Editing News server (section)

===Retention===
Retention is simply defined as how long the server keeps articles.<ref>{{cite web |title=Usenet Newsgroups Retention
 |date=16 May 2020 |url=https://www.usenet.com/usenet-newsgroups-retention/ |publisher=Usenet.com |access-date=July 28, 2020 }}</ref> Historically, most users want retention to be long enough so that they don't need to access the server every day but not overly long retention that can overwhelm users with slow computers or network connections.<ref name="Usenet The Other Internet" /> In the modern era, high speed connections, large storage capacity, and advanced search tools allows users to utilize extensive retention without any drawbacks.

Retention is generally quoted separately for text and binary articles, though it may also vary between different groups within these categories.  The times vary greatly according to the amount of storage available on the servers and continually increasing traffic. As of 2009, it is common for average news providers to have text retention of over 1000 days and binary retention of over 200 days.{{citation needed|date=August 2020}} Large news providers offer text retention up to 2480 days and binary retention of 850 days or more.{{citation needed|date=August 2020}} It's important to understand that retention time varies between different newsgroups within the text and binary categories. Omicron's HW Media is currently the Usenet server with the highest amount of binary retention, while Google is the Usenet server with the highest amount of text retention.{{citation needed|date=August 2020}}

It can be difficult for end users to accurately measure the retention of a server. One common method is to examine the oldest articles in a group and examine the date, but this is not always accurate.  Some articles in a group may be retained for longer than others, articles from remote servers do not always arrive promptly, and at times the date headers are simply incorrect.  A sampling of many or all articles, preferably in more than one newsgroup, is required to detect such anomalies.

News servers do not have unlimited storage, and due to this fact they can only hold posts for a length of time before they must delete them in order to make room for new posts. This is a particular problem to [[Newsgroups#Binary|binary newsgroup]]s which transmit large volumes of articles.

For news servers provided by [[Internet Service Provider]]s as part of a user's subscription package, typical retention rates are usually only 2–4 days.{{citation needed|date=August 2020}} To deal with the increase of Usenet traffic, many providers turn to a hybrid system, in which old articles not found on the provider's server will request the article from another server with longer retention.