Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cica!iuvax!uceng!dmocsny
From: dmocsny@uceng.UC.EDU (daniel mocsny)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc
Subject: Re: Boston public access unix?
Summary: Check out pubnet.nixpub
Message-ID: <3014@uceng.UC.EDU>
Date: 2 Dec 89 19:05:51 GMT
References: <7183@pt.cs.cmu.edu>
Organization: Univ. of Cincinnati, College of Engg.
Lines: 40

In article <7183@pt.cs.cmu.edu>, jwz@spice.cs.cmu.edu (Jamie Zawinski) writes:
>One of my friends in Boston has had a taste of netnews and wants more; anyone
> know of either 1: an inexpensive site that would give him access to news, or


The public-access usenet sites have their own newsgroup hierarchy. 
Check pubnet.nixpub for a listing of all known sites. If your site
does not carry this group, I'll mail you the latest listing.

Starting your own site is not really out of the question, if you have
about $5k to spend (386 AT clone with 4 MB RAM + >120 MB disk), UNIX
runtime + development, modem, multiport board, extra phone line or
two, a load of books), and (if you aren't already a UNIX whiz) 6
months to a year of evenings and weekends to learn UNIX and figure out
how to get everything running. Better cultivate some friends who know
what's going on, or you might become very frustrated if you aren't a
super genius. 

$5k would actually be on the low side, you probably couldn't get the
multiport board, and that would mean using the two serial ports on
your AT clone. This could make things hard, since you will probably
want to keep one port/phone line clear for uucp transfers.  But that
is what I am going to try for now. (Pull down news at night on my
voice line when I don't use it anyway; to avoid incoming data calls,
I'll poll my feed, it won't poll me. Once I get things going I'll let
select users dial in on my second phone line. When that starts to
get crowded, I'll add a third phone line and a multiport board. At
some point I'll start promoting my site, and if I get enough people
hooked I'll start asking for a nominal fee to offset expansion
costs. I figure I'll add a 5ESS switch and a 10 GB disk farm,
along with my own power substation to guarantee continuous
uptime... :-)

You'll also have to get a newsfeed. You can buy one from uunet
for a nice piece of change, but if you can swing a feed from
a local site that will be cheaper. Start by scanning the map
files for your locale and trying to get friendly. 

Dan Mocsny
dmocsny@uceng.uc.edu