"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
using these stupid Google Groups (which I'm stuck using at the hotel),

Of course, that's not true. Martin will give you Usenet access on his
server, and there used to be free Usenet accounts available for
text-based newsgroups, IIRC.

I only have web access on our two DSL lines at the hotel.

That is highly unlikely. It would only be true if your DSL ISP was
filtering your Internet traffic, allowing only stuff on port 80 (and maybe
8080) through.

If I recall correctly, you offer Internet access to your customers through
the same DSL connection, and I guarantee you they would be having huge fits
if their Internet access was restricted to port 80.

I have no
way to access email or newgroups directly, as a result. (I therefore
also must use the web to access my email -- which also drives me nuts.)

As Larry said, Martin's already offered you newsgroup access. All you need
is an Internet connection (which you have), a user account on his server
(which Martin will provide), and the name of his server (which Martin also
can provide).

Ditto with email. I find it remarkable that your Internet connection comes
without ANY sort of email service, but it's not hard to find someone who can
provide that for you.

All that said, I suspect that you are incorrect about your assertion that
you don't have email or newsgroup access. In particular, you appear to be
using Mediacom as your Internet provider, and they DO include email and
newsgroup access. For email, you would use mail.mchsi.com (for both the POP
and SMTP servers), and for newsgroups you would use netnews.mchsi.com.
Login using your email user name and password.

Are you saying there's another solution, short of upgrading our hotel's
internet service?

I doubt you need to upgrade your hotel's Internet service even to get email
and newsgroups *through your own ISP*. But even if they aren't offering
those services to your account, they are available through other sources.
Newsgroups you already have an offer for free access, and email you can
probably mooch one if you ask.

Pete