Somewhat shocking that Demon, the progenitor of UK internet access,
should have managed to make such a meal out of providing usenet
access. Does this mean newsgroups are dying?

Not completely sure about newsgroups*, but Demon is definitely dying.

-- Alex T., Demon subscriber from April 2006 to June 2008

* - probably 75% of my favourite newsgroups died out in the past 2
years (thankfully some managed successful transition to web forums)