Usenet service - Blocknews, Usenetnow, Frugalusenet

Query:

1. FrugalUsenet is $3.99/mo for the first 400 people that sign up, then $40/yr. I might be bad at math, but how is the $3.99/mo option cheaper than the yearly option? ($48/yr vs. $40/yr).
2. FrugalUsenet has retention for 300 days. What if an individual has a premium membership to nzbmatrix or other other sites which then give retention to 1200 days. Which one holds when attempting to access an article? The 300 or the 1200?

Quote from rebelx : Query: 1. FrugalUsenet is $3.99/mo for the first 400 people that sign up, then $40/yr. I might be bad at math, but how is the $3.99/mo option cheaper than the yearly option? ($48/yr vs. $40/yr). 2. FrugalUsenet has retention for 300 days. What if an individual has a premium membership to nzbmatrix or other other sites which then give retention to 1200 days. Which one holds when attempting to access an article? The 300 or the 1200?

The $3.99 is month to month with no commitment. So, you can cancel and stop paying anytime and switch to another provider whenever should wish. The $40 a year is prepaid. When you prepay you are committed to a year and your money is tied up for that year.

Frugal's retention is 300 days. So nothing from Nzbmatrix over 300 days is available from Frugal. There is a reason they use the name 'Frugal'. In order to keep their prices low, they offer only 300 days retention. For some people 300 days retention is enough. Those people usually buy block accounts with longer retention to use when they on occasion need to download content that is over 300 days old. Depending on your needs, Frugal's 300 day retention and a non expiring block account with longer retention can be very economical.

Quote from malcontent70 : The $3.99 is month to month with no commitment. So, you can cancel and stop paying anytime and switch to another provider whenever should wish. The $40 a year is prepaid. When you prepay you are committed to a year and your money is tied up for that year. Frugal's retention is 300 days. So nothing from Nzbmatrix over 300 days is available from Frugal. There is a reason they use the name 'Frugal'. In order to keep their prices low, they offer only 300 days retention. For some people 300 days retention is enough. Those people usually buy block accounts with longer retention to use when they on occasion need to download content that is over 300 days old. Depending on your needs, Frugal's 300 day retention and a non expiring block account with longer retention can be very economical.

So a nonexpiring block has no retention limit and is only limited to the amount of time present in their newsrover service (ie. nzbmatrix)?

Quote from rebelx : So a nonexpiring block has no retention limit and is only limited to the amount of time present in their newsrover service (ie. nzbmatrix)?

Every usenet provider has a retention limit. It varies between provider. The average retention is 1550-1570 days currently. Again, it depends on the individual provider. They usually advertise their retention limit on their website.

Quote from malcontent70 : Every usenet provider has a retention limit. It varies between provider. The average retention is 1550-1570 days currently. Again, it depends on the individual provider. They usually advertise their retention limit on their website.

If one were to have a Frugal account (300 days) would that mean that newsrover sites (free versions) which offer 20 days access, are now magically good for up to 300 days or do you still need to buy their premium service?

Quote from rebelx : If one were to have a Frugal account (300 days) would that mean that newsrover sites (free versions) which offer 20 days access, are now magically good for up to 300 days or do you still need to buy their premium service?

I'm not familiar with the Newsrover sites your talking about. But if you have Frugal you can access 300 days retention using Newsrover or any usenet client.

Quote from malcontent70 : I'm not familiar with the Newsrover sites your talking about. But if you have Frugal you can access 300 days retention using Newsrover or any usenet client.

It was nzbmatrix, but I think I follow your logic. Thanks!

great deal on frugal. actually you cant really beat the deal on usenetnow either at $8.99 since the crappy highwinds providers throttle on the black friday deals.

Quote from rebelx : It was nzbmatrix, but I think I follow your logic. Thanks!

To make a parallel to torrents, NZBMatirx is like your tracker sites which allows you to download the .torrent files. Downloading .torrent files doesn't mean you have the actual content. You need to use a bittorrent client and, you need people to be actually seeding the content, otherwise having the .torrent file is useless.

Same way, NZBMatrix allows you to download .nzb files. The .nzb files are just information that a news client uses to download the actual content from news servers (you can think of news servers as seeds). When you pay NZBMatirx (or similar siltes), you only pay to for the ability to download the .nzb files, not the content. The NZB sites don't care about what service you use, they will still provide you with .nzb that goes back to 1200 days. If your news service has a retention of only 300 days, then downloading .nzb that is aged 1200 days (or even 301 days) will result in an incomplete (or even no) download of the actual content. It is like the .torrent file is there, but there are no seeders.

I had a FrugalUsenet membership for about 1 week. It was horrible unless you were keeping up with up to date TV shows or wanted new released movies.

I am still on Thundernews which was posted on a black friday deal for 2 years ago. $5 a month and about 700 day retention.

Quote from Turd Furguson : I had a FrugalUsenet membership for about 1 week. It was horrible unless you were keeping up with up to date TV shows or wanted new released movies. I am still on Thundernews which was posted on a black friday deal for 2 years ago. $5 a month and about 700 day retention.

Can you elaborate on what made Frugal horrible for you? I've been using Frugal for about 2 years and have no issue with it. Thundernews is Highwinds and has a bad reputation for manufacturing reasons to dump Black Friday accounts if the customer dares to use the 'unlimited' account. They boot who they consider high volume customers. Frugal resells 'Readnews' which has better completion then Highwinds.

Quote from Turd Furguson : I had a FrugalUsenet membership for about 1 week. It was horrible unless you were keeping up with up to date TV shows or wanted new released movies.

the majority of users check usenet and have automated set ups that grab material within hours to a max of a few days old. 300 days is more than enough for seasoned usenet veterans who remember 10 days as big news.

Quote from Turd Furguson : I had a FrugalUsenet membership for about 1 week. It was horrible unless you were keeping up with up to date TV shows or wanted new released movies.

If Frugal's retention was the cause of your 'horrible' experience then that's on you. Frugal clearly advertises that it's retention is 300 days. If you regularly download content that is over 300 days then Frugal wasn't the best option for you.

As it has been mention before, many people use Frugal because they automate their downloads from usenet. With the use of Sickbeard, Couchpotato and RSS the majority of your desired content can be automatically downloaded as soon as it's indexed. So, 300 days retention and the low price of Frugal makes it a perfect choice for some users. Combined with a block account (with longer retention) to get the occasional content that is over 300 days.