Problems with NewsDemon

[Snarkyone]

Well I went ahead and got a usenet account at NewsDemon. The account was not even 3 minutes old and I see that they screwed me! I had a coupon from the list that one of you provided that had 30% for the lifetime of the account. That and the free newsrover made me pick that. I contacted Live Help and explained the problem and was told that the coupon was expired. I then told him "Gee, can you explain to me how the system knew that coupon was invalid when I have not entered yet since there is no place to enter a coupon when making your payment". I really hate being lied to. He then gathered his thoughts and passed the buck on to the accounts department which of course was not open. Not exactly what I would call a stellar start to usenet.

If you had FTN and GFT for your no ratio 0-day sites, maybe What and Waffles for music, and perhaps ScT, SCC, TL, and maybe RevTT for 0-day ratio sites and maybe Demonoid for some obscure stuff and you won't need usenet or at least you won't need a unlimted account you could get away with just a 25 GB account or something. I understand your preferences so I won't bother trying to get you to switch, as long as your happy thats all that matters.

Have to wait and see what the accounts department comes up. I look forward to how they handle this situation. After leaving a rather scathing support ticket about this and a suggestion that they should take the coupon down then instead of employing the illegal bait and switch on innocent consumers such as myself. I also told them that I was in the mind to file a complaint about that illegal practice. I really want to hear what they have to say to me about it.

Oh, and I could use a good list of groups for my account. I download 0-day movies from xvid to 1080p, music, comics, apps. Good 0-day sites would do the trick for me if someone can be so kind as to help me on this matter that would be great, if not then the hell with it I have great torrent sites I don't need usenet, lol!

[saulin]

Dude I would tell them to cancel that account that you don't want it and go with Astraweb for $11/mo - Unlimited. Astraweb has the best deal right now I think. Insane speeds and the retention is about the same as NewsDemon.

For a Newsreader right now I'm using Alt.Binz but I have a subscription for NewsLeecher Super Search so that's mainly what I use to search for stuff on usenet. Alt.Binz has support for NLSS and other search engines. That's why I use this one instead of NewsLeecher right now. A cracked version of NL with working SS can be found as well. It should be version 3.9 which is the last non beta release.

I pay less than $10 for Easynews and I have a 125GB block account with Astraweb for older stuff. Easynews has a kick ass web interface and searching for stuff with it it's easy. However I would not recommend them because of the issues they have had for the past 2 months with their servers making the web interface slow at times and some features of the web interface have not been working that great. Lately it seems like is back to normal or is getting there. Also there is no unlimited accounrs with Easynews. However I managed to bank over 400 gigs and I can't run out of gigs lol.

So my advice is that if they can't give you the discount, ditch them because Astraweb is cheaper.

[Chewie]

Well I went ahead and got a usenet account at NewsDemon. The account was not even 3 minutes old and I see that they screwed me! I had a coupon from the list that one of you provided that had 30% for the lifetime of the account. That and the free newsrover made me pick that. I contacted Live Help and explained the problem and was told that the coupon was expired. I then told him "Gee, can you explain to me how the system knew that coupon was invalid when I have not entered yet since there is no place to enter a coupon when making your payment". I really hate being lied to. He then gathered his thoughts and passed the buck on to the accounts department which of course was not open. Not exactly what I would call a stellar start to usenet...

...Have to wait and see what the accounts department comes up. I look forward to how they handle this situation. After leaving a rather scathing support ticket about this and a suggestion that they should take the coupon down then instead of employing the illegal bait and switch on innocent consumers such as myself. I also told them that I was in the mind to file a complaint about that illegal practice. I really want to hear what they have to say to me about it.

TBH the coupon code came from another site with no date shown on the page so it's entirely likely that it has expired which would not be Newsdemon's fault or problem.
I've just followed the FST link to ND and it recognised the link and welcomed me from here... and there was a "Disc ID" box for the code. Perhaps if they called the box Discount Code instead, it would be more apparent.
It's also possible that the guy was putting you through to Accounts in order to give you the discount as a goodwill gesture so don't slag them off just yet!

Oh, and I could use a good list of groups for my account. I download 0-day movies from xvid to 1080p, music, comics, apps. Good 0-day sites would do the trick for me if someone can be so kind as to help me on this matter that would be great, if not then the hell with it I have great torrent sites I don't need usenet, lol!

a.b.boneless is one of the most populated groups, as you can see from my screenie; the post count is based on the last time I updated the groups list - something you might want to do every couple of months to keep it up to date.
I don't know how NewsRover works but I would imagine that it can show you a similar list for you to pick your subscriptions.

a.b.b4e and others are filled with posts from usenet forums that don't contain a descriptive subject (and so don't appear on indexing sites) but most often have an nfo file to view and the rar set names are unaltered if you know what you're looking for.

I would say good luck but you're intelligent enough to not need any.

[Snarkyone]

Yeah, I saw the AstralWeb page and price and almost grabbed that first but ND had the full copy of the New Rover which was once less expense. As for the coupon, with no expiration date it should be valid whenever, that's why they put expiration dates on them in the first place. I would imagine that they will honor it, if not then I most definately gone from there. I followed a link someone had posted in this thread for free usenet trial accounts that took me to a page full of usenet services and coupons. So far I am not impressed, but a few hours is too early tell. I will update the thread later when I have settled this hash one way or the other.

An aside to Chewie, on the sign up form there was not a place labeled ANYTHING for the coupon code, I figured that once you signed up there would be a place within the site to apply the coupon which is common. There was absolutely no place to enter a code on the page I was at. The link that I am talking about that I followed is in this thread on page 6.

I feel cool having all of these hard to get trackers. If I used usenet, I wouldn't feel cool no more.

I just had to put this quote up each time I see it I laugh my ass off. Great post.

[tywyn]

It was I who posted the link to the Free Usenet trials and having just visited the ND site in FAQ's it states:

Note:
1. If you've signed up for a Free Trial Account, you should cancel your account before your trial period ends. 2. If you've paid using PayPal or WorldPay, please make sure to cancel your Subscription or FuturePay Agreement too.

Also in their T&C's it states

CANCELLATIONS

By subscribing to the service, the customer understands that this is a subscription that will renew automatically at the end of the term unless the customer cancels the service. Cancellations must be made by one of three methods. 1) Through our Live Chat Service 2) Through our support ticket service 3) Cancelled through the members area of our website. WE DO NOT ACCEPT EMAIL CANCELLATIONS. ALL EMAIL CANCELLATIONS WILL BE IGNORED.


It seems that you won't lose any money if you just cancel the service. I've tried some of the free offers on that page in the past and have had no problems in cancelling the accounts. I know that Giganews is excellent (a little expensive) but good for a free trial to see if you like Usenet.

If you want working usenet leeching software just PM me and I will upload it for you.


Personally I use a mixture of Usenet, Torrents and the occasional RS/Megaupload. Im not a huge leecher, a 120GB block of Astraweb credit will last me about 5-6 months, and having only just gone unlimited in the past 6 weeks as opposed to a capped peak allowance on my BB connection I have started to explore the world of torrenting more and more.

As I've signed up for about 21 trackers in the last few weeks I can honestly say that I'm only really interested in 3 maybe 4 of them. My favoutite of them has to be passthepopcorn, it has an awesome collection of movie torrents, I was extremely impressed when I got access to the site. There's a couple more trackers I'd like access to in the future, but like many others I can pretty much get anything I want

[Snarkyone]

Yeah, hopefully it won't be too much of a hassle, I didn't do the trial because of the 30% deal, it wasn't going to break the bank if I didn't like it. After the customer service I have seen I am not impressed. I also just downloaded the newest Simpson x264 episode off of usenet and it keeps hanging up during playback and just stops. Have not seen that happen since my first week of torrents and getting some crap ones from Mininova.

I guarantee you that you will end up dropping about 3/4 of those 21 trackers once you get some great 0-day, no ratio sites like FTN, GFT, PTN, and some great 0-day sites such as ScT, SCC, maybe TL, and RevTT, along with maybe What and Waffles for music and you will be set for life, and never need to pay a dime again. Like everything else you have the choice to which you prefer and whatnot, and of course there is no reason that you can't use both, it's not like they are mutually exclusive. For someone that is more a usenet guy you lucked into a nice site there at PtP for sure.

So far, I am not seeing any great advantage with usenet and I am trying really hard to not be biased especially in light of the shitty first 24 hours of my usenet experience. For those that are wondering, yeah I had no problem playing around and figuring out how to do work usenet. Torrents are simpler but I don't think that was ever in doubt. The par files do give you a nice option if the rars are bad so thats nice. The biggest pain in the ass to me is really having to look around for what I want as opposed to torrents, it is not great fun but it ain't all that painful either I am just a ornery old man with no patience for crap. Still a bit early in the game to really make a valid and objective comparision between the two forms. It will be interesting to see how I like it once I am more comfortable with the process. I think that I will get on the live chat and see about just cancelling this and getting Astraweb or something, I dunno I can't see this replacing torrents for me just yet.

UPDATE: Well it looks like being a prick paid off for me this time, I finally got my 35% lifetime discount applied. It only took 3 Live Support sessions, 3 unanswered phone calls, and 3 e-mails to get it done. If anyone is looking to go to NewsDemon or try out usenet now would be a good time to go there and grab that 35% lifetime discount now that you know it can be had. I ain't handing out blowjobs just yet, but at least now I don't feel like I was rooked with a bait and switch coupon. See the following chat for the final talk.

Andrew: Welcome to live chat support
Andrew: Hello.How may I assist you ?
Snarkyone: I just became a member last night and immediately had issues. I had a coupon for 30% off for the lifetime of the membership which is why I went ahead and decided to try ND. The coupon was not honored, I have been blown off and not given any answers
Snarkyone: support tickets unanswered, unable to login to support area to see ticket and no help resolving that. at this time I would really just like to cancel and get a refund, this has not been a very good experience for me
Andrew: May I know the discount coupon code you have entered while signing up?
Snarkyone: no one answers the 1-888 number either I get voice mail when attempting to call the number given to me when I was emailed the account details. I would like this to be treated just as a trial so I can get out of here
Snarkyone: yeah no problem
Snarkyone: http://www.newsgroupreviews.com/news...al-coupon.html
Snarkyone: go there and see and I was wrong it was 35% off
Snarkyone: it says it won an award for best discount for 2009 yet I was told that the coupon was expired which I find odd since I had never had a chance to enter the info in order for it to be validated or not.
Snarkyone: oh in case you don't see it the code with that page is this: ngr35percent
Andrew: Sorry for the inconvenience caused.
Snarkyone: not your fault but thanks your the first one to say that
Andrew: May I know your Member ID please?
Snarkyone: sure, Your login is: (removed, I ain't stupid)
Your password is: (see above)
Snarkyone: is that what your looking for?
Andrew: Please wait while I look into your account information.
Snarkyone: sure
Andrew: We have updated coupon code on your account.
Andrew: You will get a discount of 35% from now on.
Snarkyone: ok nice, thanks very much, finally someone who is competent.
Andrew: Thank you for using Live Chat support.