Discussion:
Happy Memorial Day weekend - with a hearty thanks to all the freeware Usenet server admins & clients around the world!
(too old to reply)
Arlen Holder
2020-05-25 17:12:26 UTC
Permalink
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!

My off-the-cuff history with Usenet... (please add your experiences so
that, as always, all benefit from your every action on the Internet).

When I joined a Silicon Valley startup, just out of grad school, decades
ago, the IT guy eventually implemented this "new" free communication
system, called "Usenet" where we could discuss technical things on this
thing called the "Internet" using our DEC, Masscomp, SunOS, and eventually
Solaris machines (well before Linux took off I think).

We installed this freeware thing called "rn" and then later, "tin", and it
just worked fine, where we even used our real names, and real email
addresses (by then we didn't even need to bang the path through the net to
our smtp mail servers).

Over time, Mac & Windows PC's arrived (where we were forced to use Samba
and CAP just so that they could all read the same files as PCs did) as did
graphical newsreaders like Pan or Dialog, where, at some point, we even had
this "Internet" at home, via ISDN the phone company, which the company paid
for because it was a "business need" to be connected at all times.

Moving onward, at some point, AT&T had sbcglobal Usenet server settings,
which was the first time our Usenet was divorced from the company servers
(in those days, you didn't worry about what you said on the net, even at
work as the IT guy, maybe two guys by now, was a rebel like the rest of us
were).

This weird thing called 'spam' showed up one day, out of the blue, where we
actually _responded_ to it telling people to stop it, and even complained
to their admin about them sending unwanted advertisements in our email
(where we started with 'mail -s "subject" ***@where.com < body' but now we
had graphical MUAs such as "Eudora").

At some point, we were forced to implement procmail filters (this is before
Google existed), and even mailbombs to stop what we began calling
"spammers" at some point in time.

At some point Usenet became politicized, where Mario Cuomo and AT&T decided
to kill it once and for all, one for purely political gain, while the other
for cost shaving reasons... and they ended "free Usenet" via your local
phone company (at least via mine).

At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso instantly came
to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember the order), Ray
Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and then Roman Racine, Alex
de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel & Monika Weber & Benjamin
Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et al. (whom did I miss?)

Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
Sn!pe
2020-05-25 17:47:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Arlen Holder
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
Message-ID: <1oqt612.1wiiefv1ay931rN%***@gmail.com>
--
^Ï^


My pet rock Gordon just is.
unknown
2020-05-25 19:58:14 UTC
Permalink
Post by Arlen Holder
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
I smell a Seamus MacRae clone.

Fuck off, Paul.
--
Yours Truly, Sir Gregøry

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the
essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and
not, when I came to die, discøver that I had not lived." __Henry David Thøreau
Sn!pe
2020-05-25 20:23:20 UTC
Permalink
Post by unknown
Post by Arlen Holder
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
I smell a Seamus MacRae clone.
Fuck off, Paul.
Arlen Holder certainly does display many similar characteristics
to Paul Derbyshire. Arlen is notorious for trolling Mac and iPhone
groups and is widely ignored there.

Followup-To: alt.free.newsservers, where he has at last deigned
to reply to me.
--
^Ï^ http://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E

My pet rock Gordon just is.
Colonel Edmund J. Burke
2020-06-26 19:34:22 UTC
Permalink
Post by unknown
Post by Arlen Holder
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
I smell a Seamus MacRae clone.
Fuck off, Paul.
LOL

unknown
2020-05-25 19:36:47 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 25 May 2020, Arlen Holder <***@newmachine.com> wrote:

<...>
Post by Arlen Holder
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso instantly came
to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember the order), Ray
Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and then Roman Racine, Alex
de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel & Monika Weber & Benjamin
Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et al. (whom did I miss?)
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
You are dishonoring deceased soldiers, you fool.

Saying "Happy Memorial Day" is like saying you are
happy that so many gave their lives in service to their
country.

So disrespectful of the deceased and their living
relatives. Such a display of stupidity and ignorance.

Don't say "Happy Memorial Day" any more. It's
offensive and crass.

If you must give a Memorial Day greeting say something
like "Memorial Day Greetings" and DO NOT USE such
a solemn occasion to publicly suck freeloader, NNTP
admin dick.
--
Yours Truly, Sir Gregøry

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the
essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and
not, when I came to die, discøver that I had not lived." __Henry David Thøreau
Stefan Claas
2020-05-25 20:15:45 UTC
Permalink
Post by unknown
<...>
Post by Arlen Holder
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso
instantly came to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember
the order), Ray Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and
then Roman Racine, Alex de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel
& Monika Weber & Benjamin Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et
al. (whom did I miss?)
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows
us to anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via
Usenet!
You are dishonoring deceased soldiers, you fool.
Saying "Happy Memorial Day" is like saying you are
happy that so many gave their lives in service to their
country.
So disrespectful of the deceased and their living
relatives. Such a display of stupidity and ignorance.
Don't say "Happy Memorial Day" any more. It's
offensive and crass.
If you must give a Memorial Day greeting say something
like "Memorial Day Greetings" and DO NOT USE such
a solemn occasion to publicly suck freeloader, NNTP
admin dick.
Must be a quite common to say 'happy' in the United States.

<https://www.google.com/search?source=univ&tbm=isch&q=Happy+Memorial+Day&client=firefox-b-d&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi2_4b-6M_pAhXNDewKHf87BFUQsAR6BAgEEAE&biw=1089&bih=904>

Regards
Stefan
--
https://keybase.io/stefan_claas
unknown
2020-05-25 20:25:19 UTC
Permalink
Post by Stefan Claas
Post by unknown
<...>
Post by Arlen Holder
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso
instantly came to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember
the order), Ray Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and
then Roman Racine, Alex de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel
& Monika Weber & Benjamin Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et
al. (whom did I miss?)
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows
us to anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via
Usenet!
You are dishonoring deceased soldiers, you fool.
Saying "Happy Memorial Day" is like saying you are
happy that so many gave their lives in service to their
country.
So disrespectful of the deceased and their living
relatives. Such a display of stupidity and ignorance.
Don't say "Happy Memorial Day" any more. It's
offensive and crass.
If you must give a Memorial Day greeting say something
like "Memorial Day Greetings" and DO NOT USE such
a solemn occasion to publicly suck freeloader, NNTP
admin dick.
Must be a quite common to say 'happy' in the United States.
<https://www.google.com/search?source=univ&tbm=isch&q=Happy+Memorial+Day&client=firefox-b-d&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi2_4b-6M_pAhXNDewKHf87BFUQsAR6BAgEEAE&biw=1089&bih=904>
It's mostly the crass, stupid, selfish Democrats who say it.

https://people.com/celebrity/why-happy-memorial-day-is-inappropriate/

"Memorial Day is not – as Veterans Day is – a blanket remembrance of those who have served in the nation’s armed forces. It is
specifically designated to honor those who have died while serving the country, and because of its gradual erosion into a “start
of summer” celebration, a number of organizations and individuals advocate for the return of the holiday to May 30, including both
the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War.
--
Yours Truly, Sir Gregøry

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the
essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and
not, when I came to die, discøver that I had not lived." __Henry David Thøreau
n***@zzo38computer.org.invalid
2020-05-25 23:16:28 UTC
Permalink
Post by Arlen Holder
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
I also agree. Usenet is good; let's keep using it. (You can even run local
newsgroups if wanted; NNTP is a much better alternative to mailing lists and
web forums, whether Usenet, local newsgroups, Unusenet, Rock solid, some
combination, etc.)
Post by Arlen Holder
My off-the-cuff history with Usenet... (please add your experiences so
that, as always, all benefit from your every action on the Internet).
I only started using Usenet much more recently (since approx. 1 year ago). I
write my own newsreader client at around that time, too (and am using it now).
Post by Arlen Holder
This weird thing called 'spam' showed up one day, out of the blue, where we
actually _responded_ to it telling people to stop it, and even complained
to their admin about them sending unwanted advertisements in our email
had graphical MUAs such as "Eudora").
I also used to receive a lot of spam, but now I don't receive any spam email,
since I run my own server and configured it with many aliases, and give a
different alias to each correspondent/service, so that I can then get rid of
the aliases once they are receiving spam. This seems to help.

I also still use "mail" (specifically Heirloom-mailx).
Post by Arlen Holder
At some point Usenet became politicized, where Mario Cuomo and AT&T decided
to kill it once and for all, one for purely political gain, while the other
for cost shaving reasons... and they ended "free Usenet" via your local
phone company (at least via mine).
I think here too, but fortunately there are many free servers.

I have once called the ISP on the telephone about some technical issue and I
also asked them about if they have Usenet service, but they did not seem to
understand what I was even asking about.

(About "Happy Memorial Day": I am not concerned if you say "happy" or not,
but I am Canadian anyways. Some people in other follow-up messages mention
their comments about this, but I comment about the other stuff instead.)
--
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Anton Shepelev
2020-06-04 12:55:04 UTC
Permalink
Dropped because of cross-postiing limitations:
alt.comp.freeware,alt.privacy.anon-server
Post by Arlen Holder
At some point Usenet became politicized, where Mario Cuomo and
AT&T decided to kill it once and for all, one for purely
political gain, while the other for cost shaving reasons... and
they ended "free Usenet" via your local phone company (at least
via mine).
What did Cuomo do?
Post by Arlen Holder
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso
instantly came to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't
remember the order), Ray Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine
Schultz, and then Roman Racine, Alex de Joode, Steve Crook,
Jessie Rehmer, Daniel & Monika Weber & Benjamin Gufler, Neodome
Admin, & Steen Jensen, et al. (whom did I miss?)
I didn't know there were so many free Usenet servers and am aware
of two only: Eternal September (Ray) and the anonymous AIOE (Paolo).
Post by Arlen Holder
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which
allows us to anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the
Internet, via Usenet!
What kind of anonymity do you mean? The one achieved by using a
made up name and e-mail? I am quite happy with the lack of
centralised moderation alone!
Post by Arlen Holder
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite
discussion!
Yes, and it is also one of the last truely clean plain-text mediums,
accessible from almost any machine, and not requiring the latest
version of some huge, slow, and bloated corporation-maintained
web-browser. Sometimes I think that modern forums and social
networks are just means of forced garbage delivery into people's
brains, similar to feeding geese for foie gras. Usenet must
survive, but the current tendencies are alarming.

My definition:

Social network, n. -- poaching equipment that the modern fisher of
men casts into the people's ocean, the cause of near extiction of
wild fish in the remaining neutral waters, such as BBS, Fidonet,
Usenet, and Mailing list.
--
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html e-mail
/\ http://preview.tinyurl.com/qcy6mjc [archived]
n***@zzo38computer.org.invalid
2020-06-04 19:27:15 UTC
Permalink
Post by Anton Shepelev
Post by Arlen Holder
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which
allows us to anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the
Internet, via Usenet!
What kind of anonymity do you mean? The one achieved by using a
made up name and e-mail? I am quite happy with the lack of
centralised moderation alone!
I am also happy with the lack of centralised moderation. But I do use a
made up email address too (I put ".invalid" at the end so that you can
easily see that it is not valid). But you can also use your actual name
and/or email address if you prefer.
Post by Anton Shepelev
Post by Arlen Holder
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite
discussion!
Yes, and it is also one of the last truely clean plain-text mediums,
accessible from almost any machine, and not requiring the latest
version of some huge, slow, and bloated corporation-maintained
web-browser. Sometimes I think that modern forums and social
networks are just means of forced garbage delivery into people's
brains, similar to feeding geese for foie gras. Usenet must
survive, but the current tendencies are alarming.
I agree with this. It is much better than the modern forums and social
networks and other stuff. I exclusively have set up the NNTP for the
discussion of my own projects (although it isn't that helpful if there
aren't so many people interested in it; how would I find that? Is there
some newsgroups that they may be interested to know of such a thing?)

I try to avoid the web browser, it is the worst program. And I like the
plain text format of Usenet; much more compatibility than others. And when
I do need to set up a web page, I try to ensure that it works with Lynx.
Other times, I ensure direct download links are available and recommend
those, so that you can just use curl or wget, and need not open up a web
browser just to download the file.

Although I use Fossil for version control of my projects, I adjust the
settings so that it works best without JavaScript and CSS, and you can
also use the command-line interface (which is preferable). I do not use
the Fossil forum, because it is not compatible with NNTP. (Myself and
one other person wanted support for NNTP in the Fossil forum, but this
has not yet been implemented.)
Post by Anton Shepelev
Social network, n. -- poaching equipment that the modern fisher of
men casts into the people's ocean, the cause of near extiction of
wild fish in the remaining neutral waters, such as BBS, Fidonet,
Usenet, and Mailing list.
Your definition is reasonable, although I have also seen Usenet being
called a "social network" too sometimes (although it isn't so common, I
think). I think NNTP is even better than the mailing lists too, actually.
And what you describe are some problems with much social networking. (I
do not use the modern social networking stuff; it is terrible.)
--
This signature intentionally left blank.
(But if it has these words, then actually it isn't blank, isn't it?)
Anton Shepelev
2020-06-06 14:07:45 UTC
Permalink
I exclusively have set up the NNTP for the discussion of my own
projects (although it isn't that helpful if there aren't so many
people interested in it; how would I find that? Is there some
newsgroups that they may be interested to know of such a thing?)
You have created a newsgroup dedicated to your projects or do you
refer people to more general and existing groups?
I try to avoid the web browser, it is the worst program.
Well-said!
Post by Anton Shepelev
Social network, n. -- poaching equipment that the modern fisher
of men casts into the people's ocean, the cause of near
extiction of wild fish in the remaining neutral waters, such as
BBS, Fidonet, Usenet, and Mailing list.
Your definition is reasonable, although I have also seen Usenet
being called a "social network" too sometimes (although it isn't
so common, I think).
Social network is a good term with a good meaning, describing the
graph-like relationships between people. But abominations such as
Fakebook have ruined it, similar to the great English word `gay',
which used to mean "joyful" and now denotes a male homosexual...
I think NNTP is even better than the mailing lists too, actually.
That may be true: there are NNTP intefaces to mailing lists (such
as Gmane) but no e-mail interfaces to NNTP that I wot of.
--
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html e-mail
/\ http://preview.tinyurl.com/qcy6mjc [archived]
n***@zzo38computer.org.invalid
2020-06-07 02:14:24 UTC
Permalink
Post by Anton Shepelev
I exclusively have set up the NNTP for the discussion of my own
projects (although it isn't that helpful if there aren't so many
people interested in it; how would I find that? Is there some
newsgroups that they may be interested to know of such a thing?)
You have created a newsgroup dedicated to your projects or do you
refer people to more general and existing groups?
I created newsgroups dedicated to my projects on my computer. (Currently
they are not available on other servers, but you can access them on my
computer if you are interested in them. Later, I may make it so that it
can be federated with other NNTP servers too.)

Of course, for many purposes, the more general and existing groups are
suitable too (sometimes more suitable, and sometimes less suitable).

(I also wrote my own NNTP server software (and my own client software
too); I found the others too complex or did not do what I wanted (such
as store the articles in a SQLite database), so I wrote my own.)

(I have implemented IHAVE (although it is currently disabled), although
not the program to forward received articles to other servers. I do have
an idea how I would do this (keep track of which newsgroups each other
server wants and the highest article number each has received from that
newsgroup, and then use the Path header to determine if they already have
a copy of that article; and then do all of that in a cron job), although
I have not done this and currently can't test it properly, and anyways
there are probably some more details I haven't considered yet.)
--
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Rob
2020-06-07 09:56:47 UTC
Permalink
Post by n***@zzo38computer.org.invalid
Post by Anton Shepelev
I exclusively have set up the NNTP for the discussion of my own
projects (although it isn't that helpful if there aren't so many
people interested in it; how would I find that? Is there some
newsgroups that they may be interested to know of such a thing?)
You have created a newsgroup dedicated to your projects or do you
refer people to more general and existing groups?
I created newsgroups dedicated to my projects on my computer. (Currently
they are not available on other servers, but you can access them on my
computer if you are interested in them. Later, I may make it so that it
can be federated with other NNTP servers too.)
Of course, for many purposes, the more general and existing groups are
suitable too (sometimes more suitable, and sometimes less suitable).
I think the "web forum software" that is often used these days should
have used an NNTP server as the storage backend instead of the now usually
used MYSQL database. Even if it is an isolated forum.

It would have facilitated integration with usenet when desired.

Of course a main reason why this did not happen was the attitude of
the usenet community against HTML postings and image attachments in
those days. With a little more cooperation and maybe some dedicated
newsgroup subtree where HTML was allowed (similar to .binaries) we
could have had a usenet now that is a little more significant than
it is now...
n***@zzo38computer.org.invalid
2020-06-07 18:27:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Rob
I think the "web forum software" that is often used these days should
have used an NNTP server as the storage backend instead of the now usually
used MYSQL database. Even if it is an isolated forum.
Yes, although different NNTP server software can also use different
storage backends; such as my own "sqlnetnews" software uses SQLite.
Still, I do think that using the format compatible with NNTP is helpful,
since some users will want to use NNTP to access it.

A web forum software could be made to internally deal with all messages in
NNTP format, and then to use a plugin for storage backend; the storage
backend could access an external NNTP server (which might be on the same
computer or another one), or be designed to access the article files in
the same format as a NNTP server on the same computer, or download
articles from a NNTP server and make a copy.

In addition, I think that any web forum that uses NNTP should display
the information how to connect to the NNTP server, and what is the message
ID of a message being displayed, so that users who want to use the NNTP
can see how to do so (even if given a link to the web forum).
Post by Rob
Of course a main reason why this did not happen was the attitude of
the usenet community against HTML postings and image attachments in
those days. With a little more cooperation and maybe some dedicated
newsgroup subtree where HTML was allowed (similar to .binaries) we
could have had a usenet now that is a little more significant than
it is now...
That could be done, yes. But even today many people don't like HTML
postings and imgae attachments; I like the plain text format myself.

But another alternative I have seen, which seem to me like it would work
better, is to use Markdown. It could be a subset without HTML. Markdown
text will even be readable even if it isn't interpreted as Markdown, so
it is helpful; even clients that display only plain text will display it.
The web forum software could include an option to post as Markdown or as
plain text; if Markdown, then a "Content-type: text/markdown" header is
added to the article header, and if a user who uses NNTP posts an article
containing a "Content-type: text/markdown" header, then the web interface
will also parse it as Markdown; if that header is not present, then it
will be displayed as plain text.
--
This signature intentionally left blank.
(But if it has these words, then actually it isn't blank, isn't it?)
Michael Bäuerle
2020-06-08 13:25:26 UTC
Permalink
Post by Rob
[...]
I think the "web forum software" that is often used these days should
have used an NNTP server as the storage backend instead of the now usually
used MYSQL database. Even if it is an isolated forum.
It would have facilitated integration with usenet when desired.
Looks like such software exists:
<https://github.com/arkanis/nntp-forum>
Has somebody here used this or know more about it?


[Xpost reduced to news.software.readers]
Retro (Retro Guy)
2020-06-08 23:30:00 UTC
Permalink
Post by Michael Bäuerle
Post by Rob
[...]
I think the "web forum software" that is often used these days should
have used an NNTP server as the storage backend instead of the now usually
used MYSQL database. Even if it is an isolated forum.
It would have facilitated integration with usenet when desired.
<https://github.com/arkanis/nntp-forum>
Has somebody here used this or know more about it?
I looked into several a few years ago, and the above was one. I can't remember exactly why I didn't pick nntp-forum (it may have just been a preference of interface appeal), but I went with newsportal, which also uses an nntp server as backend (but adds local caching if enabled):
https://florian-amrhein.de/newsportal

I eventually heavily modified newsportal to build rslight (Rocksolid Light), for use of a small hierarchy inside i2p and tor. I've written a simple nntp server that runs along with it, maintains a local spool, and communicates with other nntp servers without the need for mode stream.

My main site runs here:
https://www.novabbs.com
This newsgroup is here:
https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=news.software.readers

The goal was a simple usenet interface inside slow networks. Minimal javascript, etc. Just what's needed.

Retro Guy
Rob
2020-06-09 07:53:57 UTC
Permalink
Post by Retro (Retro Guy)
Post by Michael Bäuerle
Post by Rob
[...]
I think the "web forum software" that is often used these days should
have used an NNTP server as the storage backend instead of the now usually
used MYSQL database. Even if it is an isolated forum.
It would have facilitated integration with usenet when desired.
<https://github.com/arkanis/nntp-forum>
Has somebody here used this or know more about it?
https://florian-amrhein.de/newsportal
I eventually heavily modified newsportal to build rslight (Rocksolid Light), for use of a small hierarchy inside i2p and tor. I've written a simple nntp server that runs along with it, maintains a local spool, and communicates with other nntp servers without the need for mode stream.
https://www.novabbs.com
https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=news.software.readers
The goal was a simple usenet interface inside slow networks. Minimal javascript, etc. Just what's needed.
Retro Guy
I wasn't looking as much for niche packages that do implement this idea,
and of couse "Google Groups" also does it, but was more referring to the
fact that the major forum packages like PHPbb, vBulletin etc do not do
this, and thus most forums out there cannot integrate with usenet even
when their operators would not be against doing that.

Of course it is now much too late to change that.
yamo'
2020-06-09 08:02:42 UTC
Permalink
Hi,
Post by Retro (Retro Guy)
https://florian-amrhein.de/newsportal
You have also an alternative where you can propagate messages between
http instances (called JNTP servers) :
<https://github.com/Julien-Arlandis/phpNemoServer> ,
<https://github.com/Julien-Arlandis/NemoClient> and
<https://github.com/Julien-Arlandis/PHPN2J_Gateway>

You can see it working here : <http://news2.nemoweb.net/>
<http://news2.nemoweb.net/?Newsgroup=news.software.readers>
--
Stéphane
Sorry for my bad English
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