Google Groups

Google Groups is a free service from Google Inc. that supports discussion groups, including many Usenet newsgroups, based on common interests. The service was started in 1995 as Deja News, and was transitioned to Google Groups after a February 2001 buyout.

Membership in Google Groups is free of charge and many groups are anonymous. Users can find discussion groups related to their interests and participate in threaded conversations, either through a web interface or by e-mail. They can also start new groups. Google Groups also includes an archive of Usenet newsgroup postings dating back to 1981 and supports reading and posting to Usenet groups. Users can also set up mailing list archives for e-mail lists that are hosted elsewhere.

Although Google has removed or suppressed specific instances of mass abuse, it does not routinely monitor the groups service, this means that as well as genuine content, some groups also represent a historical archive of spam (and in some cases questionable content) from the period when they were archived.