Exploring groups

So I have just gone to Yahoo groups and done a search on The West Wing and boy some interesting things popped up!
Are there really that many people interested in writing fan fiction? It reminds me of the Facebook groups; people with similar interests can come together in an online forum and share their own work, thoughts on their own and others work and share links to other sites of interest. Stories of Josh and Donna require you to login - tempted as I was, I declined.

I also found:
CanberraBuySellSwapFreebies · For all of Canberra's Suburbs.
To Sell items, Buy items, Wanting to give away items as freebies to a good home, Swap and Trade items for use at home.Our Goal is to reduce LANDFILL and RE-USE and RECYCLE unwanted goods TOO.

I think this is great! The "group" technology not only being used to bring like minded people together, but here they are actually doing something in the real world not just in the virtual and creative world. It also appears that there are like minded people in Perth and Brisbane as well.
Being a member of the group entitles you to more priveleged information and contacts than just the casual user which is fair enough.

As with Yahoo products, there was a great deal of advertising in the margins, some of which was relevant to the group search and others which seemed quite out of place.
I shall await the development of the Melbourne branch of the BuySellSwapFreebies group with eager anticipation.

(Ed note: Lunge 17)