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NewsgroupDirect Blocktoberfest Usenet Sale - All Blocks on Sale Including 2TB for US $75

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NewsgroupDirect Blocktoberfest Usenet Sale - All Blocks on Sale Including 2TB for US $75
Go to Deal
Daabido on 18/10/2012 - 08:26 newsgroupdirect.com (258 clicks)

From the blog post;
"We’ve scared up something awesome for our 2nd annual Blocktoberfest here at NewsgroupDirect. All of our block accounts are on sale, with prices similar to what we’ve done for Terabyte Tuesday in the past. The sale lasts until October 26th, 2012 at 11:59 PM EST.

Here are the sale prices that we’ve cooked up:

50 GB Blocks are $5 (normally $12)
100 GB Blocks are $9 (normally $20)
250 GB Blocks are $15 (normally $32)
500 GB Blocks are $20 (normally $60)
1 TB Blocks are $40 (normally $100)
2 TB Blocks are $75 (normally $200)"

Feel free to use the non-affiliate link above, or my affiliate link below.

http://www.newsgroupdirect.com/?aff=75933

Internet Usenet

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closed Comments

  • trippy on 18/10/2012 - 08:48
    +1

    Sorry, but could someone briefly explain how newsgroups work? I sort of have an idea and wouldn't mind testing it out.

    • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 08:57
      +1

      There is a ton of files available on newsgroup servers. Movies, Games, TV shows etc etc.
      All you need is
      - a newsgroup server account (like one of these blocks)
      - software to manage the connection/downloading, like altbinz or sabnzbd
      - an index site to find the files. eg nzbmatrix or binsearch

      Configure altbinz or sabnzbd
      Then find the files using nzmatrix or binsearch
      Click on them (save and execute the .nzb file) and the altbinz/sabnzbd program will do the rest 99% of the time.

      No need to seed back like torrents. No peers getting your IP address either.
      And the files are indexed for over 1000 days.
      And you get to DL at full speed.

      • [Deactivated] on 18/10/2012 - 09:26

        Yeah usenet is actually for discussion in plain text!

        Kids these days!!!

        • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 09:38
          +1

          Binary files have been available on usenet for a long time, at least since I was a kid (in the 80's)

    • foobar on 18/10/2012 - 08:58

      Here's a previous writeup by the OP

      http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/74128#comment-935318

      • Daabido on 18/10/2012 - 11:15
        +7

        Thanks for posting that foobar. I meant to do it but was literally running out the door to join all the peak hour parked cars on the road.

        trippy, it is a bit difficult to get your head around at first. Along with my previous post and as per robinsoa, you need three things to put everything together.

        But before you dive into all of that, let me give you an analogy which might help.

        Say for example, I have in my house a computer I call Use. On Use I keep a whole bunch of writing that I have done about stuff I'm interested in. Because I'm a neat freak, I have grouped all my writing about particular subjects into folders that I call "groups".

        One day I'm talking to my neighbour Tim and he's also got a computer. Marvellous! I tell Tim about the things I'm interested in that I've written about on my computer and he says he wishes there was a way he could comment on my writing and add his own thoughts and maybe even add some "groups" of his own, because he likes writing about stuff too.

        We think it would be cool if we had each other's writing on our own computer, so we set up a little network. Every time Tim writes something on his computer, it automatically ends up on mine. And whenever I write something on my computer, it ends up on Tim's. Because we've set up "groups", each piece of writing or comments we make on each other's writing is kept separate from everything else. So we don't muddle up our discussion about cars with our discussion about Barbie dolls or Star Trek.

        We call our network Usenet. But pretty soon we realise that the discussions we're having would be better if there would be more people involved. They might have some interesting things to say and maybe even have their own groups which would enhance our enjoyment of Usenet. So we tell a whole bunch of people and they join their computers up to Usenet. Now every time someone puts a comment on their own computer or even starts a new group about something they're interested in, the Usenet protocol automatically sends it out to everyone else on Usenet. There's no central computer on Usenet. When you write something, your computer sends it to the nearest computer and that computer sends it on to the next one and so on until everyone who is connected to Usenet has it on their computer.

        Before we know it, Usenet has grown into a worldwide phenomeno, with people sharing discussion about dogs, computers, scientific inventions and just about every possible "group" you could think of. One of the unfortunate side effects of no one being in charge is that "trolls" can join too, posting inflammatory comments and getting up to all sorts of mischief. But mostly Usenet is a wonderful place of erudite discussion about hundreds and hundreds of topics, open to anyone who wants to join in. A bit like Whirlpool, but no one is in charge.

        But oh oh, there's a problem. Everyone is running out of hard disk space. Even though text doesn't take up much space, all those hundreds of thousands and millions of discussions eventually does. So I go talk to my internet provider and I say they should have a Usenet computer where they keep everything and I can just access it and post stuff onto it and see what everyone else has written without having to keep a physical copy of everything on my computer. They say that's a great idea and before you know it, that's how everyone is accessing Usenet. It's separate from the world wide web (www) and if kind of feels like you're part of a very clever, secret society because all the new plebs who are joining the internet in the mid to late 1990s don't know about it. That's probably where the first rule of Usenet came from. The first rule of Usenet is to not talk about Usenet. Keep it special, you know?

        Now, talking about stuff is lots of fun, but pretty soon people on Usenet were lamenting the fact that they couldn't share pictures of their cats, well before LOLCats came along. So some clever people worked out how to post their pictures by encoding those pictures as very long groups of letters, numbers and symbols. If you also had some software on your computer called a newsreader, you could take that string and put it back together to show you a picture. Ah, nice pussy.

        Hey, if that guy can post a picture of his cat, why can't I post some music or video people might be interested in. So they worked out how to do that too. So now on Usenet you had text discussions and binaries (pictures, music and video that was posted as a long string and then put back together by a newsreader on your computer). Now, obviously binaries take up a whole lot more space than text discussions do and pretty soon the ISPs started to face the same problems - not enough disk space to store everything that came in and too much bandwidth being used on moving all those binaries around.

        Only a small group of the ISP's clients were really interested in Usenet anyway. They were generally a bit nerdy. All the newbie clients the ISPs were signing up were only interested in the really shiny stuff and as far as they were concerned, that was www all the way. They didn't even know about Usenet, thanks to the first rule of Usenet. So the ISPs started to limit their Usenet computers to only discussion or only discussion and a few binary groups or maybe they didn't limit their computers but when hard disk space ran out, then old stuff would be thrown out and replaced with new stuff.

        This led to some problems for lovers of Usenet. Either you couldn't access the binaries any more, or not the ones you want, or by the time you looked for something, it had already been replaced by something new. Pretty soon ISPs got tired of maintaining Usenet computers and most abandoned it. That's when new companies started to appear. They were dedicated Usenet providing companies with mountains of server and bandwidth and hard disk space. They could keep text discussions for 10 years, or even binaries for five years. People who loved Usenet bought access to these new companies servers, such as NewsgroupDirect, which were fast and had good retention rates (keeping everything posted for a long time).

        And the world was good… mmm, kind of. With many multiples of TBs of new binaries being uploaded to Usenet every day, how could you find anything, let alone something specific? Sure you could download hundreds of thousands of headers which were like little library cards about what had been posted and search through them with your computer, but that would take hours and precious bandwidth. So more companies popped up. They were called indexing sites, like NewzBin2. Basically those companies employed clever computers and humans to sift through all the binaries and put them in an easily searchable form, including all the information about where to find them on Usenet.

        Great, I have Usenet and an indexing site, but how do I join them all together and get what I want. Add the third dimension, clever software which talks to both your indexing site and your Usenet provider and puts everything together for you to enjoy. My software of choice is called SABnzbd, but there are lots of options.

        OK, that's it. There's a whole bunch of other great things you could discuss about the history of Usenet, from DejaNews to Google Groups and more than can be put in one post. But I help this has helped a bit.

        • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 11:36

          Great summary Daabido.

        • Elijah on 18/10/2012 - 14:02
          +2

          Think we need a badge for longest written post ever… lol

  • paddy567 on 18/10/2012 - 09:34
    +2

    The first rule of Usenet…

    • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 09:40

      no longer applies

    • foobar on 18/10/2012 - 09:40

      These days it seems to be get it before it's gone…

  • Forgot69 on 18/10/2012 - 09:48

    Don't forget to jump into your "rewards" tab and tweet for a 50c credit!

  • 4agte on 18/10/2012 - 09:57

    Use coupon ngd201109140852 for a 20% lifetime discount. I could not find a way to add this to existing accounts so a new one may need created http://www.newsgroupreviews.com/newsgroupdirect-special-coup…

    • foobar on 18/10/2012 - 10:00

      Not certain but I don't think coupons can be used on block plans. I know the link you posted indicated they can but that code looks familiar, I believe I tried it when I got a 1TB block plan a little while ago and it didn't work.

    • Forgot69 on 18/10/2012 - 10:02
      +1

      When applying to a block I get:

      Coupons cannot be used on this plan.

  • 4agte on 18/10/2012 - 10:11

    I guess this is confirmation. A shame. $16 for 500gb would have been awesome.

    • foobar on 18/10/2012 - 10:17

      It probably does work on block accounts when they're not reduced etc.

  • p3t0r on 18/10/2012 - 10:23
    +1

    Anyone know how this service compares to Astraweb?

    • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 10:41

      Not quite as good.
      I have both, and let them both connect with 20 SSL connections.
      Astraweb seems to get about 60% more speed on average over a month. YMMV.
      I am happy with both. Between them I easily max out my 100mbit line anyhow.

    • 4agte on 18/10/2012 - 15:08

      I use both and usually get 2-4 MB/s for each

  • liveonimpulse on 18/10/2012 - 12:12

    How does this compare to https://www.thundernews.com/signup.php?pricepointid=204
    Unlimited for $13?

    • Daabido on 18/10/2012 - 12:36

      I would really love an unlimited block of Usenet for $13, but I doubt I'll ever find one.

      What you have there is "unlimited" for one month. You can either buy Usenet by the month (time) or by the block (amount).

      Each has its advantages and really depends on the usage patterns of the individual.

      If you're saturating your link 24/7 then a monthly account might be the way to go. I used to have a monthly account but I find blocks more economical for me these days.

    • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 12:37

      Depends on your usage.

      (2000GB for) $75
      is ~= to
      5.77 x $13

      So if you plan on doing more than 2000/5.77
      ie > 346.67GB per month then a monthly unlimited plan is better.

    • mshanann on 18/10/2012 - 12:41

      best time to get a newsgroup account with thundernews and most of the newsgroup providers is thanksgiving (Thursday, November 22nd 2012) which is coming up very shortly.

      I joined with a deal back in 2010 for $5 per month.. which gives ..

      Joined: 11/26/2010
      Plan: UNLIMITED / MO SSL
      Connections: 50 Connections
      Bandwidth:
      UNLIMITED

      monitor sites like http://fatwallet.com/c/18 and slickdeals on thanksgiving day for newsgroup provider deals.

      This block deal is not bad..

      2000 / 12 = 166 GB
      75 / 12 = 6
      so roughly equivalent of getting 166GB per month for $6.
      I wouldn't download anywhere near that.

      • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 12:53

        Wow $5 p/m for 50 SSL unlimited is awesome.

        Every time I see those deals like on Black Friday / Thanksgiving they are limited to only a few sales at $5 and sell out too fast, so they then offer $7, $9 etc instead.

        So you can stay on that $5 plan forever? - amazing!

    • quack28 on 18/10/2012 - 20:35

      How about unlimited for $7.50/$8 a month

      http://www.thundernews.com/thundernews_blackfriday_blowout20…

  • mshanann on 18/10/2012 - 12:33
    +1

    I have 'a friend' on thundernews. He states lots of the sporting content gets taken down very quickly these days due to DMCA. This seems to be the case with most of the well knows newsgroup providers. Literally within the hour of posting. It is unfortunate, as many sporting events cannot be obtained legally here in Australia even on pay-per-view.

    The 'friend' is looking for a newsgroup provider whom is somewhat slower to react to certain requests. Or maybe one hosted in russia!

    • robinsoa on 18/10/2012 - 12:47

      What sports?
      I have never encountered this problem.
      Plenty of EPL, NBA etc

      • mshanann on 18/10/2012 - 13:54

        UFD (intentionally misspelled)

        • 4agte on 18/10/2012 - 15:05

          Dana doesn't visit here. Some newsgroup get content pulled sooner then others. You have to be quick to get them or back to torrents

    • yamumma on 18/10/2012 - 18:47

      Not just sports. I have a friend who was attempting to procure a certain televisual program pertaining to un-living creatures and their primary method of transportation. Said program was hit with DMCA takedowns within hours of appearing on .nzb aggregators.

      Can we confirm if NewsgroupDirect is an Astraweb reseller? If so, might be better to take your money elsewhere. At least until the other providers implement a similar response time to these requests.

  • mshanann on 18/10/2012 - 12:36
    +1

    BTW - here is an interesting article for those whom have unlimited usenet (rather than block/quota accounts).

    Essentially using usenet for cloud backup purposes (obviously encrypting your data with truecrypt/bestcrypt etc first)

    http://www.wikihow.com/Backup-Your-Data-on-Usenet-%28Ubackup…

  • Newtz4 on 20/10/2012 - 16:33

    No paypal?

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