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Are there any open complete and downloadable usenet archives?

I don't expect binaries to be included, only the text messages? If the complete archive is not available, than at least a partial archive of some categories? But the most interesting aspect for me is, if there are complete archives for at least a part of groups, so containing all posts from beginning until now?

Patrick Hoefler
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2 Answers2

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You should check out Exploring the USENET Archive: Early Thoughts and here is archive.org's archive.

John
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  • Google Groups no longer appears to support search by author, archive.org's archive is not really searchable, and both are very incomplete, e.g. from the latter, comp has been removed. I suspect fully public and searchable archives may never reappear due to privacy concerns. – reinierpost Aug 29 '21 at 12:44
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Google's been hosting all the Usenet archives for some time.

Most of Google's archive only goes back to ~1990 - their oldest stuff is from 1986.

The Usenet Archive (http://www.crunchbase.com/company/the-usenet-archive) is more complete, going back to ~1980 - which technically was the beginning of the nn protocol "usenet". But the really old email based listserv archives seem to be gone.

[Someone has edited-swiped my answer. I don't believe the above information is true, google has been hosting the USENET archives all the way back since their inception -- something like 1975. --markj]

Community
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Marcos
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    If you're going to mention GoogleGroups, you have to mention that it pre-dates Google, as it was originally DejaNews ... and there has been significant complaints about how Google handles the archival nature of GoogleGroups vs. newer posts. – Joe May 12 '13 at 11:41
  • Thanks, feel free to make a new answer, I will remove mine. – Marcos Nov 12 '13 at 04:05
  • Is there any way to download a full copy of either of these archives, or are they only exposed via search? – SuperAce99 Feb 04 '14 at 15:55