If you weren't up past your bedtime spilling wine on your Performa in 1994, then you probably weren't on Usenet reading alt.gothic's "Most Gothic Way to..." epic threads on the same. Usenet predated the World Wide Web by over a decade, well before Mosaic was a glimmer in Marc Andreessen's eye. But the advent of the Web certainly boded Usenet's end. If you used the distributed collection of special-interest newsgroups to follow the Mystery Science Theatre 3000 flame wars and octo-hentai binaries, then you likely had an email address ending in .edu and a lot of time to spend late at night in the comp-sci lab. (Think FriendFeed is overwhelming? Try the chatty Cathys over in comp.os.minix.) It all seems like half a lifetime ago. That's what seems so unbelievable about politicians' crusade against child porn on Usenet — my first reaction was to wonder if it was really still around. It is — and, surprisingly, Usenet still has its uses.