I am going to keep this pretty stupid simple, cause I could write about this for hours. It is something both myself and others here have talked about doing for years. Why don't we have a Daily Kos Cookbook?
Long ago this site (IMHO) moved from being just about helping to elect progressives and banter about politics. As membership grew it became a community. A community where there are popular weekly series of Diaries that have nothing to do with politics.
One category that fits that bill as much as any relates to food.
The level and/or quality of the content, often including amazing original photos, is staggering. I wasn't the first person that said, "hey why don't we have a compilation of all these diaries put into a book people can either download or buy a print edition of?"
I've often said yeah, why don't we? So instead of asking that question again I started the process to make it happen. Below the fold is where I am. My "game plan" and next steps.
BACKGROUND
My inspiration for this is my favorite cookbook. River Road Recipes. In 1959 the Junior League (a women rights organization) in Baton Rouge, Louisiana wondered how they could raise money to promote women issues and culture. They came up with the idea of members submitting family recipes they'd turn into a cookbook.
I've got a 11th printing of the cookbook from 1965, and at that time they'd printed and sold more than 125,000 copies at 3 bucks a pop. There might be millions printed at this point.
Grassroots activism that went well locally, then regionally, and now a group of cookbooks you can buy almost anywhere with countless versions.
MY VISION
Don't see why we can't do the same thing here. There have been hundreds of thousands if not million of words written here about food. Why can't we take all that and create our own Daily Kos Cookbook?
I personally see no reason we can't. I see things working at three different levels:
I created this website here with the URL of www.dailykoscookbook.com. Most is just placeholder copy and stuff. Just a proof of concept.
I've also got a Twitter and Facebook accounts set-up under the same name. This site is based on a very easy to use blogging/website platform (WordPress). I'd open it up to anybody that wanted to post content. The more the merrier!
It would also be used, of course, to promote the PDF download and print version of the cookbook. I think we could move this cookbook outside of just here to a much wider and larger audience!
PDF/PRINT VERSION
I plan to take the "best of the best" of the content that is used in food Diaries here (with permission of course) and create an actual physical cookbook. I mean layout and formatting at the level of quality of something you'd buy in a store.*
I envision like a $2-3 charge for the PDF download and then a yet to be determined cost to use one of the on-demand printing outfits for an actual physical copy.
* I got some InDesign skills, but help here from others would be VERY welcome!
WHY I WILL CHARGE
I want to stress my goal is NOT to make a penny. Any profit (and I hope there is a profit) would be used to back some type of non-profit. I don't even have an organization in mind at this point, but they would be one that helps to feed folks that need aid.
My thinking is as we move the process forward I'd ask for suggestions for worth while causes and open it to a vote. Whichever organization wins gets the money.
NEXT STEPS & ACTION ITEMS
Input, input, input. Ideas. Feedback. Offers for help.
CAVEATS (LEGAL ISSUES)
First, I registered the domain name "www.dailykoscookbook.com" without asking Markos for permission. That is legal, but not a perfect situation. I don't want to profit off of his work, and wouldn't move forward with this project under that name and/or domain name without his OK.
Two, if there is a lawyer reading this, my only other concern is a recipe posted that isn't original or photos that were pulled from somewhere I use cold be a huge problem. I am pretty sure I can write a waver that works, but concerned about it none the less.
CONCLUSION
So there you have it. My "big" idea .....