Gnus Manual - Terminology Go to the first , previous , next , last section, table of contents . News is generally fetched from a nearby NNTP server, and is generally publicly available to everybody. If you post news, the entire world is likely to read just what you have written, and they'll all snigger mischievously. Behind your back. Mail is private.
News is public.
Mailing is not posting, and replying is not following up. Gnus gets fed articles from a number of backends, both news and mail backends. You can also have any number of foreign groups active at the same time. A message that has been posted as news. A message that has been mailed.