Discussion group messages arrive daily in your e-mail. However, to view discussion group messages you must first find a relevant group and subscribe to it using your own e-mail account. Some discussion groups have searchable archives on the World Wide Web. In most instances, however, discussion group content is only available by subscribing to the group. If you pay for your Internet access and e-mail account, that is the only expense you will incur.
Discussion groups are very similar to Internet newsgroups .
In fact, many discussion groups are available in both newsgroup format and discussion group format. The difference between the two is that the newsgroup format requires special newsreading software as well as access to an Internet news host. They specialize in making newsgroup content available on the Web. If a discussion group doubles as a newsgroup, you can sometimes find content from that group at these sites. There are currently more than 80,000 newsgroups and discussion groups on the Internet.