On 8/21/2020 at 5:05 PM, heidih said:
"Starting splinter groups is hardly a new impulse. Chowhound users have left the site before, dissatisfied over changes or after being banned, and set up new sites. Steven Shaw started eGullet after leaving Chowhound, and Opinionated About Dining, Chicago’s LTH Forum and Mouthfulsfood.com were all started by ex-Hounds".
On 8/21/2020 at 5:20 PM, Margaret Pilgrim said:I was active on RecTravelEurope on Usenet in 2001 when internet friend Robert Buxbaum told me that this guy, Steven Shaw, was starting a forum on food. "What's a forum?" So he described how special interest groups were going to take the place of cumbersome usenet. I joined in August, as member #80..
(Steve was the real pioneer. The progression was, AFAIR eGullet -> OA -> Mouthfuls and, separately, Chow.)
On 8/21/2020 at 7:52 PM, Margaret Pilgrim said:What??? You actually meet face to face? You really have an in!!!
Not that I'm THAT old, but Leff started Chowhound's board in late 1999 or so. I started participating in early 2000. The software sucked but it was highly entertaining. And informative. And argumentative. The first exodus from CH came here and, while some stayed, others moved on to OA (with Plotnicki) and then to MF. Some of us never left any of the boards and just added another one as they came, sometimes using different "names" (you know who you are, "weinoo"). I lurked here for years before joining, as I didn't want to write that damn essay.
As to "face to face"; well, I'd guess that I'm friends in the real world with a dozen or so food board contributors and have met (& had meals with) well over 100 of them (that might actually be a very conservative estimate). I've been pleasantly surprised that the overwhelming number of you all seem reasonably sane in person, although I'd guess that may not be a vice versa assessment. Not a bad way to get through 20 years of eating.
