Let me start off this introduction by describing to you what a Newsgroup is. A newsgroup is part of the internet that is organized by subject heading. Under each subject heading, people post messages to each other. It is like a large bulletin board on the internet with tens of thousands of subjects.

I first started to visit the newsgroups about a year and a half ago. The reason in which I visited the newsgroup is because I heard from a friend that it is a good place to find out about some of my hobbies, especially Japanese anime. At first, I was baffled on how to access the newsgroups. It was not as popular as the World Wide Web, and the software was not as widely publicized as Web browsers. I acquired software from a Web site called CWS Apps, a web site specializing in gathering information about Internet shareware and freeware. When I installed the software and started to look at the newsgroups, I did not suffer from the shock that many people feel when they start to visit the newsgroups. At that time, the newsgroups were not as big and did not have as much messages as they do now. I currently feel a little overwhelmed at the number of messages in the newsgroups.

I have been reading newsgroups for a year and a half before this assignment came up. I found that newsgroups were a good source of information on hobbies and topics that are of interest to me. One of my hobbies is to collect computer MIDI sound files and a good place to find MIDI files and discuss join-in in discussions on soundcards and other equipment was alt.binaries.sounds.midi (absm for short). Absm was also a good place to request certain files that you needed. Absm is a different from other newsgroups because of the fact that it has "binaries" included in the title. When a newsgroup has "binaries" included, it means that it is a group in which the primary purpose is to post up files, which in this case had to do with MIDI sound.

The other newsgroups that I keep up with is on the topic of the Japanese anime series Robotech. These include alt.fan.robotech and alt.tv.robotech. In these newsgroups, they discuss various aspects of the anime, and also such relevant news such as where to get Robotech merchandise, events that are happening, and where the anime is being shown in their area.

I used a freeware product called Free Agent 1.2 for Windows 95 made by Forté to keep track of the newsgroups. This is one of the best newsgroup browsers that I have used so far. Its main advantage over such other browsers such as Microsoft News, Netscape News, and others is the ability to maximize one of the three windows that it offers (newsgroups, the individual thread, and the message area) so that it can take up the entire space and the ability to switch between each one of these maximized windows. None of the other browsers offer this feature.

An important thing that I learned is the importance of subscribing to the newsgroups that you want to keep up with and then filtering out the rest of the list so as not to clutter the screen. Using Free Agent simplified keeping track of all the messages because the program marks the messages. A saved message is marked with a green icon, message that was read was marked with a yellow icon, and a unread message is not marked at all. A new message which was just posted is in a red font and a old message is in a black font. Also a good habit is to delete messages that are not needed anymore from the window. This way, it is easier to find new messages and is less confusing. Another useful hint is to filter out things that you do not want. Free Agent does this by "Kill" command in which it scans all the messages and looks for words that you designate. This is a good way to avoid looking at spamed messages.

I analyzed the messages by following the thread until it was completed and reading the subject heading, what was quoted from the previous message, and how often the person participated on that thread. I have observed spamming, and flaming. One problem I had to solve was on how to decode an attachment in a message. Another was I had to figure out how to post a message on the newsgroup. I felt good about it.

Some new concepts that I came across when using the newsgroups is such as spamming, flaming, and coding/decoding. Spamming is when you post to multiple newsgroups, even to newsgroups that have no relevance whatsoever. Flaming is hostile messages that are posted in response to a certain message. Coding is when you covert a file to something postable on the newsgroup (text) using a certain method. Using software, you can decode the file off the newsgroup, converting it back to its original format. People use this method to post pictures, sound files and other types of files. Flaming and spamming are unfortunate that it exists on the internet, because most of it is counterproductive and annoying. On the other hand, coding/decoding is helpful in transferring files through newsgroups.

In observing a hot debate in absm about the merits of the ever popular soundcard Sound Blaster AWE32, I observed the posting habits of people. When people respond to certain things that were said in a previous thread, they tend to quote the message they were responding to. The quoted section can be seen with the < or << markings. When responding to the quote originally, the < is used. The << is used when the someone is quoting a message that already has been quoted before and is being requoted. This happens because the program adds the < sign to the previous < automatically. About 75% of the people quote the entire message, while the other 25% only quote the parts necessary. And fewer alternate between quote and reply to the quote. Experienced people tend to limit their quoting and alternate between quote and reply.

Overall, the messages tend to contain one topic per message. Most messages tend to follow the request-reply format where one person requests information or a file and then someone replies to that message either in the same thread or with a separate one, starting off the subject area with the "Re" heading. Most requests are started with the "REQ" in the subject heading. For example, a typical subject heading will look like this for a request: REQ: "Tears in Heaven" by Billy Joel and for a reply, RE: REQ: "Tears in Heaven" by Billy Joel -- TEARHEVN.MID (1/1). There has been some cases in the Robotech groups that someone new with either the Internet or the series have posted multiple topic and the reply has been a multiple topic response. Many of these start like this: "I am new to the series Robotech and have several questions. 1) How come. . ." But this is rare and does not occur to often.

On flaming: One sure way of getting flamed is to post a message that is highly opinionated statement with a defiant tone. In fact, anything with a opinion that is negative with sure to generate some flames. One example of this is when a person starts a thread which subject states "Re: AWE 32's are CRAP!!!!!!!!!" could be found in alt.binaries.sounds.midi. This thread continued for 2 weeks and another thread was started, defending the AWE 32. There are many people who read these newsgroups and there will always be a small group disagree with you that will vocalize their opinion. Many times, the flaming is very diplomatic, sometimes even apologetic: "P.S. I really don't mean to sound adversarial, I'm just curious," while other times down right nasty, with name calling and swearing: "Anyone who argues [this] is obviously ignorant and tin-eared." At other times, people will get upset and flame you if you spam over newsgroups, post messages that are considered inappropriate, or breach other forms of netetiquet.

On posting behaviors: People will post a follow up when the message is a follow-up to the original message in the thread and they will start a new thread when the topic is different from any other threads. The more interesting a thread is, the more longer it is maintained. Also discussion threads are more longer than other types of threads, such as request threads. Discussion threads are when someone throws out a question and people would add their comments. An example of this could have been seen in the Robotech newsgroups. One that was posted sometime ago was this question: "Which is better, the U.S.S Enterprise D (from Star Trek - The Next Generation) and the SDF-1 (from Robotech)?" This was cross-posted in many of the Star Trek related newsgroups and their were over 50 follow-up posts from fans all over the world.

Because there are so many people on the newsgroups, there is no set pattern of predictability on the response of messages. Some things that are predictable are that if you do post a request, there is a high chance that someone will respond to it. People tend to be very good about reposting things when people request the same type of information again. If you do something that irritates a person (spaming, or just being annoying) then there is a high chance that you will be flamed. People do take their time to help someone new on the internet if the new person asks nice enough (for example a common question is "How do I decode an attachment?").

People tend to be more blunt when they disagree with another person on the Internet. When they do disagree, they tend to flame the other person (see section on flaming). Because of the feeling of anonminty, they feel more free to express themselves. When people do break a norm or rule on the newsgroup, they are more or less ignored if the violation is not to sivier. If they repeatedly do it or make a nuisance of themselves, then they will be flamed or worse. There are stories of people receiving e-mail bombs (small programs sent through e-mail that erase their e-mail or worse) to worse offenders.

When I encountered newsgroups for the first time, I was apprehensive. It was completely different from the World Wide Web, which is more visual and user friendly that newsgroups. It also took me a while to find a newsgroup that I liked. What helped was that several web pages that I visited often had links to some newsgroups with similar topics. Also felt overwhelmed. The newsgroups that I participated in was very active, so if I did not visit everyday, I would have hundreds of new messages to read. I would spend hours reading the messages. I soon learned to discriminate important from unimportant messages by looking at the subject of the message. I also try to follow the thread all the way through, reading every message that is part of the thread. I do not read every message posted in a newsgroup, skipping requests for files and such and I tend to skip spams and things that do not interest me. I read the newsgroups using the Free Agent news browser. I have benefited a great deal by participating in the newsgroups, finding information and files that I otherwise would not have been able to obtain.

It took me a while to post my first message. In fact it took me about one year to post my first message. I was content in just reading the message that other people posted and feeding off the information that it provided. My first post was on absm, requesting a midi file. I was disappointed when no one had that midi file. Soon it became very easy to post on the newsgroups. I have posted about 20 messages so far. I do not use my real name when I do post, using many of my nicknames to hide my true identity. I feel comfortable this way. This seems to be very popular on the Internet in general. People who put up Web pages seem to shy away from putting their real names and use aliases instead.

My current posting style is a very conservative style. I don't post unless there is a very interesting discussion group going on or someone requests a file that I have. I check 4-5 times a week for replies. I try not to incite flaming. People tend to respond to me. I still do have some conflicts when I debate with myself if I should post or not post. Unless someone says something that is very ignorant, I usually do not flame people, but if a person is asking for it I will flame them.

Using AltaVista I searched for newsgroups that related to the topics of spamming and flaming on Newsgroups. The first one that I found was by Henry Edward Hardy. He posted his masters thesis on The History of the Net. Here, he covers the overall history of the Internet, from its early beginnings. He also looks at some of the social phenomena that developed along with the Internet, such as flaming and spamming.

The next page that I found was titled Social Forces that Developed USENET. On this page, the author covers the development of USENET and also the some of the motivational forces that pushed the development of USENET.

Asynchronicity covers the structures of the USENET, and the social reverberations of its development. From this site, I found a link that pointed to The Net Abuse FAQ. This page describes many of the ways that the people abuse the USENET, and has a very good section describing Spammers.