I did, for 12 years. Monthly. The free servers were substandard. I left when flame wars got to be too nerve-wracking in the unmoderated groups and the moderated groups screened every post on a pre basis, sometimes not approving the posts until a week later. I don't think that the forums we enjoy today, like SENIORSonly existed 1998-2012. Or at least I wasn't aware of them.
I have no idea what Usenet even is, can you please explain, @Boris Boddenov ? I don’t think that I belonged to actual forums before 2012; but yahoo used to have groups, similar to Facebook groups, which were about any subject a person wanted to discuss. The yahoo Groups were free. Back in the days of dial-up, there was a free service called Juno, and then it went to having to pay a few dollars a month, but it was hard to get on line and you got kicked off every little while. About all I did was use it to check email.
Usenet contains 110,000 groups covering every conceivable subject. The overwhelming are unmoderated groups. Yahoo groups as I recall were moderated to the extent that the "owner/creator" could delete you if (s)he merely disagreed with your opinion. Recall one woman removing people who knew what they were talking about regarding SSA. She had no background in that area but held strong opinions nevertheless. Usenet server moderators could delete you from their service for serious things like threatening or excessive flaming but they didn't want to disrupt your monthly payments. Today, Google provides free access to Usenet as well as to their own Google Groups, but their Usenet coverage is lacking in my opinion. And with respect to Google Groups, the "owner/creator" can remove you as (s)he sees fit, like Yahoo. I "created/owned" a Google Group, but quit when my wife's dementia required constant attention.
@Yvonne Smith Coupla other things, Yvonne. The servers allowed cross-posting to multiple groups, within reason. E.g., if you had a political issue pertaining to minority females, you might choose to send it to alt.non-racism, talk.politics.misc., and soc.women. Usenet, though, has become a place for flamers and in the last years in which I participated, a target of robot spammers that the servers have been unable to control.
I've never heard of Usenet, but there were plenty of forums/bulletin boards in the late 1990s. I think the first forum I joined was the QVC shopping forum, then called "Shop Talk," in 1996 or so. The iRV2 Forum for RVing enthusiasts was created in 2000 and is still going strong with over 275,000 members. I was a forum moderator there for a few years.
My first and only encounter with Usenet was back in the 80's I think. You could get to it from a terminal at work. I typed in something and someone from St Petersburg, Russia, replied. At the time I thought this was just the most amazing thing ever!
Barley remember that. However if it has become anything like I read on replys fom news sources, Google, and others..I would pass. Some of those people sound cut throat and out for blood vs having an opionon.
I did, but only for a short time. I was running a BBS at the time so I put my time into that instead. There were BBS forums that operated similarly, with various degrees of moderation.