| Instructions for Report |
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| Different Newsgroups | Wine | Driving | Surfing |
| How they are used. | Informative | Entertainment | Social life |
| My reactions | What I learned | Would I participate | My feelings during. |
I explored through some of the generations newsgroups reports. I found that most students directed their attention towards driving newsgroups and what and how people conversed about on those newsgroups. I decided to look at three different kinds of news groups and how people interact on those. I started by looking at wine, then I looked at what seems to be the more traditional, driving and then I looked up one of my hobbies, surfing you can find newsgroup articles on each of these different topics by clicking on the topic and then clicking on the find button once you get to the site.
Wine
I accessed a few listings of newsgroup entries and I was delighted to find that many people accessed wine newsgroups to exchange information daily. Each day there were a few more entries on the different wine newsgroups. I chose wine in the hopes of finding information that would be relevant to my work and also to pose a few questions concerning how to store wine and also some good books on how to make wine at home. After going through many articles written to various wine newsgroups I found that many people had these same questions. I plan to frequent these newsgroups until someone answers these questions. I am glad to see that many previous questions by the newsgroup readers were answered within the week in most cases.
1.
Subject: New UK direct wine site
Date: 1999/03/11
Hi,
I have just launched a direct wine sales internet site for the UK. I would be very pleased to receive comments. It is very small but it is a start!
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2.
Subject: Wine Spectator ö August 1996-Great Wine Cellars
Can anybody help me?
I have recently moved and Iâm building a 5,000 cubic cellar. In the move I have ălost or mislaidä some of my back issues of The Wine Spectator including the August 1996 edition which featured Great Cellars.
We say they do not have back issues for sale. Anyone out there willing to part with their ăcherishedä copy. I would be willing pay a pair price including shipping.
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The newsgroup I got these two entries from was actually from a newsgroup on alternate usage of the English language. It was just interesting what kind of topics you could find on different newsgroups. I chose these entries because it shows how conversations start on newsgroups due to asking questions and receiving responses. I started by just looking for articles that were in driving newsgroups. Then I searched through newsgroup entries just by title name and I came up with these two entries that are not in a driving newsgroup, but did have something to do with driving. It was interesting to learn some trivial facts.
1.
Subject: Re: ăDrunk Driving.ä
Date: 1999/03/11
In California for many years people would say, ăHe got a ă502ä, meaning he was charged with drunk driving. ă502ä was the old Penal Code section for DUI or DWI (ie. Driving Under the Influence, or Driving While Intoxicated).
Anyway, what do they call it in England, or Australia? Any short hand terms? (Maybe in Australia itâs just called ăDrivingä).
Here we call it standard police procedure.
Hope this helps.
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2.
Subject: Re: ăDrunk Driving.ä
Date: 1999/03/11
In Australia itâs commonly called drink driving. Donât know why. ăDrunk drivingä makes more sense.
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I chose the newsgroup posting below because it was a subject first of all that I was interested in and second of all the topic was one that I am very familiar with. I replied to this entry with a little bit of insight on what this gentleman could expect this summer on Maui, since I grew up there and on Oahu. Accessing a newsgroup next time I go on a trip could be very beneficial in finding inside information on the area I am planning to visit. I found that most people in newsgroups wrote about waves. Many articles gave in depth ideas of wave formation with explanations that gave me another lesson in physics. I was glad to find that even surfers from around the nation have some technical information to discuss with each other, besides just hyping each other up about who is the best surfer or what is the best spot to surf.
1.
Subject: SURFING IN HAWAII??????
Date: 1999/03/09
Can any of you guys tell me what the surf is like in the summer (may-august)? On any of the islands. I will be there sometime in early summer (Maui & possibly Oahu). If there is any good surf, where? And how consistent.
thanx..............
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I am going to discuss how I have found newsgroups to be used by people on the internet. The uses I have found are informative uses where people exchange information, entertainment reasons in which people use the information to entertain themselves. Also many people tend to become friends though newsgroups and start to interact with each other on social levels
Each newsgroup seems to have a good amount of productive material being filtered into it. I found that some entries by readers were short and unelaborated, but some writers have put in great information that can help other readers find what they are looking for. I was looking through wine newsgroup entries and I found one entry that is displayed above which gives a great site to order wine from. The site is www.winebuys.co.uk the site is great for anyone who would like to purchase wine, see if a certain wine is in stock, or price a wine against a competitors price. This could be helpful say if I wanted to know how much the local wine store marks up their prices from that of other places.
Entertainment
Newsgroups can be a great source of entertainment. I spent about two hours the first time I looked up newsgroup article descriptions and newsgroup descriptions. It was enjoyable to look up subjects that I had interest in. The first subject that I spent time on was wine. I found a few articles where people were obviously bored and started chating with each other. People on the surfing newsgroups talked about various things like theories on waves and how they are created and travel to their destinations.
I personally donât have time and donât enjoy enjoy chatting on the computer. I found that many people on these different newsgroups frequent them often and get to know each other on these newsgroups. People with the same interests can meet other people just by accessing newsgroups. They can be a great place to acquire information and converse with other enthusiast. I was happy to find that there were plenty of newsgroup articles on wine, where to find it, and various other things concerning wine. I chose to display one of the articles under the wine section in this paper because the author was interested in wine cellars. I am also interested in wine cellars and am waiting for a reply by other newsgroup goers.
First of all I learned how to access newsgroups. I found the easiest way to find what I wanted by using a search engine on America Online to search newsgroup and newsgroup article descriptions. The newsgroup article descriptions were great at giving me access to a large number of informative articles in various newsgroups. Second I found out how informative newsgroups can be. I found links to great sites and a lot of trivial knowledge. Most of all I found that a lot of people use newsgroups and access them daily.
When I started this project I didnât feel like I was the type of person to access newsgroups. I have accessed chat rooms before and I didnât find them to be entertaining or worth my time. Talking to individuals whom you donât know and may not have anything in common with didnât appeal to me. Some newsgroups turned out to be a great surprise. I have found that they can be a great source of information. I plan to keep accessing sites where information on wine is being exchanged. I am also interested in what other types of newsgroups are out there to be explored.
My feelings during, and what I would tell the next generation
I enjoyed looking through newsgroups once I got the hang of it and found out that there was something out there that was of interest to me. First I want to tell the next generation to be open minded and explore. I feel the more you explore, the better you will gain a grasp on what is really out there. I also recommend that one search on items that are of interest to oneself. This will greatly affect the out come of what you are trying to accomplish.
My Report1: (Online communities)