The new Google interface to Usenet has Atom feeds for every newsgroup (add /feeds to a group URL) and features membership more prominently, with shortcuts such as favorites groups and bookmarked threads. Some of the display modes work better than others, but where did the ability to sort search results by date rather than (dubious) relevancy go? This just after the new, very consumer-friendly (as opposed to power-user oriented) Blogger. Waiting for Froogle's facelift...

Update: I missed the most important: it's not just Usenet, and you can create your own groups.

06/05/04: I had forgotten or missed the Neotonic acquisition in April last year, which is relevant to this (and possibly Gmail?). Brandon Long and David Jeske worked for Egroups (which became Yahoo Groups) then Neotonic and now Google. I also just learnt that Mark Fletcher who founded ONElist/eGroups is the founder and CEO of the company behind Bloglines. And I don't think I knew about the templating system Clearsilver (used by Techdirt among others) either.