NewsDemon helped celebrate the 30th anniversary of Usenet on November 10th, 2009. The celebration included an interview with Brad Templeton and Tom Truscott. They also managed to find the original memo announcing Usenet written at Duke University in November 1979.
The original idea for Usenet was to allow communication between University Unix systems. The estimated cost would be $15 a month to connect daily and transfer around 3,000 bytes of data via 300 baud modem.
Here is our favorite part of the Usenet annoucement. It is from a “questions answered section at the end of the memo:
This is a sloppy proposal. Let’s start a committee.
No thanks! Yes, there are problems. Several amateurs collaborated on this plan. But let’s get started now. Once the net is in place, we can start a committee. And they will actually use the net, so they will know what the real problems are.
So many people want to plan, plan, plan but never act. Luckily the guys at Duke moved forward with Usenet recognizing problems would be worked out as members joined and made use of the network.
The interview with Tom Truscott and Brad Templeton is quite interesting as well. NewsDemon gathered questions from the Usenet community and the results made for a good interview.
Brad Templeton mentions in the interview that he feels like Usenet will fade into oblivion unless the network is completely redesigned for our current always-on Internet.
I’ve had the opportunity to get to know many of the key players in the Usenet industry. There are some very sharp people behind the scenes. Will they reinvent Usenet? Will companies that compete for customers come together to improve the network for everyone? Hopefully the answer to all these questions is “Yes” and the Usenet community will continue to grow for decades to come. It would be a real pleasure to write a post for the “50th anniversary of Usenet in 2029”.
To learn more Usenet providers take a look at our newsgroup tutorial including more information on the history of Usenet.
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Here is the official press release from PRWEB:
NewsDemon.com Newsgroups Celebrates the Thirtieth Anniversary of USENET
NewsDemon.com Newsgroups provider teams with a founder of USENET to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of USENET. An interview with one of the creators and a prominent USENET pioneer to go along with never before released memos detailing the initial existence of USENET. To end the celebration NewsDemon Newsgroups offers unheard of discounts on USENET access.
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Anderson, SC (PRWEB) November 10, 2009 — NewsDemon.com Newsgroups celebrates the Thirtieth Anniversary of USENET. It was thirty years ago this month that USENET debuted and quickly became the largest online community channel on the planet. As the first online social network, USENET newsgroups continues to be a vital resource and destination to thousands of users after three decades.
In late 1979, Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis developed the foundation of what we know USENET to be today. Quickly outgrowing expectations, USENET exploded in popularity and became a daily destination for thousands to access a wide variety of newsgroups. Since then, USENET newsgroups have accumulated millions of subscribers over the last thirty years and continue to attract new ones every day. USENET also has been a vital online communication channel for amazing achievements, including the announcement of the launch of the World Wide Web in 1991.
To celebrate the thirtieth anniversary, on Wednesday, November 11th, all monthly USENET accounts will be offered for only $1.00 per month for the first two months of the membership term. This special applies to all premium USENET monthly plans, including the unlimited USENET newsgroup memberships.
Throughout the years, NewsDemon.com Newsgroups has been active in promoting the resources that the USENET newsgroup community provides. This year alone, they have hosted a number free USENET access offers to University and College campuses as well as media outlets to grow awareness and the overall USENET newsgroup participation.
NewsDemon.com Newsgroups has also put together an interview of two USENET pioneers: Tom Truscott, one of the founders of USENET and Brad Templeton, the originator of one of the most famous newsgroups, rec.humor funny. Both Truscott and Templeton share and discuss the past, present and future of the USENET phenomenon and offer their insight as well as a previously unreleased copy of the original memo announcing USENET.
USENET continues to grow the global community of users, developers and activists it has spawned since its creation. It’s expected that over the next thirty years, USENET will continue to evolve and innovate to better serve the community that has sustained it.
It’s no question that USENET is a unique place in the online world. After thirty years of being driven by its subscribers to improve upon it, the community fueled system is expected to sustain its growth for another thirty years to come. From all of us at NewsDemon.com Newsgroups, we wish a fond Happy Birthday, USENET!
Providing top-rated premium USENET access to both United States and Europe, NewsDemon.com Newsgroups is proud to participate in celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of USENET.
