Is Newsgroups going down the drain???

[WeaponXxX]

I have not been very active lately, you could even say my online alter ego has been in a virtual coma over the past year. Now what I like to do is get newsgroups access for a few months once a year with a 360 day retainer and just go ape shit, like a kid in a candy store I like to say. Games and dvdrips are usually no problem but I often "download the internet" while still having a month in a half or so of prepaid newsgroups access. So then the wife and I like to watch current shows or even sometimes grab a screener release. Now here is where I feel down right frustrated, download the file and it is password protected? WTF is this crap seriously? Newsgroups used to be my one place where ... like I said kid in a candy store. So I download another source and STILL password protected. Now if I am downright in the middle of a show I often end up going to torrents where I can read the reviews to verify what I am trying to access is legit. Anyone else have these frustrations? Does anyone actually fall for that "go to this site to get the password" shit? Just curious to get some thoughts from other members and friends.

 

[Armadillo]

It seems to be just one idiot/group of idiots putting up the passworded files and they only started doing it fairly recently, so hopefully they'll get bored and it'll pass, one even changed name to match a normally reliable uploader, so obviously just doing it to annoy.

Can't say it's been causing me any problems though, I haven't come across anything where there is only a passworded release of it up, normally I just quickly check the first file and if I see another rar contained within it, rather than the file, I just go to another posting of it.

 

[jgu1994]

Holy crap it's weaponxxx. That's a name i haven't seen in awhile.

 

[FAST6191]

We had a discussion on this in IRC earlier this evening/last night.

The way to dodge it seems to be

Download first file in the rar set and check for password with that (force extract or open it- another rar file and it is passworded).

The fakes do impersonate the good posters but not well (different emails). My simple way is find the good one (usually the first to post but not always in the case of the 360) and click on that uploader, standard browser history features change the colour making life easier in the future. On the flip side people will usually mirror releases with no names somewhere but that is as troublesome as ever.

Anyhow we have always had fakes but I will agree it has either come to the fore or more of it is happening. I guess it is just more frustrating because you know the data is right there in front of you.

The third option I guess would be to use the NZB boards/sites (think torrent sites for NZB), not immune but usually good enough.

edit: As for down the drain it has not made life easier but it is still an extremely long way from ruining anything.

 

[Costello]

Good to see you around mate

On topic, yeah I have this problem a great deal of times, it's so annoying. I have to download stuff two or three times before I actually get the real deal.

 

[Sonicslasher]

OFF TOPIC:

Nice to see you around again. Maybe you can join us on IRC sometime or another.

 

[BiscuitBee]

Yeah, I got a downloaded a few full 'packages' which turned out to be password-protected. Pretty sad. I've switch to other means since then. There are some places that host .nzb files where people can comment on them, though. So, hopefully, someone will warn others of the password (or even give the password)
edit: oh, 600 GET

 

[TrolleyDave]

Yep, I've been noticing this alot as well. It's like newsgroups are the new p2p. Don't really see the point in it either, it's not like newsgroups have a share ratio! lol