If you like to keep up with politics, USENET is a great place to be. Some people love discussion, and coincidentally, many of those same people seem to love the USENET system. The USENET system has some distinct advantages over Internet forums that you may want to consider if you like politics and are following the US presidential election this particular year.

more and less concentrated

Internet forums tend to attract people who strongly agree or strongly disagree with the general position of the forums. For example, if you were to go into an internet forum that had to do with the environment, you would probably find a pretty dysfunctional mix of true believers and trolls constantly picking on each other. USENET tends to be different.

First, there are newsgroups that are much broader in scope than most Internet forums. For example, you can go to groups like talk.politics and enjoy conversations that aren’t limited by the forum moderator’s preferences. If you don’t like that newsgroup, you can go to soc.politics and see what they have to offer. These groups offer a wider selection of topics and discussions than your average forum.

If you want a very focused conversation, you can head to a newsgroup like alt.politics.usa.constitution to express your views on the founding framework of the United States. You’ll find that, particularly in this newsgroup, people on the USENET system are good at staying on topic compared to what you’ll see on Internet forums. Someone isn’t going to barge into a conversation about economic policy and post a picture of their cat, for example, which is good for people who like their conversations to be a little more focused and intellectual.

rarefied hearing

USENET is very popular, with over 100,000 active groups, but its use is not as widespread as the Internet. USENET is also set up in a way that encourages people to find the information they want by making specific decisions about which newsgroups they join. This creates a situation where most people on USENET subscribe to newsgroups because they want to participate in them instead of just wanting to cause trouble.

If you’re a political junkie or a little more interested than the average individual, USENET’s political newsgroups may offer you something you’ll really enjoy.