their geographic location (such that we could install a gigabit fibre interconnect to their servers directly).

When you frame 13 days retention in a popular (obviously binary) newsgroup, you're not mentioning the article count - which (on groups with 'only' that retention) is typically well over a million articles. Its a tradeoff. Text groups have much larger retentions.

And I don't think anyone is whingeing on the speed front. Read the thread.

Michael P writes...

My Unison seems to be playing sweet now, so I think it was maybe just a little bug in the news server that Kingsley as since resolved.

Yes, Kingsley came up with another approach that solved it at our end. You might like to tell the Unison folks (since you contacted them already) that its ok now anyway.

Mathew McBride writes...

has anyone got aus.* newsgroups downloading on the pnews server?

The server claims the headers are there but when my client (seamonkey/mozilla mail/news) tries downloading from an aus group it doesn't work.


I'm experiencing the same thing with Thunderbird, only the aus.* groups, the others work ok.

P.J.C writes...

I'm experiencing the same thing with Thunderbird, only the aus.* groups, the others work ok.

forum-replies.cfm?t=4526...=16&u=13754#r303

i too was seeing wierdness with the aus groups, I had them working a little differently,
they arnt now. so things should be fixed.

I'm late seeing this thread and changing my newsreader to the new server, but I'm VERY pleased by this addition - my USENET use is limited but the groups I read tend to have very long threads and branching discussions which will be easier to manage now. BTW it's working very well in MT-Newswatcher (the best free Mac news app).

Hey,
Is there any chance of this awesome feature been peered over PIPE or WAIX ?? as wouldnt that essentially be free content as well ??

As i would love to use this feature, but alas i am on Westnet
( sigh, free PIPE, but i was with node... )

Thanks.

Zyklone writes...

Is there any chance of this awesome feature been peered over PIPE or WAIX ?

*sigh*

As i would love to use this feature, but alas i am on Westnet

There's a simple solution to that you know!

https://accounts.interno...cgi-bin/ids-home

Zyklone writes...

Is there any chance of this awesome feature been peered over PIPE or WAIX ?? as wouldnt that essentially be free content as well ??

The idea is for us to spend some money to attract more customers and make existing customers happy. Why would we give it away for free to customers on other ISPs?

Zyklone writes...

Hey,Is there any chance of this awesome feature been peered over PIPE or WAIX ?? as wouldnt that essentially be free content as well ??

No, it would not be free content (for to provide). Far from it.

To satisfy your Usenet content demands, we'd be importing content from the USA for you, at considerable expense to you, and giving it to your ISP to give to you.

Not really a smart move for us!

(have a read of the FAQ at the top of this forum for more details on what is behind the service offering - which helps to explain how we can do this and others... can't).

Customer retention is one of the reasons why ISPs generate unique value-added propositions.

I know you'd be happy using the service, so the answer is easy - c'mon back :)

Zyklone writes...
sigh, free PIPE, but i was with node...

Feel free to roll on back.. churn is free (if on a telstra dslam) until end of jan. :)

i know it's still in early development..

if internode end up breaking even or making a small profit from this will node be putting the cashflow back into the service, ie upgrading server storage capacity for better retention etc...

nuggets writes...

if internode end up breaking even or making a small profit from this will node be putting the cashflow back into the service, ie upgrading server storage capacity for better retention etc...

the new box doubles the disk space of the old one and uses it far more effeciently

Kingsley writes...

Secondly alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ -talkshows doesn't exist on 3 servers i checked.

Not a problem, I use a second server, Astraweb and they have it.

Simon Hackett writes...

I know you'd be happy using the service, so the answer is easy - c'mon back :)

I would love to, but the 50 gig a month i pull through on PIPE as free content is just holding me back, plus the data you a providing to your customers is counted towards their usage, i know that it sounds like a lot, but i just can not churn..

Free PIPE is pretty much the do or die type thing, if you had free PIPE i would be back in a heart beat mate :)

This is an awesome service, especially for a value-add woah.

I'm not all that familiar with usenet so call me stupid if you like, when downloading headers i appear to be only able to get about 6 or 7k, so downloading a whole stack naturally takes time. Is this normal or should i be getting a bit faster than this?

Im on ADSL2+, 15/1Mb Sync rate. And downloading actual binaries appears to be relatively speedy. I've tried both newsbin pro and now grabit.

Perhaps slightly OT, but do you think this new value-add service be of much benefit to the x% of Internode's customer base who are not Whirlpool internet geeks :) [I mean that in the nicest possible way guys]

You certainly need a solid level of proficiency to get your head around how to get organised. Jargon is fairly thick and flying. Newsgroups, servers, readers, RARs, PARs, PAR2s, NZBs, yENC, repairs. Holy moly - I need a glass of red wine and some polenta.

I realise its still in the Beta stage, and that if/when it is launched it will benefit from being supported by the Support Team etc. I suppose I am just thinking aloud about whether it will make much of a footprint in the 'wider' broadband community, which I read this morning has reached 2.5 million users. (www.accc.gov.au/content/...3/fromItemId/142)

Bingo Bongo

Perhaps slightly OT, but do you think this new value-add service be of much benefit to the x% of Internode's customer base who are not Whirlpool internet geeks :) [I mean that in the nicest possible way guys]

Good point, if you look at a paid service like Easynews, you dont even need a newsreader to get what you want, you just access whatever you want through a HTTP webpage.

Anyone can use a paid service like Easynews, this service though, is a different story

I realise its still in the Beta stage, and that if/when it is launched it will benefit from being supported by the Support Team etc. I suppose I am just thinking aloud about whether it will make much of a footprint in the 'wider' broadband community, which I read this morning has reached 2.5 million users.

I dont think we will ever get a HTTP page to interface with but a listing of easy to use free newsreaders in the FAQ would be a nice way to get more users on board at no cost to internode.

At the moment I am pulling my hair out literally trying to find out where I can get a decent Newsreader from, that is truly free, and will download multipart binaries.

Grabit will only let you have a certain amount of free searches and News Rover will not let you grab any binaries (in its free version)

The one-armed man writes...

Perhaps slightly OT, but do you think this new value-add service be of much benefit to the x% of Internode's customer base who are not Whirlpool internet geeks :)

I would hazard a guess that it will cut a large amount of bittorrent traffic, which is both upload and download. I would say that would be the best they could hope for! Any caching would be a huge bonus.

Someone from node quoted earlier that it's about twice as expensive as regular IP traffic, but I wonder how much it'll reduce the uploads of average Mr Leecher.

what is the retention rate? 60 days i think is what supernews says

nice

The waiting for incomplete parts to become complete or at least for the par2's to show up may drive me up the wall ;)

would be so cool if giganews was on the west coast and node could have mirrored them =(

nobodyinpartcular writes...

At the moment I am pulling my hair out literally trying to find out where I can get a decent Newsreader from, that is truly free, and will download multipart binaries.

Why not expand your horizons just a tad. There is a mountain of excellent low cost shareware newsreader software out there.

nobodyinpartcular writes...

Grabit will only let you have a certain amount of free searches and News Rover will not let you grab any binaries (in its free version)

The lack of a good free usenet search service that lets you import a nzb file is something I am struggling with at the moment. I am a Usenet nub.

For now I am using www.newzbin.com to find what I want and then going into GrabIt and downloading all the headers for the newsgroup it is in, finding the files I want to download and then downloading them. Less than ideal but the free Usenet search services I have found just don't seem to cut it.

I am not one to pay for something I can get for free with a little effort. You get what you pay for I suppose.

If someone has a better way to download from usenet without spending any money I'd like to hear it.

That is sensible only if you consider your time to be worth nothing.

To borrow a spin on this that I didn't invent: You are, in effect, working for less than the minimum wage right now (in doing it via a crappy multi-stage process).

If you consider your time to be worth anything above nothing, then the shareware is an excellent invesment that is easily justified.

RichardM writes...

Someone from node quoted earlier that it's about twice as expensive as regular IP traffic, but I wonder how much it'll reduce the uploads of average Mr Leecher.

Internode will probably save at least 10GB (estimated) of international traffic from me.

Simon Hackett writes...

If you consider your time to be worth anything above nothing, then the shareware is an excellent invesment that is easily justified.

This would be a consideration if I had something more important to do with the extra few minutes I would save. At the moment I don't.

CronoS writes...

This would be a consideration if I had something more important to do with the extra few minutes I would save. At the moment I don't.

Read a book. Do some exercise. Call your mum and tell her that you love her.

nobodyinpartcular writes...

At the moment I am pulling my hair out literally trying to find out where I can get a decent Newsreader from, that is truly free, and will download multipart binaries.

Xnews is a decent free newsreader.

xnews.newsguy.com

NOTE: The current 'test version' seems to run well it is WAY more current than the 'latest version'.

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

what is the retention rate? 60 days i think is what supernews says

Not quite - forum-replies.cfm?t=452627&p=16#r314

CronoS writes...

For now I am using www.newzbin.com to find what I want and then going into GrabIt and downloading all the headers for the newsgroup it is in, finding the files I want to download and then downloading them. Less than ideal but the free Usenet search services I have found just don't seem to cut it.

Have you tried:
www.binsearch.info
or
www.nzbzone.com
?
I think they go okay..

I took advantage of newsbin's Christmas promotion and got about 260 days of search access for a paltry amount.. well worth the money IMO.

Edit: it was $12, shouldn't break anyone's bank!

Just posted a test article.

Xref: sn-us alt.test:1920400
Path: sn-us!sn-sjc01!sn-xt-sjc-10!sn-xt-­ sjc-08!sn-post-02!sn-post-01!super­ news.com!corp.supernews.com!not-fo­ r-mail
From: The Phantom <the.ghost@who.walks>
Newsgroups: alt.test
Subject: Test
Date: Mon, 09 Jan 2006 09:14:58 -0000
Organization: Booga Inc
Message-ID: <Xns9746CDFD32E0Etheghostwhowal­ ks@203.16.214.243>
User-Agent: Xnews/06.01.10
X-No-Archive: yes
X-Complaints-To: abuse@supernews.com
Lines: 1

test 123.... errr 4.


It's nice to see that the X-trace header appears to be removed, as I don't particularly like half of the nutters that hang out on Usenet to know my IP address.

Another thing; I guess the remark in the FAQ, We access their servers directly, not 'over the Internet'. didn't really sink home until I saw the Message-ID line. Nice one Internode.

Just a note the Usenet noobs in here: This is a beta trial so assume Internode are happily logging a lot of stuff which is kind of the point of beta testing :) So it might be in your best interest to behave yourselves ok. And like P2P, LEA officers and other interested parties also patrol usenet groups so take care how and what you post. Sometimes it makes me think that certain obvious and highly illegal groups are allowed to exist just for the case of trying to entrap those who post in them.

Tankc4 writes...

it was $12,

How did you pay? I passed them up because I don't recognise any of the payment methods.
docs.newzbin.com/Newzbin:Payment_FAQ

Sorry to be a pain and ask again, but should i be recieving higher speeds when downloading headers or is 10k about right?

JohnL writes...

Sorry to be a pain and ask again, but should i be recieving higher speeds when downloading headers or is 10k about right?

Edit: Dammit

JohnL writes...

Sorry to be a pain and ask again, but should i be recieving higher speeds when downloading headers or is 10k about right?

Pretty sure you should be getting them at full speed..

Bob B writes...

How did you pay? I passed them up because I don't recognise any of the payment methods.

Paid by credit card through Worldpay. I hadn't heard of them before, but had zero problems paying that way.

Wow - I've used news since the green screen days. All of my access has been through oz based servers - I have never seen soooo many articles as this service. Rock on!

BTW - I can tell what groups you ppl have been looking at by the fact that they are already cached on the node server - bad people .. ;-)

Tankc4 writes...

Pretty sure you should be getting them at full speed..

It may depend on the news reader and it's settings. With OE I get about 80Kb/sec on a 165Kb connection. Some news readers don't use all the connections when accessing headers and reserve one, so the others can be used for downloading bodies while you get headers at the same time.

id never seen a full premium news feed before - omg so many posts! the amounts of data involved must be phenomenal.

Hoodoo writes...

I can tell what groups you ppl have been looking at ...

Some people may hesitate complaining about a bad feed when you have to tell what group is playing up :-)

OK I have just tried to look for a.b.tv but newsleecher keeps giving me the following error message;

Active Group does not exist on server

nobodyinpartcular writes...

OK I have just tried to look for a.b.tv but newsleecher keeps giving me the following error ..

I think there are a few problems with some groups. Someone says they can see a group, alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ ­-talkshows for example but I can't get it. I tried to download some files from a.b.tv and NewsBin Pro couldn't find it either but I see it on OE.

Bob B writes...
I think there are a few problems with some groups. Someone says they can see a group, alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ ­ ­-talkshows for example but I can't get it. I tried to download some files from a.b.tv and NewsBin Pro couldn't find it either but I see it on OE.

I can see a.b.m.late-night-talkshows in Newsbin, but get a 411 No Such Newsgroup message when I try and access it, and a.b.tv seems to be unusually slow ATM for me as well.

it is very hard for someone to catch you leeching off the server anyway, its not like they can get your IP and file a Jon Doe. They can only kill it and get the logs that probally wont exist in the time it will take them to gain access

Foo completion seems to have gone to the dogs in a quite a few groupd for posts after 7am today :(

I might have missed it but in the interests of privacy online - what logs are kept? I have no intent on doing anything illegal but I still prefer to know what is going on.

If I missed it then you would have to forgive me, the thread isn't the easiest to read.

well, as much as id hate to say this well done internode..

however, your provider of choice is amusing when archiving stuff.
retention for a dvd is 13 days, so it says.
yet and erotic dvd goes for 500 days.

most amusing.

Offline writes...

... what logs are kept?

I'm certain any data kept would only be statistical in nature to aid performance. If your paranoid open a cheap limited account like Astraweb. Complete anonymity and free uploads and header downloads. I'm keeping my account open even if just as a backup. They have a nice special on at the moment, 90Gb for US$25 :-)

I am not worried at all, in fact I just helped someone sign up with Astraweb yesterday which seemed an excellent price. It is more of an interest thing if anything, most things usually come with some form of policy (I saw the post by Simon) but would prefer to know.

Mr.BigPond! writes...

most amusing.

Most confusing. What are you on (about)?

Bob B writes...

Most confusing. What are you on (about)?

well, Retention is how long a server holds the data..

it will hold a dvd for 13 days, yet store the porn for 500 days.
seems like alot of people like their erotica...

Do you have ANY idea what you're talking about?

Mr.BigPond! writes...

it will hold a dvd for 13 days, yet store the porn for 500 days.
seems like alot of people like their erotica...

LOL very true.

alt.binaries.*(assorted pron) existed before probably 90% of whirlpool users knew what the internet was :)

Mind you the "normal" DVD group gets a hellva lot more articles than the pron DVD group, so you are churning through and dropping older articles quicker due to disk space restrictions, hence the lower retention rate in that group.

yea gotta be quick to get your shit or its gone till someone posts it again :(

Mr.BigPond! writes...

yet store the porn for 500 days.

Well considering the server has been running for a week or so where do you get 500 days from :-)

seems like alot of people like their erotica...

On the contrary, if it is held on a server for that long there can't be much new material being added so in my opinion that group is dead.

Bob B writes...

Well considering the server has been running for a week or so where do you get 500 days from :-)

The way we have designed this service, you can access anything in the entire supernews Usenet server store - right now. It doesn't have to 'fill up' first. Its there now, in effect - if you want to download it and its not on our local hard drive, its pulled over in real time, as you need it.

Simon Hackett writes...

.. you can access anything in the entire supernews Usenet server store - right now.

Yes I understand that but wonder where he was getting his info from. It's not as if it is specific to Internode so why post here if not just to troll.

Im drueling over the fact we now have alt.binaries.hdtv.repost.. now if only there was a way around the whole download limits and legal issues. Screw dvd's, 1080i all the way. Now thats a nice way to spend 15gb a pop on movies.

Still no a.b.tv

and there are groups that I have subscribed to from nodes own list that wont pull any headers from either

How long do we have to wait for Groups to show up?

Surely it shouldnt have to be days?

nobodyinpartcular writes...

Surely it shouldnt have to be days?

No it shouldn't.

EDIT - I just had another look at a.b.tv and it seemed to be working fine?

I completly cleared the stored headers, and then re-downloaded the latest set again.

They all seemed to come through and max out my connection no worries at all.

I call PEBKAC!

is that the alt.bin.tv with 1.2million posts im looking at

It would seem so! ;)

Yep, a.b.tv works fine for me, took 3 or 4 hours to download the headers... Gah.. what is going on with this!

JustSomeGuy writes...

EDIT - I just had another look at a.b.tv and it seemed to be working fine?

I completly cleared the stored headers, and then re-downloaded the latest set again.

They all seemed to come through and max out my connection no worries at all.

I call PEBKAC!

Well its still not working for me at all

I redownloaded the group list from node and there was still no sign of it in the official list, so I added it again manualy and still no go.

I have tried it in Newsleecher, Newsrover and Newsbin Pro and its still not working

your not pulling my leg are you?

JohnL writes...

Gah.. what is going on with this!

From the FAQ of another Usenet server:

Some clients will attempt to download headers in small chunks. This will greatly slow down the download speed of headers by a factor of 10-1000x time slower. All tested clients, except newsbinpro have the ability to turn this off. Please unselect the "download x number of headers at a time" feature for best performance.

nobodyinpartcular writes...

Well its still not working for me at all

I redownloaded the group list from node and there was still no sign of it in the official list, so I added it again manualy and still no go.

I have tried it in Newsleecher, Newsrover and Newsbin Pro and its still not working

A thought occurs. You DO realise that 'a.b' is just a short-hand way of writing alt.binaries, right?

The actual proper name for the group is alt.binaries.tv

If you've been trying to add the group as a.b.tv, then you're definitely not going to get anywhere!

PLEASE tell me that's not what you've been doing?

your not pulling my leg are you?

No I'm not. Why would I?

what clients are we all using here?

Newsbin Pro 5.05RC5 - Build: 6448

JustSomeGuy writes...

No I'm not. Why would I?

I don't know but the pic you posted here would suggest you only subscribe to one group which is odd. forum-replies.cfm?t=452627&p=14#r263
I still can't get alt.binaries.multimedia.late-night­ ­-talkshows on Node's server but can on Astraweb.
As far as a.b.tv goes I can now get the bodies on Node's server but the files were a day old whereas earlier today the files I tried to get were only hours old. Maybe Supernews lagged a little behind and they're weren't available immediately.

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

what clients are we all using here?

Unison.

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

what clients are we all using here?

OE6 for text based, NewsBin Pro 4.32 for binaries.
It's been running flawlessly with Astraweb for months so I doubt there is a software problem. Perhaps once all the groups have been primed and in use things will settle down.

Bob B writes...

I don't know but the pic you posted here would suggest you only subscribe to one group which is odd.

I don't. If you have a look, that's just showing the search results for a particular group.

As far as a.b.tv goes I can now get the bodies on Node's server

PEBKAC?

JustSomeGuy writes...

If you have a look, that's just showing the search results for a particular group.

I see. I can't get it on OE6 or NewsBin :-(

PEBKAC?

No, the operator is fine :-)
I have access to that group on Astraweb so it's not a user or software issue.

EDIT: What's your IP, maybe it's a 59.xxx issue :D

well time to DL the headers :(

512k iNTERNODE n00b writes...

well time to DL the headers :(

Downloading headers is for chumps! There are far quicker and more efficient ways of doing binaries.

HINT: NZB files!

JustSomeGuy writes...

Downloading headers is for chumps! There are far quicker and more efficient ways of doing binaries.

HINT: NZB files!

yeah and ya need to wait a -while- to make sure all the parts are as complete as possible otherwise you'll end up with an incomplete file, in this situation its probably easier to manually pick them out...

<=Nick=> writes...

yeah and ya need to wait a -while- to make sure all the parts are as complete as possible otherwise you'll end up with an incomplete file

Not really.

The latest version of Newsbin that I'm playing around with will hold any incomplete files in the download queue, and periodically retry downloading any missing parts.

in this situation its probably easier to manually pick them out...

I'm not sure what you mean by that?

JustSomeGuy writes...

The latest version of Newsbin that I'm playing around with will hold any incomplete files in the download queue, and periodically retry downloading any missing parts.

wow thats awesome *smirk*

JustSomeGuy writes...

The latest version of Newsbin that I'm playing around with will hold any incomplete files in the download queue,

Older versions too :-)
V4.32 has an auto-save so it remembers files that are queued and auto-starts them next time you load the app. With PAR2 files you don't even need all the parts. It's all too easy :-)

Oh man, wet dream come true, lol.

THIS.....this is why i stay with Internode! Thank you Simon and all who make it possible!

I also have to chuckle a bit (ok, maybe a lot) at all the other ISP's forums now where all their users are wanting them to put up something similar, haw.

You can tell that you've done something totally utterly kickass when everyone else turns green at it.

Two thumbs up :D

nobodyinpartcular writes...

Still no a.b.tv

Try sorting the group list after you download download or update it.

Even though the list may already appear to be sorted, I've seen some clients have the odd group or two seem missing until you manually sort them in alphabetical order.

Simon Hackett writes...

p.s. is anyone aware of any other Australian ISPs providing a full US grade newsfeed as a standard part of their service offering? I'd love to think we're the first to do it, but I really don't know. I just can't think of anyone else who is, right now...

Inspired started gving customers/me a rebadged giganews account with a GB and speed limit for > 12 months. It has been great for fills when my normal server is missing segments/parts.

Sorry if this has been answered before.

Ok I have a.b.tv finally but I am not going to wait a couple of days for the headers to download over a 64k connection

I am heading back to bittorrent, it might be slow but at least its reliable and I can actually get what I want

nobodyinpartcular writes...

Ok I have a.b.tv finally but I am not going to wait a couple of days for the headers to download over a 64k connection

No need for headers...e.g. binsearch.net + NewsLeecher/NewsBin.

Terminus writes...

Inspired started gving customers/me a rebadged giganews account with a GB and speed limit for > 12 months.

We have neither a GB nor a speed limit on the service. So I don't think that one really counts.

Any other examples, guys? Still interested in that question (of whether this is a genuine first in the 'broadband era' for usenet in Australia - anyone know what the Telstra usenet feed is like, for instance? (not that it really counts for people stuck with a 10Gb either-way quota))

yea i gonna sign with newsbinz soon :)

catlover writes...

No need for headers...e.g. binsearch.net + NewsLeecher/NewsBin.

Newsleecher is not working for me and I am only getting the odd occasional NZB working with Newsbin Pro

BTW I dont use binsearch.net I use binsearch.info

Personally I don't much like Newsbin Pro, but NewsLeecher is good. I have no idea what your issue is, but I suggest you use google, etc and try to get it functioning properly. I don't think you'll regret it.

catlover writes...

I have no idea what your issue is, but I suggest you use google, etc and try to get it functioning properly. I don't think you'll regret it.

My issue is that I cant get a decent version of Newsleecher for free.

What I am looking for is something that will do everything, an equivalent to Bittorrents Azureus in Usenet software if you like.

NewsRover was the closest I could find but it is buggy as all hell.

Since most people just get whatever they want from their paid news service via a webpage instead of a newsreader its a lot harder to find a good newsreader as opposed to a good bt client

Bob B writes...

V4.32 has an auto-save so it remembers files that are queued and auto-starts them next time you load the app. With PAR2 files you don't even need all the parts. It's all too easy :-)

Which is great in theory, except when you're missing 2+ parts on all files, including the PAR2 files (Which is 100% of my (un)luck so far).

i agree as ppl have said already xnews is pretty usable (ive really only used pan on linux before though so havent tried many).

nobodyinpartcular writes...

My issue is that I cant get a decent version of Newsleecher for free.

There is GrabIt, but its support for many nzbs is buggy (apparently something to do with html tags).

Even so, IMO news > bittorrent.

Burn writes...

Which is great in theory, except when you're missing 2+ parts on all files, including the PAR2 files (Which is 100% of my (un)luck so far).

Granted the groups I have accessed have been limited, but I have found completion to be much much better than that.