This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) for the reorganization of
the unmoderated newsgroup, rec.food.cooking.

This RFD is being posted to news.announce.newgroups, news.groups,
rec.food.cooking, rec.food.drink, rec.food.historic, rec.food.recipes,
rec.food.sourdough, rec.food.veg and rec.food.veg.cooking, with
followups set to rec.food.cooking.

Rationale: Rec.food.cooking has been a high-volume newsgroup for several
years, and the subject of splitting has been brought up with a fair
amount of regularity. Traditionally, rec.food.cooking has been an
amazingly civil, calm and flame-free newsgroup, so a split never seemed
to be justified.

However, in recent weeks the noise level and number of inappropriate
posts has skyrocketed, and polite pointers to the FAQs (which usually
did the trick before) now go ignored or become targets for flames. I
feel that splitting rec.food.cooking will help bring back the focus that
it once had.

Proposal: rec.food.cooking be split into 5 unmoderated groups:

rec.food.cooking.misc rec.food.cooking.cookware rec.food.cooking.recipes
rec.food.cooking.media rec.food.cooking.discuss

Charters:

rec.food.cooking.misc (unmoderated) What rfc used to be and should be.
For general cooking discussion. This newsgroup will replace
rec.food.cooking.

rec.food.cooking.cookware (unmoderated) Bread machines, microwaves,
crockpots, knives, cutting boards, glass-top stoves, barbecues, cast
iron, woks, Calphalon, aluminum, dehydrators, pasta makers, rice
cookers, etc.

rec.food.cooking.recipes (unmoderated) Recipes and requests.

rec.food.cooking.media (unmoderated) Cookbooks, cookbook authors, tv
shows, movies.

rec.food.cooking.discuss (unmoderated) For all the spam and tripe that
currently plagues the group. For flames, rumors, controversial topics
(such as food poisoning), the $250 cookie, and those threads that bear
marginal relevance that seem to go on forever like, "What did you have
for dinner last night?" "What is your favorite fast food restaurant?"
"What is your least favorite fast food restaurant?" Etc, etc.

Discussion will run for a minumum of 21 days. The newsgroups in this
proposal are subject to change, and if major changes are necessary, the
discussion period may be extended an additional 7 days.

A Call for Votes (CFV) will be posted after the end of the discussion
period. The vote will be run by a neutral third party.

This RFD attempts to fully comply with Usenet newsgroup creation
guidelines set in "How to Create a New Usenet Newsgroup". Please refer
to this document if you have questions about the process.