Usenet newsgroup
A Usenet newsgroup is a repository usually within the Usenet system, for messages posted from many users in different locations. Despite the name, newsgroups are discussion groups, and are not devoted to publishing news. Newsgroups are technically distinct from, but functionally similar to, discussion forums on the World Wide Web. Newsreader software is used to read newsgroups.
Before the uptake of the World Wide Web, Usenet newsgroups were among the most popular Internet services, and have retained their noncommercial nature in contrast to the increasingly ad-laden web. In recent years, this form of open discussion on the Internet has lost considerable ground to individually-operated browser-accessible forums and big media social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.
Transmission within and at the bounds of the network uses the Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP), an Internet standard.
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