Usenet Retention Explained: PAR2 Repair Science vs Raw Headline Numbers
Every Usenet provider brags about retention. “5,000 days!” “6,000 days!” Bigger must be better, right? Not necessarily. Retention is the most misused number in the entire industry, and it’s the one most likely to make you overpay. But there’s a second, quieter piece of the puzzle that almost nobody explains: PAR2 repair science. Retention is the window in which content exists; PAR2 is what actually rescues you when content inside that window is incomplete. This guide covers both — why the headline retention number misleads you, and why your downloader’s ability to repair a broken file often matters more than a couple of extra thousand days of storage. ...