As I'm sure most of you know of the location of Googles Beta Test section at Google Labs
And the AOL Beta section is also easy to find at KW "Beta"
Yahoo's Beta Tests are located at http://next.yahoo.com/ Might have to register to access these? (Only just found these)
Nothing on MSN Betas yet anyone know where they are?

It took a bit of digging but I was able to find something called the MSN Sandbox located at http://sandbox.msn.com/ . It is the place where MSN presents its latest ideas, technologies, and prototypes. The items on that page may peek your interest.

Derek

Thanks for that Derek
Bit sparse best thing I can see is the Newsgroup program called Netscan
http://netscan.research.microsoft.com/
May be worth including on your Usenet, Forums, & Lists section? Which has only 4 items so far
I did see an European Bulletin Board Archive List a few years ago (not UK) and it had most of the postings of a UseNet type list which was Usenets main rival (name escapes me ) could be on the Wikipaedia pages somewhere?
definitely wasn't Deja News that was half of the Usenet brought by Google and Fidonet was swamped out of existence by Usenet groups
I have an old site list (hand written) dating back to the first time I ventured onto the Web 1998? ...I discovered how favorites where organised afterwards I was that green!! I compiled it out of just about every book with site listings in the local library!
I did find it the site was http://www.clari.net but..
It closed in April 2005 homepage is still open but is only a museum piece
Still have to track down that European Archive of Usenet Clari.net and other sites postings that may have gone too?
Fidonet is still running! http://www.fidonet.org/ Navigation on the pages is not easy So I cannot tell you how up to date the site is And clicking on links gives you a prompt for a download (Avoid!!)Better off finding an archived posting site(if such a site exists?)
My advice stick to Google Groups Or ask the gang here to do a search?

I admit that the one thing in the Sandbox that intrigued me was the MSN Netscan Usenet service you mentioned, Bedstor. Google Groups has just dominated the Usenet scene in recent years. The reason is obvious. To bring the Usenet to the general public free of charge is something almost no company has the money or personel to do(due to ENORMOUS bandwidth). Obviously Microsoft has some deep pockets (their annual income is greater than many smaller nations) and would be nice if they could put out an viable alternative to Google Groups. Unfotunately the Netscan service is updated monthly which is ridiculous for everyday Usenet users.

Derek

Not very good
Daily or hourly updates is what most regular users expect
For the casual browser they need not know about how the updates are setup
Perhaps they are running it this way until it comes out of Beta?