So, you want to be able to; ftp or use; gopher, archie, usenet, agora, veronica, etc. But, all you have available is simply email service and nothing else. Following are the major addresses to write and they'll send you (by email) all the information you need to do it all yourself - with nothing more than your standard email service. This tells how to do (via email service only); ftp, gopher, archie, usenet, agora, veronica, etc. all by email - as well as doing web searches, downloading web pages, and playing games on an email game server.

To get some dox - telling you exactly how to do it all - use your email service and send these messages EXACTLY (all in lowercase - required):

TO: mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu
SUBJ:
BODY: send usente/news.answers/internet-services/access-via-email

TO: infomart@acy.digex.net
SUBJ: send email4u
BODY:

TO: infomart@acy.digex.net
SUBJ: send getit4u
BODY:

Note that all of these are autoresponders, so they're unforgiving if you make an error. They should send you some documents, if you want more read the documents and they tell you how to get even more info. If you have trouble, email me and I'll send you whatever you need, I have successfully obtained copies of the documents. And yes, I have tried a couple of the things they list and they do seem to work. Can't vouch for the safety of everything in the dox, but the stuff I have tried seems to be OK.

Hope this information will help others that are stuck with email only service - to allow them to do virtually everything that somebody with a full ISP could do.

You can email the author at:Peter A. Kasting