Claire Petersky wrote:
"Wolf Kirchmeir" wrote in message
.. .
Chuckie wrote:
What do you mean by a newsreader?
A program that connects to a news server and presents the posts for every
group that you select. I'm using Thunderbird (part of the Mozilla suite -
look for it on mozilla.org.) There are others, such a Forte. Google on
"news reader software", and you will find a large number of programs. All
provide some means of setting filters to block posts that you don't want.

If you have a Windows machine, you probably got Outlook Express for free,
which has a newsreader. Many people dis OE, but I suspect a lot of it is
because it is a Microsoft product. OE works just fine. Your ISP will
probably have a webpage on how to set up your newsreader. OE is used by
many, so they'll show how to configure it for your service, along with
Thunderbird and other common newsreaders.

Yes, OE and IE do work well, but if you use any MS 'net software, you
should learn about how to improve security: do not rely on MS's
anti-virus or anti-spyware products, they are _not_ good enough. A
healthy dose of paranoia doesn't hurt either! :-)

And Windows and MS software aren't "free", they're just included in the
price of the machine. Your computer would cost about $100 to $150 less
without any operating system on it.

My ISP is Earthlink, and they carry any newsgroup I'd care to read. If your
ISP doesn't provide newsgroups (I wouldn't pay for one that didn't, but I
use Usenet daily), then you can pay individual.de (see:
http://news.individual.net/) 10 euros/year for the service, which is a
pretty darn good deal.

Useful info, thanks.