There is a lot of history and useful knowledge archived in Usenet. A lot of that content (e.g., the early UNIX newsgroups) puts today's forums and blogs to shame.
Google acquired Deja News (if Usenet is wortheless, why?) and now all the archived Usenet messages are web-access only and fronted by Java and Javascript nonsense.
If the Usenet archives are no longer important or if everyone thinks Usenet is "dead", then why put these messages behind Javascript and try to prevent bulk downloads (which is how NNTP was designed to work)?
déjà news acquisition was in 2001, lifetimes ago in web time. And it does fit with Google's stated mission of putting everything online, in easily searchable format.
The "let's put a thin web veneer over X" approach has never been a great one, perhaps sufficient for Web 1.0, but not these days.
Google acquired Deja News (if Usenet is wortheless, why?) and now all the archived Usenet messages are web-access only and fronted by Java and Javascript nonsense.
If the Usenet archives are no longer important or if everyone thinks Usenet is "dead", then why put these messages behind Javascript and try to prevent bulk downloads (which is how NNTP was designed to work)?