Google Groups screenshot |
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| Developer(s) | |
| Written in | Java[1] |
| Operating system | Cross-platform (web-based application) |
| Type | Newsgroups electronic mailing lists |
| Website | groups.google.com |
Google Groups is a service from Google Inc. that supports discussion groups, including many Usenet newsgroups, based on common interests. The service was started in 1995 as Deja News, and was transitioned to Google Groups after a February 2001 buyout.
Membership in Google Groups is free of charge and many groups are anonymous. Users can find discussion groups related to their interests and participate in threaded conversations, either through a web interface or by e-mail. They can also start new groups.[2] Google Groups also includes an archive of Usenet newsgroup postings dating back to 1981[3] and supports reading and posting to Usenet groups.[4] Users can also set up mailing list archives for e-mail lists that are hosted elsewhere.[5]
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The Deja News Research Service was an archive of messages posted to Usenet discussion groups, started in March 1995 by Steve Madere in Austin, Texas. Its powerful search engine capabilities won the service acclaim, generated controversy, and significantly changed the perceived nature of online discussion.
While archives of Usenet discussions had been kept for as long as the medium existed, Deja News offered a novel combination of features. It was available to the general public, provided a simple World Wide Web user interface, allowed searches across all archived newsgroups, returned immediate results, and retained messages indefinitely. The search facilities transformed Usenet from a loosely organized and ephemeral communication tool into a valued information repository. The archive's relative permanence, combined with the ability to search messages by author, raised concerns about privacy and confirmed oft-repeated past admonishments that posters should be cautious in discussing themselves and others.[6]
While Madere was initially reluctant to remove archived material, protests from users and legal pressure led to the introduction of "nuking," a method for posters to permanently remove their own messages from search results. It already supported the use of an "X-No-Archive" message header, which if present would cause an article to be omitted from the archive. This did not prevent others from quoting the material in a later message and causing it to be stored. Copyright holders were also allowed to have material removed from the archive. According to Humphrey Marr of Deja News, copyright actions most frequently came from the Church of Scientology.[7]
The service was eventually expanded beyond search. My Deja News offered the ability to read Usenet in the traditional chronological, per-group manner, and to post new messages to the network. Deja Communities were private Internet forums offered primarily to businesses. In 1999 the site (now known as Deja.com) sharply changed direction and made its primary feature a shopping comparison service. During this transition, which involved relocation of the servers, many older messages in the Usenet archive became unavailable. By late 2000 the company, in financial distress, sold the shopping service to eBay, who incorporated the technology into their half.com service.
By 2001 the search service was shut down. In February 2001, Google acquired Deja News, and transitioned its assets to groups.google.com.[8] Users were then able to access these Usenet newsgroups through the new Google Groups interface.
By the end of 2001 the archive had been supplemented with other archived messages dating back to May 11, 1981.[9][10][11] These early posts from 1981–1991 were donated to Google by the University of Western Ontario, based on archives by Henry Spencer from the University of Toronto.[12] Shortly after, Google released a new version, which allowed users to create their own (non-Usenet) groups.
In February 2006, Google modified the interface of Google Groups, adding profiles and post ratings.
In October 2010, Google announced it would be dropping support for welcome messages, pages, and files effective January 2011.[13][14]
In December 2010, Google rolled out a New UI Preview with more Gmail/Reader-Like functionality.
Google provides two distinct kinds of groups: traditional Usenet groups, and non-Usenet groups that are more similar to mailing lists. The latter type is accessible only by web or by e-mail, not by NNTP. The Google Groups user interface and help messages do not use a distinct name for mailing-list style groups, referring to both styles of group as "Google Groups."[15]
Google recognizes the X-No-Archive header and displays messages containing it for only seven days, after which the article becomes no longer available to the public. Google also recognizes the "-- " Usenet signature delimiter, and removes the significant space at the end (thus, proper Usenet signatures can't be added to articles posted via Google Groups).
Google has created several official help groups for some of its services, such as Gmail. In these groups, users can ask and answer questions about the relevant Google service. Each official group has a Google representative who occasionally responds to queries. Google representatives always have a blue G symbol in their nicknames.
Some official groups include:
In addition to the Groups, and Forums (see below), Google also now has Product Ideas for giving feedback for some of their products including the Google Groups New Preview UI:
Google also uses Google Groups to host their Google Friends and Google Page Creator Updates mailing lists, which are announcement-only groups where only moderators can post.
There are also help forums, which appear to have different functionality from Google Groups:
The late Lee Rizor, also known as "Blinky the Shark," started the Usenet Improvement Project, a project which is highly critical of Google Groups and its users. The project aims to "make Usenet participation a better experience." They have accused Google Groups of turning a blind eye to an "increasing wave of spam" from its servers and of encouraging an Eternal September of "lusers" and "lamers" arriving in established groups en masse. The Usenet Improvement Project provides several killfile examples to block messages posted by Google Groups users in several newsreaders.[18]
On October 16, 2003, John Wiley & Sons sent a letter to Google after discovering that copyrighted text from a book they published was made available for download on a Google group.[19]
Slashdot and Wired contributors have criticized Google for its inattention to a search engine for Google Groups, leaving many older postings virtually inaccessible.[20][21][22]
Google Groups has been blocked in Turkey since April 10, 2008 by the order of a court in Turkey.[23] According to The Guardian, the court banned Google Groups following a libel complaint by Adnan Oktar against the service. Google Groups was the first of several websites to be blocked by the Turkish Government in rapid succession solely for including material which allegedly offended Islam.[24]