Ms Leebee wrote:

> So not to detract or steal from your own very worthy NG ... but it
> would be great to have your support. Maybe you want to ask an
> Australian about a new wine that has come on your O/S market. Maybe
> you are planning to visit relatives and are curious if you can buy
> soy-bread in the grocers while you are here. Maybe you'd just like
> to chat ( or lurk ) in another country, cyber-style.
>
> Whatever your reason, I urge you to support aus.food.
> The CFD ( Call for Discussion ) has been posted in here by our
> aus.administrator.

Suggestion: Also post a notice in rec.travel.australia+nz.

I'm in favor of the new group. It's not going to split anything; there
are numerous local food-discussion newsgroups in the US, and probably
elsewhere.

Note: There's a set of newsgroups devoted to nostalgia about rock
music, beginning with alt.culture.us.1960s and going up through the
decades. If I recall correctly, alt.culture.us.1990s was created in
1995. There were people whose high school years were just a bit too
late for alt.culture.us.1980s, and already they were noticing that
today's kids didn't appreciate _real_ music.

"The golden age of science fiction is twelve." Pete Graham.
I asked a rock musician what the golden age of rock was, and he
estimated it as sixteen.


--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Clutterers Anonymous unofficial community
http://www.livejournal.com/community/clutterers_anon/
Decluttering http://decluttering.blogspot.com
Predictions and Politics http://dsgood.blogspot.com
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.

Ms Leebee > wrote:

> The Brits have a food group, as do the Merkins

Eh... which one? You don't mean rec.food.cooking by any chance? If you
do, I'd say you do no favours to your cause by posting misleading and
unhelpful information. rfc, like every other Big-8 newsgroup, is an
international English-language newsgroup quasi by definition. If "the
Merkins" had a food newsgroup, it would be located in the us.*
hierarchy. There are currently no food newsgroups in that hierarchy.

Victor

Dan Goodman wrote:

> Suggestion: Also post a notice in rec.travel.australia+nz.

ahh - good idea thanks
( missed your post, replying via Google... )


> I'm in favor of the new group. It's not going to split anything; there
> are numerous local food-discussion newsgroups in the US, and probably
> elsewhere.

thanks for your support.

--
Vote YES aus.food

augie wrote:
> said...

> || I am here writing for your support for a new newsgroup we are trying to set
> || up.
> ||
> || The group is aus.food.

<snip>

>
> Yessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss ssssssssssssssssssssss
> ssssssssssss


<grin>

Ms Leebee > wrote:

> But, as I said, with the hemispheres as they are, while the UK and US people
> are happily chatting, we are sleeping, and vice-versa. It makes for
> convoluted conversation at best.

I don't find this argument at all convincing. We are talking of Usenet
newsgroups, not IRC with its real-time communications, and delays are in
the nature of the beast. One never knows if a reply to a message will
appear in a few minutes, a few days, or a few weeks.

> I went to bed with this group empty, and have woken up to over 300+ posts.
> That is a 'light' smattering. Miss a few days, and there's 1000's of posts
> to sift through.

This, on the other hand, is a valid argument. Too large a newsgroup can
certainly be a bother.

> However, I know there are people from the Southern Hemisphere that post
> here, and I know too that there are Notherners that would be interested in
> such a group, even if they would not use it all the time.

Again, not a convincing argument; anecdotal evidence rarely is. Someone
like me, who spent some time on news.groups (the Big-8 equivalent of
aus.net.news), would expect a proponent to do his homework and provide
actual statistics of said interest. That would be the most convincing
argument of all.

That said, of course there is nothing against cheerleading to make
people aware of the proposal and get them to vote.

Victor

Victor Sack wrote:
> Ms Leebee > wrote:
>
> > But, as I said, with the hemispheres as they are, while the UK and US people
> > are happily chatting, we are sleeping, and vice-versa. It makes for
> > convoluted conversation at best.
>
> I don't find this argument at all convincing. We are talking of Usenet
> newsgroups, not IRC with its real-time communications, and delays are in
> the nature of the beast. One never knows if a reply to a message will
> appear in a few minutes, a few days, or a few weeks.

I think the ol' replies showing up in a few hours/days etc is very
archaic.
My replies show up immediately, as do those of others I commnicate with
in various other groups.


>
> > I went to bed with this group empty, and have woken up to over 300+ posts.
> > That is a 'light' smattering. Miss a few days, and there's 1000's of posts
> > to sift through.
>
> This, on the other hand, is a valid argument. Too large a newsgroup can
> certainly be a bother.
>
> > However, I know there are people from the Southern Hemisphere that post
> > here, and I know too that there are Notherners that would be interested in
> > such a group, even if they would not use it all the time.
>
> Again, not a convincing argument; anecdotal evidence rarely is.

Actually, Victor, there *is* a lot of support for this group. I do not
have time to compile stats, and I doubt anyone would really care if I
did. Would stats change your mind, rouse your interest, get your
support ? I think not.


> That said, of course there is nothing against cheerleading to make
> people aware of the proposal and get them to vote.

I thought not.
Hope to see you visiting and contributing sometime if we're successful
in our bid.

Cheers.

Volume on RFC may seem imposing, Ms Leebee (at least these days), but there
are tools for selective reading: killfiling, marking of threads (depending
on your choice of newsreader program), etc.

Something else, much more important long-term to newsgroups, and which you
may or may not know of, is the regrettable history of people, often
well-intentioned and often indeed motivated by traffic volume, proposing
splits that fragmented or de-railed successful fora. This was a constant
issue in the early-mid 1990s especially, though it has happened throughout
the newsgroups' 25-year history. In cases I've witnessed, people convinced
of the wisdom of a split, and persuasive about it, often were relative
newcomers, and more importantly, they did not stay around to live with the
consequences of their inspiration. (That for instance is how the
longstanding wine newsgroup, created 1982, was mis-handled in 1993-94,
ending up rather carelessly in the "alt." hierarchy as alt.food.wine instead
of rec.food.drink.wine (a situation incidentally STILL shown misleadingly in
basic newsgroup descriptions that I see: rec.food.drink no longer carries
the wine postings, alt.food.wine does -- including from Australia). But the
impulse to spin off something to serve perceived needs created most of the
overlapping or competing or inactive or confusingly-defined newsgroups that
now exist.

As I mentioned in a history reflection on the wine group, the long view has
been in short supply.

-- Max

Ms Leebee > wrote:

> Victor Sack wrote:
> > Ms Leebee > wrote:
> >
> > > But, as I said, with the hemispheres as they are, while the UK and US
> > > people are happily chatting, we are sleeping, and vice-versa. It
> > > makes for convoluted conversation at best.
> >
> > I don't find this argument at all convincing. We are talking of Usenet
> > newsgroups, not IRC with its real-time communications, and delays are in
> > the nature of the beast. One never knows if a reply to a message will
> > appear in a few minutes, a few days, or a few weeks.
>
> I think the ol' replies showing up in a few hours/days etc is very
> archaic.

I think the word you want is "anachronistic".

> My replies show up immediately, as do those of others I commnicate with
> in various other groups.

It appears you understand neither the point I was making, nor the nature
of "real-time" communication. If I'm mistaken in this evaluation,
please correct me. IRC and telephone are real-time, because people have
to be there at the same time to be able communicate with each other.
Snail mail, e-mail and Usenet are not real-time, because people reply at
their own convenience, with no guarantee of immediacy.

Your own reply, which took eight days to appear, is the best
illustration of the above.

If immediate replies are important to you, you ought to consider
creating an IRC channel instead.

> > Again, not a convincing argument; anecdotal evidence rarely is.
>
> Actually, Victor, there *is* a lot of support for this group. I do not
> have time to compile stats, and I doubt anyone would really care if I
> did. Would stats change your mind, rouse your interest, get your
> support ? I think not.

It is very obvious that creating aus.food is of no real importance to
you. Perhaps it would be better to delegate the task of drumming up
support to someone who takes it seriously? Splitting a newsgroup is a
serious matter, in case you are unaware, particularly where rfc is
concerned. A lot of ill-will has been generated by previous attempts to
split it and this is still occasionally noticeable even today.

Victor

Victor Sack wrote:

> It is very obvious that creating aus.food is of no real importance to
> you.

Not obvious to me.

Perhaps it would be better to delegate the task of drumming up
> support to someone who takes it seriously?

> Splitting a newsgroup is a
> serious matter, in case you are unaware, particularly where rfc is
> concerned. A lot of ill-will has been generated by previous attempts
> to split it and this is still occasionally noticeable even today.

I don't see it as a split. It's a proposal for something equivalent to
the uk.* food newsgroups, fr.rec.cuisine, and various other national
food newsgroups. There are also a bunch of US-local *.food and *eats
groups, which I don't consider to be splits of either this newsgroup
nor restaurant newsgroups.

--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Clutterers Anonymous unofficial community
http://www.livejournal.com/community/clutterers_anon/
Decluttering http://decluttering.blogspot.com
Predictions and Politics http://dsgood.blogspot.com
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.

"Ms Leebee" in :
|
| Australia is an isolated, but net-connected community.

Yes indeed, it was notable at the time for its early connectivity to the
growing international Internet with high-speed links (along with other
pioneering highly-connected countries -- Finland comes to mind). 15 years
or so ago I could exchange email between the US and Australia in seconds.
(It took seconds, for instance, for a professor in Adelaide to request an
article reprint from me. It then took two months for the printed article to
arrive by post. Could have done it just as fast 200 years ago )-:

> I wouldn't call aus.food a 'spin off' per se.

I appreciate your perspective. I meant the term in the particular and
established sense of newsgroups that emerge out of and/or attract traffic
away from existing newsgroups. I don't really know if your proposed group
will follow this pattern and neither, to some extent, can you know it. I am
just pointing out that every new-group creation in the last 20 years that
ended up disrupting an existing forum, creating confusing overlap, etc., was
proposed by someone who believed sincerely in the idea, or dream, and
thought it was the right thing to do.

"Ms Leebee" in :
| "Dan Goodman" > wrote ...
||
|| I don't see it as a split. It's a proposal for something
|| equivalent tothe uk.* food newsgroups, fr.rec.cuisine,
|| and various other national food newsgroups. There
|| are also a bunch of US-local *.food and *eats groups

US *.food and *.eats groups (at least, those of them I've known in the last
20 years) are local restaurant-oriented newsgroups with traffic of local
interest, unrelated de-facto to RFC's charter ("All about food, cooking,
cookbooks, recipes and other alimentary effluvia" -- 29 Jan 82). Someone
could certainly conjure anecdotal examples of overlap, but that is not the
point of those groups. (It's common incidentally for newsgroup users from
other US regions to look in on local *.food or *.eats groups, when traveling
or relocating.)

If the new group's _actual_ traffic were to prove of strictly local interest
and not related to RFC's charter then that would show it's not a split. On
the other hand, new-group advocates are historically the people least able
to assess that prospect objectively. Most people who split successful
newsgroups argued in advance that that was not the idea. Many of them meant
it. That is the whole problem, in a nutshell, as I see it. (And why I
argue for erring in the direction of fewer new groups. From experience, not
theory.)

-- Max

Dan Goodman > wrote:

> Victor Sack wrote:
>
> > It is very obvious that creating aus.food is of no real importance to
> > you.
>
> Not obvious to me.

Not prepared. Not willing to devote any time to the matter. Not able
or willing to argue congently. Still not obvious?

> I don't see it as a split. It's a proposal for something equivalent to
> the uk.* food newsgroups,

They were a split. Anything that potentially takes actual or future
traffic froam a newsgroup is a split by definition.

> fr.rec.cuisine, and various other national
> food newsgroups.

Irrelevant. They are not English-language newsgroups and take nothing
from rfc.

> There are also a bunch of US-local *.food and *eats
> groups, which I don't consider to be splits of either this newsgroup
> nor restaurant newsgroups.

Most of them are de-facto splits of the rec.food.restaurants newsgroup.
Not of rfc, as Max implicitly points out, as they deal mainly with
restaurants.

Victor

Ms Leebee > wrote:

> "Victor Sack" > wrote
>
> Immediate replies ARE possible in the
> Southern hemishere in NG's.

Unmitigated nonsense. Immediate replies are possible anywhere where
people are sitting at their computers at the same time. If they are
not, immediacy disappears. In either hemisphere, there are people who
post in the morning; there are people who post in the evening; there are
people who post in the middle of the day or night. There are 24 hours
in the day everywhere and there is no guarantee someone is out there at
the same time you are. That's the nature of Usenet.

> It is much easier for me to have ongoing,
> interesting communication with others regarding common interests etc in the
> aus* hierarchy, than it is here.

Are those interests food-related (the only relevant thing)? How many
"others" are there who have the same interests? Were they around
discussing food 5 years ago? 2 years ago? How many of them? In which
newsgroups did their discusions appear? How do you know there is real
interest which is strong enough to likely be there 5 or 10 years from
now?

> I really don't think you know what it is like for us, but it would be very
> nice if you could extend some compassion for our cause. Can't you *see*
> what it would be like on the other side ? Sense our frustration ?

Will you stop whining, please? Do you even know where I am located? I
could be in Australia for all you know. As it were, there is a six-hour
difference to the east coast of America and a nine-hour difference to
the west coast. How is it so much different from Australia
(respectively six or nine hours to the west coast of America
efvectively, i.e. if it's noon in Sydney, it is 6 p.m. in San
Francisco)?

> > It is very obvious that creating aus.food is of no real importance to
> > you.
>
> huh ? It is VERY important to me.

So, why don't you do your homework and provide some real information?
You can't, for some reason? As I said before, delegate this to someone
else who takes it seriously. Seek advice from someone who really knows
about the matter, for example David Formosa (Nick Andrew's predecessor
as ausadmin) who, as I remember, has even posted to rfc a couple of
times. Now that he is no longer ausadmin, maybe he has some time for
giving advice.

> > Perhaps it would be better to delegate the task of drumming up
> > support to someone who takes it seriously? Splitting a newsgroup is a
> > serious matter, in case you are unaware, particularly where rfc is
> > concerned.
>
> SPLITTING a newsgroup ???? What ???
> I'm sorry Victor, but have I fallen for a troll ?

Do you even know what a troll is, child? Creating any newsgroup
potentially taking traffic from an existing one is a split by
definition.

> Victor, there is about 5 Australians posting here regularly. I doubt you'd
> even miss them ( do you even know them / reply to them ? ).

I've been around long enough to know more than you perhaps realise.

> I'm not "after'
> them or spiltting any newsgroups ( ??? ). I suggest you read the proposal
> again ( if you are not a troll ), because your own issues have clouded your
> thought processes.
>
> If you are not interested, fine... but please do not make this into
> something it quite obviously isn't.

I would most kindly suggest that you concentrate on your own issues and
your own homework. You are already up to your neck in it and it is time
to stop digging. What you don't realise, is that you are actually
arguing against the creation of aus.food and alienating people who, for
all you don't know, may be actually sympathetic. Has it even occur to
you to read the aus.* new groups creation FAQ. Don't think so. Here
are some excerpts.
_________________
http://aus.news-admin.org/Faq/aus_faq

Is there another newsgroup which covers your topic? You would need a
good reason to create a new place to discuss something where there's
already a place available. One appropriate reason may be volume of
postings on your subject; very active newsgroups may be split into
subgroups - on the other hand, if there's very little discussion going
on in your topic, you may not have a good reason to create a new group.

Finally, (since this is an aus.* FAQ) consider whether your topic is
uniquely Australian or has enough Australian content to justify a
regional newsgroup rather than a global one. For example, there's not
much point to having an Australian coca-cola newsgroup - you can buy
coke around the world and it's much the same wherever it is sold.

[....]
People will respond to your proposal in a variety of ways. Expect
negative criticism. Some of it will come from people who read like
overbearing arseholes; some will come from quite reasonable human
beings.

The newsgroup name and the expected traffic are two of the most
important things that are going to discussed at this point. Ausadmin
and the people in aus.net.news are going to be looking for evidence
that this newsgroup is going to get enough traffic to be a healthy
[....]
Try to be patient, and listen to what they have to say. You may
find that they are making sense. At this point, you might consider
better group names (if suggested), moderation or not, changes to
the newsgroup's charter, or maybe even whether or not the whole
thing was a good idea in the first place. Try to be objective and
mature about this, and don't take any of it personally (even if
the overbearing arseholes get personal first).

Two things have to be taken into account at this point: one is what
you think, and the other is what other people think. If you can't be
dissuaded from a bad proposal by sound arguments, fine. Go ahead and
take it to the next step. In general, however, if few other people
are convinced by your arguments in favour of the newsgroup, it won't
pass the vote, and you'll end up wasting your time. (See point 7.)
____________________

Victor

Victor Sack wrote:

> They were a split. Anything that potentially takes actual or future
> traffic froam a newsgroup is a split by definition.

A rather odd definition, in my opinion.

> > fr.rec.cuisine, and various other national
> > food newsgroups.
>
> Irrelevant. They are not English-language newsgroups and take nothing
> from rfc.

Well, some of the people on fr.rec.cuisine are literate in English; and
if it didn't exist, they might be in this newsgroup instead or more
often.

--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Clutterers Anonymous unofficial community
http://www.livejournal.com/community/clutterers_anon/
Decluttering http://decluttering.blogspot.com
Predictions and Politics http://dsgood.blogspot.com
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.

Victor Sack wrote:

> Will you stop whining, please?

When this topic dies down, someone please remind me to take Victor out
of my killfile.

--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Clutterers Anonymous unofficial community
http://www.livejournal.com/community/clutterers_anon/
Decluttering http://decluttering.blogspot.com
Predictions and Politics http://dsgood.blogspot.com
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.

"Dan Goodman" in . net:
| Victor Sack wrote:
|
|| They were a split. Anything that potentially takes actual
|| or future traffic froam a newsgroup is a split by definition.
|
| A rather odd definition, in my opinion.

Mr. Goodman, he cites a definition not set by him or you or me. It has
years of Usenet tradition and very many people behind it. If you don't
realize this then why are you arguing on the subject. With messages that
can be surprisingly durable by the way. I posted some advice once:

> Write each Usenet article on the assumption that you will see it again,
> years later, in a glossy plastic page protector, shown to you pointedly by
> someone you have never met before. It happens.

That was in 1987, and it does. (Among other cases it happened to me soon
after that posting.)

Max Hauser wrote:

> "Dan Goodman" in
> > Victor Sack wrote:
> >
> > > They were a split. Anything that potentially takes actual
> > > or future traffic froam a newsgroup is a split by definition.
> >
> > A rather odd definition, in my opinion.
>
> Mr. Goodman, he cites a definition not set by him or you or me. It
> has years of Usenet tradition and very many people behind it.

It's quite possible for an _incorrect_ definition to have years of
tradition and very many people behind it.

> If you
> don't realize this then why are you arguing on the subject.

One reason: I consider that definition incorrect.

> With
> messages that can be surprisingly durable by the way. I posted some
> advice once:

I don't mind being proven wrong. For example, I will not mind it if it
happens to me farther along in this thread.

--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Clutterers Anonymous unofficial community
http://www.livejournal.com/community/clutterers_anon/
Decluttering http://decluttering.blogspot.com
Predictions and Politics http://dsgood.blogspot.com
All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.
John Arbuthnot (1667-1735), Scottish writer, physician.

On Mon, 29 Aug 2005 23:44:58 +0200, Victor Sack > wrote:
> Ms Leebee > wrote:

[...]

>> I really don't think you know what it is like for us, but it would be very
>> nice if you could extend some compassion for our cause. Can't you *see*
>> what it would be like on the other side ? Sense our frustration ?
>
> Will you stop whining, please? Do you even know where I am located?

I would guess Germany.

[...]

> Seek advice from someone who really knows
> about the matter, for example David Formosa (Nick Andrew's predecessor
> as ausadmin) who, as I remember, has even posted to rfc a couple of
> times. Now that he is no longer ausadmin, maybe he has some time for
> giving advice.

I am perfectly willing to give advice.

[...]

> What you don't realise, is that you are actually
> arguing against the creation of aus.food and alienating people who, for
> all you don't know, may be actually sympathetic. Has it even occur to
> you to read the aus.* new groups creation FAQ. Don't think so. Here
> are some excerpts.
> _________________
> http://aus.news-admin.org/Faq/aus_faq
>
> Is there another newsgroup which covers your topic? You would need a
> good reason to create a new place to discuss something where there's
> already a place available. One appropriate reason may be volume of
> postings on your subject; very active newsgroups may be split into
> subgroups - on the other hand, if there's very little discussion going
> on in your topic, you may not have a good reason to create a new group.
>
> Finally, (since this is an aus.* FAQ) consider whether your topic is
> uniquely Australian or has enough Australian content to justify a
> regional newsgroup rather than a global one. For example, there's not
> much point to having an Australian coca-cola newsgroup - you can buy
> coke around the world and it's much the same wherever it is sold.

It seems that this supports the idea of creating a local newsgroup.



--
Please excuse my spelling as I suffer from agraphia. See
http://dformosa.zeta.org.au/~dformosa/Spelling.html to find out more.
Free the Memes.

[Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]

David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
wrote:

> Victor Sack > wrote:
> > Ms Leebee > wrote:
> [...]
> >> I really don't think you know what it is like for us, but it would be very
> >> nice if you could extend some compassion for our cause. Can't you *see*
> >> what it would be like on the other side ? Sense our frustration ?
> >
> > Will you stop whining, please? Do you even know where I am located?
>
> I would guess Germany.

Indeed. And that means that I'm intimately familiar with most every
argument and problem discussed so far. It is exactly the same for me -
the time difference (why the hell should it matter?), recipe
conversions, local brands and customs, availability of local
ingredients, etc., etc. Besides, English is not even my first language.
And yet, I don't find that all these problems bother me very much and I
have no trouble killfiling or ignoring threads on subjects that don't
interest me.

However, I do appreciate that all of the above may be more important to
other people.

> I am perfectly willing to give advice.

Great! Thank you, David. I wish the proponents would consult you,
unless they have already done so in the meantime.

> > _________________
> > http://aus.news-admin.org/Faq/aus_faq
> >
> > Is there another newsgroup which covers your topic? You would need a
> > good reason to create a new place to discuss something where there's
> > already a place available. One appropriate reason may be volume of
> > postings on your subject; very active newsgroups may be split into
> > subgroups - on the other hand, if there's very little discussion going
> > on in your topic, you may not have a good reason to create a new group.
> >
> > Finally, (since this is an aus.* FAQ) consider whether your topic is
> > uniquely Australian or has enough Australian content to justify a
> > regional newsgroup rather than a global one. For example, there's not
> > much point to having an Australian coca-cola newsgroup - you can buy
> > coke around the world and it's much the same wherever it is sold.
>
> It seems that this supports the idea of creating a local newsgroup.

Maybe, maybe not. How about this part:
________________
"very active newsgroups may be split into subgroups - on the other hand,
if there's very little discussion going on in your topic, you may not
have a good reason to create a new group."
________________

And further from the FAQ:
________________
"You should include the following information:
[....]
4. An estimate of expected traffic for this group and the current
traffic on the net related to this topic."
________________

And also:
________________
"The newsgroup name and the expected traffic are two of the most
important things that are going to discussed at this point. Ausadmin
and the people in aus.net.news are going to be looking for evidence
that this newsgroup is going to get enough traffic to be a healthy
group."
________________

So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for
opposing the proposal. However, there may very well be a *better*
reason to support it instead, *if* real interest is demonstrated with
honest statistics. No one wants to prevent people from having a
newsgroup for which real interest is there. BTW, only Usenet traffic
matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
irrelevant.

Victor

Victor Sack wrote:

> [Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]
>
> David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
> wrote:
>
>> Victor Sack > wrote:
>> > Ms Leebee > wrote:
>> [...]
>> >> I really don't think you know what it is like for us, but it would be
>> >> very
>> >> nice if you could extend some compassion for our cause. Can't you
>> >> *see*
>> >> what it would be like on the other side ? Sense our frustration ?
>> >
>> > Will you stop whining, please? Do you even know where I am located?
>>
>> I would guess Germany.
>
> Indeed. And that means that I'm intimately familiar with most every
> argument and problem discussed so far. It is exactly the same for me -
> the time difference (why the hell should it matter?), recipe
> conversions, local brands and customs, availability of local
> ingredients, etc., etc. Besides, English is not even my first language.
> And yet, I don't find that all these problems bother me very much and I
> have no trouble killfiling or ignoring threads on subjects that don't
> interest me.

Yes, it is easy to ignore threads which contain stuff which do not interest
us but sometimes a thread is interesting enuff to want to do something
about and as you know it can be difficult trying to find "a catty of ung
tao and two tahils of raw attap kernels and a cup of suntan"

> However, I do appreciate that all of the above may be more important to
> other people.
>
>> I am perfectly willing to give advice.
>
> Great! Thank you, David. I wish the proponents would consult you,
> unless they have already done so in the meantime.

David Formosa has always worried me even since the day I discovered he has a
very disturbing interest in higher mathematics - unless I have confused him
with "the other David"

Although I cannot speak for others, I, for one, still consider David's
advice to be valuable on matters relating to computing.

Victor Sack wrote on 31 Aug 2005 in rec.food.cooking

> So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
> doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
> rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
> divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for
> opposing the proposal. However, there may very well be a *better*
> reason to support it instead, *if* real interest is demonstrated with
> honest statistics. No one wants to prevent people from having a
> newsgroup for which real interest is there. BTW, only Usenet traffic
> matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
> irrelevant.
>
> Victor
>

I hold the view that another newsgroup will affect RFC nrgatively at
first. But if the new group gets new posters perhaps the cycle of
repeating questions will extend and include new repeating questions.

To my way of thinking deversity can't hurt, it can only improve RFC or
force it to die. And if it is RFC's turn to die then another group will
pop up to take its' place.

--
The eyes are the mirrors....
But the ears...Ah the ears.
The ears keep the hat up.

In article >, (Victor Sack) wrote:
>[Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]

G'day Vic,

[...]
>So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
>doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
>rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
>divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for

I had the opposite thought -- that it could well be largely redundant
because much traffic on the local group will be crossposted to rfc!
(That wouldn't worry those of us who use competent newsreaders, if it
is properly crossposted; but it could be a problem if the inevitable
idiots out there insist on posting individually to both groups.)

>opposing the proposal. However, there may very well be a *better*
>reason to support it instead, *if* real interest is demonstrated with
>honest statistics. No one wants to prevent people from having a
>newsgroup for which real interest is there. BTW, only Usenet traffic
>matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
>irrelevant.

Have you read "Catch-22"? ;-)

ISTR from years back that this bureaucratic requirement is indeed the
way the "system" is supposed to work. However, if there is no
newsgroup serving the purpose then people are clearly forced to use
other methods of communication. So active mailing lists on a topic
may well indicate there would be viable traffic on a proposed new
group. Particularly as mailing lists can be a real pain compared with
following newsgroup discussions.

Cheers, Phred.

--
LID

"Victor Sack" in :
| . . .
| Besides, English is not even my first language.


Fast unglaublich, darf ich sage? (Sicherlich mussen Sie lange Erfahrung
auf englisch haben.) So weit wie ich gelesen haben, ihre Sprachbeherrschung
war fast eingeboren. (Ein europäisch Stil, kaum vernehmlich, ist jetzt klar
gemacht.)

Und bitte beachten, ich habe daß Sie Deutsch lesen vermutet, nicht daß es
ihre Muttersprache war.

Entschuldigung noch einmal uber die DIN 5008 Nichteinhaltung der Nachricht.
:-)


-- M

On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 23:50:51 +0200, Victor Sack > wrote:
> [Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]
>
> David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
> wrote:

[...]

>> I would guess Germany.
>
> Indeed. And that means that I'm intimately familiar with most every
> argument and problem discussed so far.

I can think of one that hasn't been mentioned seasonally. Australian
sesons are 180 degrees out of phase with Northen Hemisphere seasons.
As topics arise from the sesonal change in freash ingredents, from an
Australian perspective this newsgroup is upside down. You talk about
summer foods in winter and winter foods in summer.

[...]

> So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
> doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
> rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
> divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for
> opposing the proposal.

That argument isn't realy a valid one in terms of aus.net.news. If it
was valid then it would mean that almost no newsgroups would be
created under aus.* for fear of siphoning off traffic from alt and the
big8.

> BTW, only Usenet traffic
> matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
> irrelevant.

In the past we have counted mailing list and other forums to estimate
interest. I'm unsure of Nick's current policy on this.

--
Please excuse my spelling as I suffer from agraphia. See
http://dformosa.zeta.org.au/~dformosa/Spelling.html to find out more.
Free the Memes.

David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
wrote:

> On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 23:50:51 +0200, Victor Sack > wrote:
> > [Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]
> >
> > David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
> > wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >> I would guess Germany.
> >
> > Indeed. And that means that I'm intimately familiar with most every
> > argument and problem discussed so far.
>
> I can think of one that hasn't been mentioned seasonally. Australian
> sesons are 180 degrees out of phase with Northen Hemisphere seasons.
> As topics arise from the sesonal change in freash ingredents, from an
> Australian perspective this newsgroup is upside down. You talk about
> summer foods in winter and winter foods in summer.

Good point! Still, considering that a lot of produce and other seasonal
ingredients are imported from both hemispheres nowadays, this is by far
not as critical as it used to be many years ago. As to the "seasonal
style", personally, I basically disregard the seasons, often eating
"winter foods" in the summer and vice versa. The only exception is that
I rarely eat cold soups in winter. But, as I said, good point.

> > So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
> > doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
> > rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
> > divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for
> > opposing the proposal.
>
> That argument isn't realy a valid one in terms of aus.net.news. If it
> was valid then it would mean that almost no newsgroups would be
> created under aus.* for fear of siphoning off traffic from alt and the
> big8.

I think it is valid, because it really is a question of how many
denizens of the global newsgroup would want to vote "no" to prevent a
de-facto split. A demonstration of real interest would be a better
counter-argument, so it should be presented, I believe.

> > BTW, only Usenet traffic
> > matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
> > irrelevant.
>
> In the past we have counted mailing list and other forums to estimate
> interest. I'm unsure of Nick's current policy on this.

Interesting. It really is a question of whether different audiences
overlap. Besides, mere existence of certain forums is no proof of
anything. At the very least, a straw poll should be done in each of the
forums to gauge an interest in the newsgroup.

Victor

Max Hauser > wrote:

> "Victor Sack" in :
> | . . .
> | Besides, English is not even my first language.
>
> Fast unglaublich, darf ich sage?

Leider wimmelt es nur so von grammatischen Fehlern in meinem Englisch...
Ich merke zwar die meisten, aber oft zu spät... Und manchmal merke ich
sie nicht, weil es mir nicht bewußt ist, daß es sich um Fehlern
handelt...

> (Sicherlich mussen Sie lange Erfahrung
> auf englisch haben.)

"Du", nicht "Sie", bitte! In deutschsprachigen Usenet-Gruppen wird
traditionsgemäß immer geduzt (auch ohne Bruderschaft zu trinken)! :-)

> Entschuldigung noch einmal uber die DIN 5008 Nichteinhaltung der Nachricht.
> :-)

Die Entschuldigung wird hiermit zur Kenntnis genommen. :-)

Victor

Phred > wrote:

> (Victor Sack) wrote:
> >[Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]
>
> >opposing the proposal. However, there may very well be a *better*
> >reason to support it instead, *if* real interest is demonstrated with
> >honest statistics. No one wants to prevent people from having a
> >newsgroup for which real interest is there. BTW, only Usenet traffic
> >matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
> >irrelevant.
>
> Have you read "Catch-22"? ;-)

Sure.

> ISTR from years back that this bureaucratic requirement is indeed the
> way the "system" is supposed to work. However, if there is no
> newsgroup serving the purpose then people are clearly forced to use
> other methods of communication.

Surely there are some such newsgroups, rfc being one, along with a few
other global ones. Besides, in such cases people often post off-topic
or borderline off-topic. In the aus.* context, I'd check such
newsgroups as aus.family and aus.general, for example. A serious
proponent would do exactly that, i.e. compile statistics of
Australian-related food posts on all those newsgroups. If the evidence
is favourable, the problem is solved. If there are only an average of a
couple posts a week, the proposed newsgroup is probably not viable.

> So active mailing lists on a topic
> may well indicate there would be viable traffic on a proposed new
> group. Particularly as mailing lists can be a real pain compared with
> following newsgroup discussions.

They may or they may not. It always depends on the audience in
question. I remember many such discussions in news.groups over the
years and many people maintained that the audience is different in
either case. Russ Allbery, as I remember, was one exception, but I
believe he had technical newsgroups (such as those for programming
languages) in mind. In any case, it is highly unlikely that people who
post on mailing lists but not on Usenet will want a change. If there is
an overlap, it might be different. As to other forums, such as
Web-based ones, there was a consensus that practically no overlapping
occurs and the audience is completely different. Some Usenetters use
such forums and indeed sometimes cease to post in Usenet altogether in
favour of them, but there is apparently no movement in the opposite
direction.

Victor

And now, in high fidelity ASCII, it's David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)
with some words for aus.net.news:

<snip>

}I can think of one that hasn't been mentioned seasonally. Australian
}sesons are 180 degrees out of phase with Northen Hemisphere seasons.
}As topics arise from the sesonal change in freash ingredents, from an
}Australian perspective this newsgroup is upside down. You talk about
}summer foods in winter and winter foods in summer.

That strikes me as as probably the best justification for the proposed
group I've seen.

--
Brett

"I'm a Greek God, you're Nick Giannopolous
I'm Julio Iglasias, you're Tommy Raudonikis"

"David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)" > writes:

>That argument isn't realy a valid one in terms of aus.net.news. If it
>was valid then it would mean that almost no newsgroups would be
>created under aus.* for fear of siphoning off traffic from alt and the
>big8.

Indeed. We've never seen a bloc of NO voters disgruntled because we
proposed a newsgroup which overlaps the topic of their favourite
international newsgroup. And I doubt we ever will. I'm certainly not
going to be influenced by fear in which proposals I choose to accept.

We have seen a bloc of YES voters keen to help out their Aussie brethren;
people who had no intention of using the newsgroup themselves.

>In the past we have counted mailing list and other forums to estimate
>interest. I'm unsure of Nick's current policy on this.

My policy is that I don't make the decision. It's up to the voters
whether they think the proposal has adequate justification; whether
they think evidence of mailing list traffic is important; whether
it's enough. I just try to help the proposer to write a good proposal,
whatever it is.

Nick.
--
http://www.nick-andrew.net/ http://aus.news-admin.org/
I prefer USENET replies. Don't send email copies. Drop the spamtrap to reply.

(Victor Sack) writes:

>Interesting. It really is a question of whether different audiences
>overlap. Besides, mere existence of certain forums is no proof of
>anything. At the very least, a straw poll should be done in each of the
>forums to gauge an interest in the newsgroup.

That's why we have an RFD.

Nick.
--
http://www.nick-andrew.net/ http://aus.news-admin.org/
I prefer USENET replies. Don't send email copies. Drop the spamtrap to reply.

In article >, (Victor Sack) wrote:
[...]
> As to other forums, such as
>Web-based ones, there was a consensus that practically no overlapping
>occurs and the audience is completely different.

There's just no accounting for taste! ;-)

Cheers, Phred.

--
LID

Nick Andrew > wrote:

> (Victor Sack) writes:
>
> >Interesting. It really is a question of whether different audiences
> >overlap. Besides, mere existence of certain forums is no proof of
> >anything. At the very least, a straw poll should be done in each of the
> >forums to gauge an interest in the newsgroup.
>
> That's why we have an RFD.

Umm... we are talking about forums *other* than Usenet newsgroups. Has
the aus.food RFD been posted to such forums, then? If so, which ones?

Victor

(Victor Sack) writes:

>Nick Andrew > wrote:

>> (Victor Sack) writes:
>>
>> >Interesting. It really is a question of whether different audiences
>> >overlap. Besides, mere existence of certain forums is no proof of
>> >anything. At the very least, a straw poll should be done in each of the
>> >forums to gauge an interest in the newsgroup.
>>
>> That's why we have an RFD.

>Umm... we are talking about forums *other* than Usenet newsgroups.

Ah, okay. I'll try to keep up next time.

Nick.
--
http://www.nick-andrew.net/ http://aus.news-admin.org/
I prefer USENET replies. Don't send email copies. Drop the spamtrap to reply.

"David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)" >
wrote in :

> On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 23:50:51 +0200, Victor Sack >
> wrote:
>> [Notice to rfc readers: crosspost to aus.net.news]
>>
>> David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) >
>> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
>>> I would guess Germany.
>>
>> Indeed. And that means that I'm intimately familiar with most every
>> argument and problem discussed so far.
>
> I can think of one that hasn't been mentioned seasonally. Australian
> sesons are 180 degrees out of phase with Northen Hemisphere seasons.
> As topics arise from the sesonal change in freash ingredents, from an
> Australian perspective this newsgroup is upside down. You talk about
> summer foods in winter and winter foods in summer.
>
> [...]
>
>> So, why am I persevering? Because I hold that there is very little
>> doubt that the creation of aus.food will be damaging to the
>> rec.food.cooking, if only very, very slightly, because it will likely
>> divert some useful traffic from it. This is a good enough reason for
>> opposing the proposal.
>
> That argument isn't realy a valid one in terms of aus.net.news. If it
> was valid then it would mean that almost no newsgroups would be
> created under aus.* for fear of siphoning off traffic from alt and the
> big8.
>
>> BTW, only Usenet traffic
>> matters here; mailing lists, no matter how numerous or popular, are
>> irrelevant.
>
> In the past we have counted mailing list and other forums to estimate
> interest. I'm unsure of Nick's current policy on this.
>
> --
> Please excuse my spelling as I suffer from agraphia. See
> http://dformosa.zeta.org.au/~dformosa/Spelling.html to find out more.
> Free the Memes.

Does "agraphia" prevent you from using a spelling checker or something?