A few sites around the world maintain autoresponders which, if they receive a message in a test group, will mail you a notification that your article has reached them. If you want to post to a test newsgroup without autoresponders telling you that your article has reached them, just include the word ignore somewhere in the article's "Subject:".

To test your ability both to send and receive email, send a blank email (with nothing in the subject line) to support@demon.net - the autoresponder there will send you an email back, usually within minutes, listing various other documents that can be requested by email in a similar way.

See section 6.1 for help on problems with the telephone line.