🚀 go-pugleaf

The bit.* hierarchy is a bit of a fossil these days, and is definitely an
orphan.  It was created to be a Usenet mirror of discussion forums that were
distributed over Bitnet, a now defunct network that operated through packets
sent over communications satillites between nodes, mostly located at
universities.  The majority of the bit.* hierarchy are bit.listserv.* groups,
which were meant to be mirrors of e-mail discussion groups using the LISTSERV
distribution system and software, which is sold and maintained by LSoft
(http://www.lsoft.com).  LSoft had gradually migrated LISTSERV groups into
Internet traffic until Bitnet finally met it's maker, sometime around 1994,
if memory serves.  LISTSERV e-mail forums still flourish, but Bitnet is a
fading memory.

There had once been several gateways transferring posts between the
newsgroups and the mail lists, maintained by volunteers at universities.  The
last of these died a slow and lingering death of neglect when the one person
doing the work, Jim McIntosh, finally left American University for greener
pastures, about two years ago now.  The bit newsgroups are now orphaned, most
of them abandoned.  They're still in the Netnews distribution system because
American University lost the PGP keys needed for control orders.