Maybe you have not read the article closely. You normally have a bunch of .par2 files (my knowledge is also 10 years old) which can repair your missing files/parts when the amount of loss is smaller than the size of all (non broken) .par2 files.
My comment was more about the reliability of replication across geographies (author writes, "and it will be stored redundantly in news servers all over the world.")
The par2 files would be more surefire if you're using your own subscribed newsserver in a closed-loop fashion for backups. However par2 technology doesn't mean NNTP will guarantee those parity files actually got replicated to other servers.[1] If one is looking for safety beyond your own newsserver, you'd have to consider increased probabilities of failures. I think that's ok for sharing rips of Blu-Ray movies. However, for the irreplaceable backup photos of your children, hoping for par2 files on other Usenet servers you don't subscribe to may be too risky.
