Usenet reseller and Back-end Usenet Providers

Back-end Usenet Providers and Usenet resellers

* How does Usenet work ? : A brief history of Usenet. History of U.A.P (Usenet Access Provider)
Usenet is a decentralized network consisting of multiple servers around the world which are all linked and synchronized but fundamentally independent (which avoids outages). There are two kinds of Usenet servers:

Back-end Usenet providers = Tier 1 provider = Back end NNTP Newsgroup Server
Usenet resellers = reseller of Newsgroups

In order to explain Usenet resellers and back-end Usenet providers, first of all a quick overview of the Usenet network and the workings of its servers is necessary:

* Usenet was created in 1979. Newsdemon has an excellent history of Usenet (Newsdemon offers a lot of good educational material on Usenet.The team over at NewsDemon does a great job of promoting Usenet, and being a good steward of all things Newsgroups/Usenet related. Their website offers a lot of good educational material on Usenet, which is great for anyone that is new to the concept, or just wants to brush up on their Usenet history) as well as the first announcement from J. Ellis about the launch of the first Usenet network between Duke University and North Carolina University at Chapel Hill. It is a very basic system as Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis invented Usenet (then called UNIX User Network, supposed to be an alternative to Arpanet) by connecting two computers and developing the protocol, using UUCP as transport and modems (two 300 baud autodialers) and telephone lines as the backbone. Source: News.Duke.Edu. It is worth nothing that Duke’s Usenet server closed down in May 2010 because of high running costs and low utilisation.

At its origins it was a simple system: the computers (future servers) which were interconnected (future Usenet network) could send each other messages with a unique attribute: the messages sent by one computer on the network would be automatically copied onto all of the other network computers. Basically, the computers and servers were ONE. At the time they were used exclusively for messages.

* Later on computers and servers were separated. In 1985 the current Usenet infrastructure was created with the adoption of the NNTP (Network News Transfer Protocol). The original UUCP protocol was abandoned. Servers connected to Usenet duplicated and circulated the messages posted from individual computers to all the other servers.

* Faced with a flood of messages, Usenet had to be restructured and run by certain rules.
- In 1987 Usenet was organised according to the Big 8 (Great Renaming): Messages were divided into 8 hierachies (by theme) and then into groups and subgroups. It was a simple and ingenious classification system. Within the 8 possible hierarchies of the Big 8 (comp (computers), misc (miscellaneous), news (newsgroup workings), rec (leisure), sci (sciences), soc (society) et talk (discussion) and humanities (literature, human sciences)), it was possible to discuss and exchange ideas, share points of view and specialist knowledge. The Newsgroup network was intially a text-based network: a place for debate, discovery, information and communication. You can find Usenet archives on Google groups. And the oldest message sent via Usenet saved and archived from May 11, 1981

- At the same time rules were put in place for the Usenet servers: what we call Peering. Contrary to popular belief, Usenet can accept or deny certain groups or even certain hierarchies. It is a simple procedure. Usenet servers make use of an operating system like INN, Leafnode or DNews which allows them to configure their servers and their links with others. Reading a page from a small text-based Usenet server like Swapon.de (this Newsgroup server only accepts three groups from other servers: comp, de and muenster) clarifies the idea of Peering

Peering Data

Send to:	news.swapon.de news.ipv4.swapon.de (IPv4 only) news.ipv6.swapon.de (IPv6 only)
Accept from:	news.swapon.de
Path:	news.swapon.de
Hierarchies:	comp.,de.,muenster.*
Note:	Sending path info to TOP1000 daily IPv6 available
Spamfilter:	Cleanfeed

Même un serveur de Newsgroup comme Giganews a des règles de peering:

Peering Data

Site	Giganews, Inc.
Send to:	assigned when newsgroups peering agreement met
Accept from	news-out.nntp.giganews.com
Pathname:	nntp.giganews.com
Max Art. Size	100kB
Hierarchies	,!unidata.,!*.bin

The transfer of text-based or binary files is called Feed

* Finally the arrival of the alt hierarchy

In the nineties, a ninth hierarchy dedicated to attachments (video, iso, music, bin, ..) was added. The development of Usenet servers providing more disk space coincided with a significant price drop in server cost. The concept of retention was born. More files posted, more space needed, more retention offered. A positive feedback loop for Usenet users.
The period between 1998 and 2002 saw the arrival of the Back-end Usenet Provider (indepedant autonomous servers).

Giganews (originally Giga News) launched its first newsgroup subscription in December 1998 for 12$/month. However this Newsgroup access did not include any retention, extra GB or completion. The next in line was UsenetServer which announced a promotional deal for 4,95 $ in January 1999. Equal third were Newshosting and Supernews. The latter created a site in 1996. Initially Supernews only provided a newsgroup search engine, offering paying access via net-link.com for 10 $/month. Then Supernews diversified into Webhosting among other activities and finally addressed newsgroups in 1999, launching an offer for individual access: 12$ for 2,5GB !!!!
The other providers started up around 2001-2002, like Astraweb (initialised newsgroup access in 2002) or NewsFeeds
Then in 2003 Usenet reseller: reselling newsgroup access. One of the first was Ngroups.Net, still on the market. Their first provider was Newsfeeds. Later they switched to Highwinds in 2004 and finally the current Readnews

What is a "Usenet reseller" or Newsgroup reseller ?

A Newsgroup reseller is an enterprise that buys monthly packages of GB from a newsgroup provdier and sells them on under a new name. Without their own servers, they are virtual usenet operators. "You can use your own hostname and your own headers, so it becomes almost impossible to detect you are a reseller. You can manage your accounts through our web based Customer Portal. Or you can hookup your own database to our system" : Source News-Service

- These virtual providers appeared for several reasons:

A huge increase in traffic. In the beginning this required considerable technical clout (buying severs // buying bandwidth) to offer only 10 days retention and a completion rate of 70-80%. This is why PAR files (files that repair and equalize) were created !!!
An influx of new users.

These factors forced some newsgroup providers to buy Feed (Suck feed to fix their poor completion rates or Full Feed) because they couldn’t keep up with Usenet’s rapid growth. Others, like Ngroups.net, quickly realized the financial incentive in not running their own servers. They could then concentrate on the commercial side of newsgroups and economize on the organization of newsgroup servers.

- The evolution of the market for Back-end Usenet Providers mirrored Usenet’s evolution

At the beginning there was Giganews , Newsfeeds and NNTP Server
Giganews differed from the other two in two main ways:

Concentration on American ISPs like Adelphia to which Giganews provided Usenet access. The American ISPs also resold newsgroup access to Usenet resellers like Giganews (for economic and structural reasons - do not need to invest a lot of money in server systems and infrastructure). Recently Giganews bought Supernews corporate users (and ISP activity). Giganews has control of sale to ISPs while Supernews has developed its individual service using its existing Usenet network

Quality Usenet service from the very beginning (always with higher rates than the competition)

Newsfeeds sell on their newsgroup packages to partner sites like Usenet.com // Newsgroups.com or to independent associations (like Ngroups.Net) which quickly fail due to terrible completion rates ( like the disastrous 100ProofNews!)

NNTP Server developed its own system for managing newsgroups, that was not always practical or compatible with the norms observed by other servers. Some Newsreaders had serious problems decoding the binary files. NNTP Server reached a pinnacle of success with TeraNews and Yottanews

In 2004 the arrival of HighWinds changed the market again, specialising uniquely in Usenet reselling. Based on its own operating system for Usenet servers (or groups of servers) Highwinds went on to bring down the cost per GB while offering a much better service than Newsfeeds (which was already suffering from poor completion rates). The first customers that trusted HighWinds were Ngroups.Net and NewsgroupDirect. Services that sold newsgroup subscription with HighWinds only had to develop a good customer service (eventual technical support), a system of payment, rates and special offers as well as the site interface.

Giganews, fresh from the invention of reselling newsgroups to independent sites, had to retaliate by launching its own partner site Livewire Services Inc which commercialised Usenet access like Powerusenet. Giganews itself chose to launch its own Usenet servers, determined to provide a quality service, with less retention but the same infrstructure, technology, methods of payment and “Made in Giganews” customer service.
Highwinds is an interesting exception to the rule since it never resold newsgroup access to individuals, Highwinds doesn't sell directly through their own name but succeeded thanks to other dependent Usenet resellers some of which they acquired, like UsenetServer, Newshosting or Easynews. These last are owned by Highwinds and use a different network to Usenet resellers.
It is worth noting that Giganews and Highwinds have divided between them (and their partner sites, acquisitions and dependent Usenet resellers) almost the entire Usenet market. (Astraweb, one of the last Tier 1 Usenet provider, is behind them in regard to number of users). But each one followed a different method of expansion in order to arrive at the same point:

Giganews experienced an internal expansion based on developing its user base
Highwinds grew externally (acquisition) by investing in independent Usenet servers (Usenetserver, NewsHosting, Easynews) or by attracting Usenet resellers (with a good rate per GB that was easily to modify for commercial purposes).

Today Newsfeeds has vanished NNTP Server is a nonstarter. Only Readnews is still developing its service. Proof of which is the swap by Ngroups.Net from Highwinds to Readnews. This can be explained by a better retention and more attractive prices. Unfortunately neither ReadNews nor HighWinds will comment on the matter.
Other independent Usenet providers (mainly based in Germany or Dutch) also sell on Usenet access: News-Service, Euroaccess , Xentech, XS4all , XSNews.

There are currently more than 50 Usenet providers. But only 6 Back-end Usenet providers have really mastered a good quality service: Giganews, UsenetServer, Newshosting, Easynews (that belongs to HighWinds), Astraweb and Supernews (that belongs to Giganews). All the other servers in the market are either Usenet resellers that rely on Highwinds // ReadNews or partner site directly linked to back end providers (like PowerUsenet with Giganews)

How can you spot a Usenet reseller?
Often it is enough just to create a trace route to see the original provider.
For example: Trace route for Newsgroupdirect, obtains the following original address : "traceroute to newsfarm.iad.highwinds-media.com"

See below for a full list of Usenet resellers. It worth adding that:

Usenet resellers are not necessarily low-cost, low-quality. The best example is Newsdemon: good prices, a good site, good block-account rates, excellent management and reputation
A Contrario Usenetforyou has always advised against some services like Usenext or Usenet.nl not because they resell Usenet access but because they offer dubious promotions. Both Usenext and Usenet.nl have very attractive initial promotions but - as soon as the trial period is over - then automatically debit the user for the most expensive subscription (95.35 Euro/year = the price of the plan 30+ with Usenext !!! )
Some Usenet resellers depend on two or more back end providers according to fluctuation in price and retention offers.
Others like Ngroups boast multiple sites for the exact same service (Ngroups.net = Usenet-News = Usenet.se = Anonynews) This is very common to Newsfeeds (Usenet.com = Newsgroups.com = Binaries.net)

* In most cases, it’s best that you choose to go with a Tier 1 provider *

Giganews partners: PowerUsenet , Usenet.net , Rhinonewsgroups --> N.B: The only difference between them is retention and price

Giganews bought part of SuperNews (sales to ISPs) but SuperNews uses and runs its own servers for a special newsgroup rate of 11.99 $ (unlimited with SSL)

Highwinds resellers: Newsdemon, Newsgroupdirect, Thundernews, altbinaries.com, Newsgroups-Download, Newsgroup-binaries, Usenet-access, Newsrazor, Megabitz , Eweka --> N.B: Newsdemon is our favourite