Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!ptsfa!ames!ucbcad!zen!trinity!max
From: max@trinity.uucp (Max Hauser)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: rec.nature.birds?
Summary: New group, not name change
Message-ID: <5281@zen.berkeley.edu>
Date: 10 Dec 87 09:07:07 GMT
References: <19021@bbn.COM> <7055@sunybcs.UUCP>
Sender: news@zen.berkeley.edu
Reply-To: max@eros.UUCP (Max Hauser)
Organization: UC Berkeley
Lines: 25

In article <7055@sunybcs.UUCP> dmark@joey.UUCP (David Mark) writes:
>>  [rec.nature.birds] seems reasonable to me.  ... 

If I may humbly inject a civil comment, since this topic is under
active discussion, it seems obvious to me that the proposal should
correctly be for a NEW group rather than a name change. Birds 
in nature are only one of the subtopics of birds, and practice
has established without doubt that other subtopics too are
discussed on rec.birds. Even the existence of controversy
establishes that.

Since there are more topics on rec.birds than just birds-in-nature,
please do not presume to change the name to reflect only one of
the subtopics. If you do, it will be necessary for the rest of
us to re-create rec.birds to (explicitly, for a change) serve the 
broader interest (as it has been doing _de facto_ for some years).
In any event, many have already lamented that birdwatching alone
does not provide anough traffic for a satisfactory group.

I suggest as an obvious alternative the creation of a new group
about general wildlife. That will have a larger volume than
"rec.nature.birds," as many have pointed out (and asked for);
will combine diverse wildlife interests not currently served at 
all; and will leave non-wildlife bird matters in rec.birds where
they are now, so as not to annoy wildlife-only enthusiasts.