Customers will experience faster access, longer retention periods and more

ATLANTA – Cox Communications today announced that its high-speed Internet customers who utilize its newsgroup service will be able to experience a number of enhancements, including faster transfer speeds, longer storage of newsgroup posts and access to additional newsgroups. Newsgroups will continue to be available to all Cox High Speed Internet customers at no charge.

“Newsgroups are the original version of collaborative online communities,” said Scott Hightower, Cox's vice president of data development and support. “Many of our customers remain loyal newsgroup users, and we are glad to expand our already comprehensive newsgroup service.”

Cox is working with Highwinds, an industry leader in newsgroup management, to:

• Increase retention by at least 30 days: Retention time for binary newsgroups is being increased from an average of 3 days to at least 30 days. Text groups will have even longer retention.
• Boost transfer speeds by more than 30%: Each Newsgroup user can utilize up to four connections to the server, and transfer speeds for each connection have been increased from up to 384 Kbps each to up to 512 Kbps each.
• Add more newsgroups: Cox has traditionally offered access to over 55,000 newsgroups, and now thousands of additional newsgroups are available to Cox customers. Each newsgroup has a primary topic of discussion, and users can read and post messages on topics ranging from C++ programming to sports and jokes.

“Highwinds Media Group is excited to be joining in Cox's efforts to continually improve the Internet experience for Cox subscribers. The partnership with Highwinds is enabling Cox to offer an incredible Newsgroup service with greatly enhanced article retention, access speeds and availability. Highwinds looks forward to bringing its state-of-the-art service to the Cox community,” stated Robb Barkley, VP Corporate Communications Highwinds Media Group.

The trial version of the newsgroup enhancements is effective today, and customers that wish to be one of the first to experience Cox's new newsgroup capabilities can add the new server to their group list. The server address is either newsbeta.east.Cox.net or newsbeta.west.Cox.net, depending on where the customer resides. Customers who wish to switch after the trial period will only need to reset their group list. All newsgroup users should experience uninterrupted access to all newsgroups and the ability to enjoy all of the new enhancements.

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