When a user posts an article, it is initially only available on that user's news server. Each news server, however, talks to one or more other servers (its "newsfeeds") and exchanges articles with them. In this fashion, the article is copied from server to server and (if all goes well) eventually reaches every server in the network (or every Usenet server in the world).

Usenet is a group of networking protocols that propagate messages and discussions from computer to computer. At the risk of using a bad analogy, it is like a bunch of message that spreads like a flu virus from one person to another. One person has the flu but every time he comes into contact with somebody he passes it on, potentially affecting every person on the planet. Usenet works in a very similar way; with the message being a virus and all the infected persons being computers. Of course, with computers, it all happens very quickly meaning a message posted in Australia becomes available in other parts of the world within minutes. As an experiment, if you posted a message to one of the Usenet forums (or newsgroups) here at usenet.com.au, it would be anywhere between 10 and 20 minutes before you might see that same message via your own ISP or on Google Groups.

It is an old (and arguably inefficient) way of transferring messages but the speed of networks now makes it very bearable. In the early days of Usenet, messages didn’t appear in newsgroups for over 12 or even 24 hours, but now it will generally be minutes before your message is archived on Usenet services worldwide.