really stinks! This is totally new and I understand that they are trying to reduce the amount of spam we receive on the group....but even with my normal eyesight and mostly good hearing, I still can't get all of the letters/numbers they request! I just tried using Outlook Express for reading again last night and found it to be useless. I enjoy Google - or at least I did!
Frustrated me is now going to get some breakfast, dress the kids and forget that the computer exists for the rest of the day!
Outlook Express only works IF your ISP subscribes to a newsreader like Usenet or SuperNews among others or you subscribe and are able to read thru OE with that subscription. There's a lot of variables. You access the groups THRU Outlook Express, not with Outlook Express. Call your ISP and see what or if they have a newsreader before you blame OE. Perhaps they do and you just need to change a few settings to make it work for you.
I tried listening to the numbers and found them even more confusing than the letters :) But I think you only need to do this once - in order to sign up with an account. So perhaps you could find a kid to help?
FWIW, it is possible to bypass these 'security' measures if you know how to write the right kind of computer program. There was a tv program on "Marketplace" recently that discussed just this. Apparently word verification like google uses is also used for buying concert tickets online. But scalpers can use a computer program to "read" the verification letters and buy the tickets automatically. Explains how an arena can be sold out faster than humanly possible!
I find it hard to imagine how if you set up OE or any other newsreader correctly how it can not be preferable to google, I'm using google right now because I'm waiting to get a new computer, so I've not set up anything on the one I'm using, so a web portal is useful. I've never tried reading newsgroups by having google put them into an email and deliver them to my inbox, which sounds like torture if you ask me, the nice thing about reading newsgroups via a dedicated server is keeping it separate from email, being able to set up a fair amount of personal preferences, but also have the ability to take a break without them landing in your inbox and needing to hit delete. The reading experience for me is much better and I think the amount of flexibility makes it worth learning.
Actually, this week I had the honor (if you'd call if that) of being signed up without my permission for a Google Group by some jerk who thinks that I and about 20 others shouldn't post on "his" forum. He asserts that he can be as big a jerk as he wants, but we can't post there, and he sets this one up and signs us up (not invites us, mind you).
Any security they provide is fine with me. There's nuts loose on a lot of Usenet.
If you had a news group reader like Agent, Eudora, Thunderbird, or something else, you would never have to use google to read this group again. Google Groups is so slow and clunky that you would save yourself a lot of time and effort too. You would have the ability to download just the headers then click all the ones you want to see and download them all in a minute, then read to your heart's content and reply quick as a wink.
I use Agent and it was worth the money I paid. Debra in VA See my quilts at:
Geez, i use Google Groups! i like it better than anyother groups' formats. i can go down the list, pick which ones i want to read and go back to the list. i dont particularly like the verification icons, but if it saves us the spam, then i dont mind so much!!! The Trolls will be so mad....no more soup for the Queen!!
What other things have you tried? I mean, if you are comparing google groups to web forums then it is amongst the better ones, but if going down a list and picking something out from it is what you like about it - which is exactly what I want from a newsreader, then you can do that same task even faster from a newsreader.
Don't confuse google groups with usenet, google groups is a web based thingy that lets you read usenet and groups that have been created by users, rather like yahoogroups, individual newsgroups do vary on what is ok and what isn't and most are unmoderated, anyone can post whatever they want, but some things will not be approved of, google groups doesn't help things there as it doesn't allow individual users to make posts to newsgroups invisible to them. But what also exists are groups that aren't newsgroups, so this jerk, if he created a forum is well within his rights to say you can't post there, or what you can post there etc. unfortunately it doesn't look any different to newsgroups superficially, so his behaviour and google by failing to distinguish the two gives newsgroups a bad name, when it was simply a bad forum or email list. Same with creating groups, it is possible to create a newsgroup and people do do it in local settings when they have adequate server access, often within companies or academic institutions, but it's a technical thing and doesn't cover people wanting to create groups for, say, all the parents of the kids in a particular class, small things that come and go and for that, you do want to be able to create a list of people that can access the group, or get sent group emails etc. which is why someone can sign you up to a group without your permission, what they can't do is make you continue to be in it, read it, take part in it etc. they can make a nuisance of themselves by continually resubscribing you when you unsubscribe, I haven't dug around to see if that's a setting you can set, never subscribe me to this group - but all of this isn't usenet/ newsgroups.
I'm glad google groups exist, it gives mobile access to newsgroups, when previously that wasn't very reliable, but by making everything look so uniform, it has it's disadvantages too and does rather muddy the waters, no one owns this group, if google went away, it would still be here, bouncing around servers all over the world and being read by using newsreading software.
There are an awful lot more nuts loose on the internet in general than usenet, usenet never has been, or never will be immune, nor will verification each time solve it, but it's organic, self policing, multiple server type structure allowed a lot more blocking and individual settings than accessing it via google allows.
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