Both demand for and use of newsgroups and mailing lists has
been growing here at Stanford, mailing lists more so than
newsgroups. The attempts that have been made to convert
popular local newsgroups to web-based fora have failed miserably.
Having worked at large universities for a number of years, I understand the
unique environment that universities afford. Usenet and mailing lists grew
up with universities, and I don't see that ever changing. However the
Internet has become a far far bigger place now, and the proportion of Usenet
and mailing lists in the grand scheme of things is going down. When I say
"dying" I don't really mean literally decreasing in size, merely not growing
nearly to the degree everything else is and becoming more or less stagnant
(in both size and mindshare). Growth of the Big-8 newsgroups is essentially
flat. I don't know what stats like are for article flows over the last 6
years. Regionals are growing in some areas, shrinking in others. It seems
that for what corporations used to turn to email or Usenet communication
internally, they are turning to proprietary or web-based technologies.
blog/LiveJournal strikes me more as a completely new
phenomenon, not a replacement for any other existing
communications medium.
I don't agree. Now that blogs are around, they are being used in places
where Usenet or email would have been before. That's a replacement.
But if you want to see the future of Usenet technology in my
view of things, go to <http://www.gmane.org/>.
Fun stuff.
--Dave