PQ> It's something I picked up from my Russian comrades. 'News' is a fancy   
    PQ> form of telnet (probably wrong technically - it might be more proper to   
    PQ> say that it rides on the back of telnet). So, being able to connect via   
    PQ> telnet, and, seeing the responses from the news server would suffice for   
    PQ> confirmation that that server was operating.   
      
      With all respect for our Russian Comrades, that doesn't sound right.   
      
      My firewall directs telnet calls to one computer, running my now 23yo BBS,   
   while news calls are directed to another computer, running JamNNTPd. If my   
   JamNNTPd server goes down, I'm sure you can still telnet my BBS.   
      
   --- Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; sv-SE; rv:1.9.1.16) Gecko/20101125   
    * Origin: Quinn's Post - Maryborough, Queensland, OZ (3:640/384)