Well, it's a feature by our policy, since it currently works as documented.

Probably the first thing would be to get the opinion of someone who works on the IO module, so I've nosied Antoine.  Note that this was obviously a conscious design decision, as it is documented clearly.

Another possible first step is the one I suggested: posting a recipe on the recipe site and seeing if there is any uptake.  Python-ideas would be another option.  For this level of change, I don't believe a PEP is required :)