"The packaging has been completely revised and, we hope, foreshadows the great experience that awaits you once you open it," said Vista product manager Nick White. "Designed to be user-friendly, the new packaging is a small, hard, plastic container that’s designed to protect the software inside for life-long use."

OK. I really *am* laughing my posterior-off at that bit of drivel.

Pretty! Shiny!

Yup! That's microsoft for ya. The packaging probably is the most valuable part of your purchase experience. Don't forget to bring your own can of grease.

SO THAT'S WHERE THE $200+ OF MY HARD EARNED MONEY IS GOING TO; THE PACKAGING!!!

Oh boy, it's got a package and everything!!!

I think i'll wait for bugs & driver issues to surface before I buy it. not to mention I really dont *need* to upgrade. why fix what isnt broken? not to say XP is perfect, but im happy atm

I don't know why people keep b****ing about the pricing. It's a product that you will be using for YEARS in most cases. I bought Windows XP waaaay back when it came out, here I am still using it today. Was it worth the money? Totally. The best OS Microsoft's come up with yet. I plan on buying Vista Ultimate ASAP as well, and I plan on using it for years. The price? It fits perfectly fine in my honest opinion.

I bet there'll be bugs in the packaging also!

It will be interesting to see if microsoft backfires on itself once vista gets enough end user testing. By backfire, i am refering to the inevitable Xp vs Vista war, with vista being left behind. We have seen predecessor superiority once too many times before, as solid, good working programming gets filled up with useless running code, purely there for fairy fluffed aesthetics...

Amazing looking! You know some lib with piss and moan because they feel there is to much plastic and or tree deaths.

packaging-shmackaging. at this point, they'd have to deliver it using fully naked lapdancers with free (cold) beer before I'll even think of shelling out $ for it anytime soon.

I like the look of the packaging, however I'm still sticking with XP for now.

I'm curious to see if cheaper OEM-packaged versions of Vista will be available. If you go to Tigerdirect they have both the normal and OEM version of XP Home and Pro. The OEM is only HALF the price!!

The only difference aside from a lot of money is the packaging and the fact that you must do a fresh installation for OEM (I do anyway). For $115 Canadian, XP Home OEM sure is a great deal.

The only difference aside from a lot of money is the packaging and the fact that you must do a fresh installation for OEM (I do anyway).
I believe the retail versions of XP actually allow for installation on a few machines (though it isn't supposed to be on all of them at once); but if Vista's licensing is as restrictive as we keep hearing, there won't be any difference other than packaging and price.

Beautiful Packaging, ugly License model.

Tank you

Considering the vast majority of Vista sales will be bundled with a PC, I wouldn't go screaming about MS killing the Earth just yet.

You car produces more crap to contribute to global warming than that piece of plastic ever will, so give it a rest.

As for the look, I pretty much expected the "Energy" theme. Funny though, how that theme actually began it's life in XP MCE. One would think they'd create something new to differentiate it.

Thought the Starter would be a light blue though... (lighter than the business edition)

So much for my powers of prognostication.

Save the planet, download it from bit torrent. :)

i'm subpoenaing you as my first witness :D

ZING! ouch.

well with the price tag being so high I'd expect nothing less..... omg lets hope it comes with a free vista ready mousepad.

More non-biodegradable packaging for the landfill. Reminds me of the polystyrene clamshells McDonalds used to use to "protect" their fast food sandwiches for the 2 minute trip from counter to table. They had to be shamed into reverting to biodegradable, environmentally-friendly cardboard.

When was the last time your Microsoft media succumbed to a packaging-related accident? If a hard plastic shell is required, why not something more efficient like a DVD-style case? It's not like they're going to start including lots of printed documentation to fill that big, empty box.

That is the first thing I thought of as well. I would rather a cardboard box with a paper sleeve for the disc. I never keep the box anyway. The first thing I do is make an ISO, put the original media some place safe and then always used a copy. Infact a ISO for download and an email with the product key would be better for me than a boxed product.

I remember IBM's packaging for their original PC and software. You got these nice binders and sleeves made of cardboard with I think cloth or some type of material. They looked nice and were very durable so they'd last forever if you took care of them, but being made of cardboard they were biodegradable so they wouldn't sit in a landfill for all eternity. Much nicer than the cheap plastic crap everyone gives us today.

http://i4.ebayimg.com/05/i/08/03/45/dc_1.JPG

Cry me a river, it’s just the packaging. I think were all getting sick of being treated like criminals because we don't buy into the global warming hype.

Well I guess that liberals won't buy it since it's not biodegradable. I on the other hand will enjoy the product no matter what the packing is made of. Try to whine a little louder, maybe you'll find someone who cares.

How about sharing your address with us so we can send all our plastic packaging to your house? Paper would have been the sensible choice, conservative tree-haters aside, but the economic reality is that the crystalline polymer plastic Microsoft uses is cheaper for them.

Aside: global-warming isn't a belief like the way conservatives believe in a god; it's a sad fact, unless you're just delusional.

Quoting above: "If a hard plastic shell is required, why not something more efficient like a DVD-style case?"

Quoting the MS rep: "the new packaging is a small, hard, plastic container that’s designed to protect the software inside for life-long use."

Am I missing something? After your rant, it sounds like they are doing exactly what you proposed!! So much noise over nothing.

Genius, it is the causes of global warming that are being debated! But like a good knee jerk lib you want to mistate the issue. And look at larger cycles such as long term solar activity and its relationship to earth environmental cycles. And continue to ignore the fact that one substantial volcanic eruption totally renders the total yearly human contribution to the environment negligible. And while you are at it, explain the Maunder Mimimum to us. Look it up!! Was that the result of aerosol can use as well?

A DVD-style case is smaller, thinner, and uses less plastic than the thicker, book-style case MS proposes (and Apple is already) using. Cardboard DVD-cases are even better.

This is not as so much a global warming issue as a simple landfill issue. Despite the dubious "life-long" protection the proposed MS cases offer, the lifespan of Vista and Office, like every prior OS, is only a few years, and then it's just trash (some may disagree on the use of the word "then"). Cardboard cases at least have some potential to decompose in a landfill; plastic lasts forever unless it's deliberately recycled.

and, like a good conservative lemming, you continue to ignore the scientific opinions of people much more capable of making a proper judgment on the matter than you or I, and instead believe in your socio-political leaders' views that the scientists don't know what they are talking about.

Noise.

Dude, between your volcanoes and aerosol cans, you're really drinking the conservative koolaid. Turn off Rush "oxycontin-viagra-addiction" Limbag radio and read a book or play some golf. Let's hope Microsoft sells so few copies of Vista that it will never matter. They had to put a pearl on that pig somehow.

Let's see...is it one centimeter or two centimeters different in size.

And regarding it being a landfill issue, most don't throw out he software disk and the case! DUH!

And for all of you zealots out there, you can still recycle it when you do get rid of it.

Its amazing just how difficult life is for some of you.

How many degrees in physics do you have genius? I have two among others. Some of us don't have to listen to the radio to know whereof we speak, unlike the high school kiddies here. And if you don't think that there is a real debate over the causes of global warming among legitimate sources, you are not familiar with the issue.

And while you are at it, please explain the causes of the Maunder Moment...we are all waiting.

OMG your so full of complete s*** its a wonder you dont drown LOL

Physics is a large, large science. What fields were they in, or did you get two associates in the same field(stargazing?) from a mail order school? I really didn't know two physics degrees would help so much at working on AIX machines. I guess you just never know. All sarcasm aside, you really don't come across as a person that has a single degree in anything, those people wouldn't have a hard time understanding that this is 1) a casual forum, and 2) belief or lack thereof in global warming really does not necessarily indicate liberal or conservative political leanings. Oh, and degrees matter much less than what you did to deserve them. Did you know an surprisingly large percentage of business majors cheat on ethics tests? I also know people receiving master's degrees that don't deserve their BA.

And if you'll read carefully, I've not claimed to know more than you, only to have heard the conclusions of those more knowledgeable than myself. And whose judgments I would trust much more than those of a person that has nothing better to do than troll forums claiming knowledge in everything, and claiming lack of bias while clearly showing it in the very same statement.

I don't know what the "Maunder Moment" is, and I won't use google results to claim otherwise as I am sure you can. I was always bad with the name game, thats why I stuck with math and computer science where you just need to know how to do things. But, from the google results I glanced at, it looks like the Maunder Moment is the "seasonal" pattern that causes warm and cool periods over long periods of time. I believe it is associated with the occurrences of ice ages and extended heat waves. However, from what I recall hearing, this heat wave we are in is abnormally high for what it should be.

Some people live and breathe it.

I remember those. Wow, turn the way-back machine on! :)

I personally always used rather large binders for all of my software, opting to discard the original packaging unless it was some type of special collector's edition metal tin. I used to keep all of my C64/128 floppies in binders on a bookcase, labeled accordingly (productivity, games, etc.), and just flip through 'em until I found the one I needed. It looked much nicer to me, and took up much less space... not to mention I always knew where everything was.

"I won't use google results...But from google results". Good grief man, you contradicted yourself within two sentences. Yep you're credible, I'll listen to what you have to say.

"Physics is a large, large science. What fields were they in, or did you get two associates in the same field(stargazing?) from a mail order school? I really didn't know two physics degrees would help so much at working on AIX machines. I guess you just never know. All sarcasm aside, you really don't come across as a person that has a single degree in anything, those people wouldn't have a hard time understanding that this is 1) a casual forum, and 2) belief or lack thereof in global warming really does not necessarily indicate liberal or conservative political leanings. Oh, and degrees matter much less than what you did to deserve them. Did you know an surprisingly large percentage of business majors cheat on ethics tests? I also know people receiving master's degrees that don't deserve their BA.
And if you'll read carefully, I've not claimed to know more than you, only to have heard the conclusions of those more knowledgeable than myself. And whose judgments I would trust much more than those of a person that has nothing better to do than troll forums claiming knowledge in everything, and claiming lack of bias while clearly showing it in the very same statement.
I don't know what the "Maunder Moment" is, and I won't use google results to claim otherwise as I am sure you can. I was always bad with the name game, thats why I stuck with math and computer science where you just need to know how to do things. But, from the google results I glanced at, it looks like the Maunder Moment is the "seasonal" pattern that causes warm and cool periods over long periods of time. I believe it is associated with the occurrences of ice ages and extended heat waves. However, from what I recall hearing, this heat wave we are in is abnormally high for what it should be."
______________________________________________

“working on AIX machines”…hahaha, yeah right. If that were only what I have actually done... You might want to do a bit more research into what is involved in the internal development of massively parallel environments leading up to such installations as ASCI White, ASCI Blue, Blue Gene and platforms such as RS/6000 SP. And my degrees do not end with physics. But you sound like so many engineers who repeatedly say ‘oh, physics…that’s the course that almost kept me from becoming an engineer…but we don’t do any physics here…’ No wonder so many in CS ran there after they discovered that they couldn’t cut it in engineering.
Ironically my experience and training in science extends beyond physics and CS and business, and I have had extensive relations in both the FSU and in the Far East, especially mainland China.

And unless your schools outrank Columbia University (among others), you can keep your mail order degrees.

But then few on this forum have any idea of what constitutes the market structure and/or forces in the IT marketplace, let alone any other market aside from the aisles of Best Buy. And rather than discuss ideas and how developments reflect developments and the strategic positioning of various vendors and products in reference to a particular market situation – thus potentially learning something, the general posture here is simply that of partisan rants based upon emotion – whereby folks are threatened if someone else has the audacity to find merit in something they disagree – and it extends from the MS/Apple/Linux rants to the Xbox/PS3 rants to the anti-DRM rants as so many justify their stolen software and music files while trashing legitimate markets as well as ignoring larger more significant markets. But then for most ignorance is bliss, and we have allot of very blissful partisan contributors who think the world revolves around what the P2P users and skateboarders think. Think what you like, but it is ironic that folks here have little idea of the realm of the enterprise – and for that reason have little understanding as to why companies such as Dell, who refined a BTO standalone computer structure are suffering as the market evolves from a BTO model with replacement cycles every 1.5 years to a market increasingly dominated by solution providers.

And like the others, you say you claim not to know more than me or others, yet you do not discuss the possible causes of global warming, instead you repeatedly posit the cause of global warming as if it is monolithic and settled (which it is NOT!) all the while denigrating anyone who dares posit another point of view. Yeah, as if you are actually interested in a discussion! Like hell you are as you hide behind your ‘reliable sources’. And your closed minded position (based on some other unidentified sources) is completely consistent with a particular political position. And who was it that pigeon holed me into being a conservative Rush fanatic? You know, the irony is that even NASA is funding research into the study of solar variability on the earth’s climate – and showing amazing correlation between solar variability and earth’s heating and cooling. But don’t let that confuse the conclusions of a few who have only woken up to the idea of climate change in the last 30 years and have jumped to the conclusion that it must be due to man. And yet the fact that a single volcanic eruption renders mankind’s contributions to the atmosphere negligible still confuses you. But then I suspect you had no clue regarding that fact. But for one who assumes that mankind’s contributions are so significant, discovering that a natural occurrence such as a volcano or, heaven forbid, solar activity, can render the sum of humankind’s contribution to the atmosphere as negligible must suddenly make you feel pretty small. And it threatens ALLOT of the so called experts who have built their careers on a singular causal explanation. So there is much more to the debate over what is causing a warming of the atmosphere then the clichés we too often see based upon the positions of so many with a vested interest in having a particular conclusion accepted. So, in all, you have shown to be very closed minded. Especially for one who also claims to ultimately know very little about the subject – except to mouth what a vocal group of politically motivated climatologists have claimed. It seems that one so self admittedly ignorant of the debate would be less inclined to issue such pedantic conclusions rather than exploring more contributing factors.

Oh, and your supposition regarding the Maunder Minimum (often referred to as the Little Ice Age) is incorrect. Maybe you might want to look into it just a bit further. Not only the nature of the climatic change which lasted for more than a ‘season’!. It even had a significant and fundamental impact on the economic development of Europe and the development of the industrial age. And I can refer you to in depth analyses of this as well – that is if your so-called experts haven’t already covered it… But their explanations of manmade aerosols and chlorofluorocarbons won’t cover this one!

It would be wonderful if people actually wished to have intelligent discussions reflecting various opinions. But as the format is hit and run, and the majority simply wish to post partisan rants trashing whatever the other person uses that differs from them, this is a futile effort. And just as you and your cronies are welcome to post your partisan rants, I am also able to post my frustration and dislike of the simplistic partisan rants. So, you might look more closely and note that I tend to play the contrarian to any partisan rant. And if I sound like I am partisan for a particular position, I think you will find that it is simply because it has more folks piling on with rants against it. The difference between me and so many fanboys here is that while I have preferences given a particular application or use, I acknowledge the potential for other positions given different needs and uses…and the right for others to make their own decision as they see fit. And I don’t like it when a particular group, whoever it may be, attempts to bully others who find merit in a particular product. If you don’t like it, don’t use it. And if you are going to bash products on some infantile emotional basis, don’t expect to be immune to criticism yourself.

And this recyclable versus compost-able debate is absurd. Besides, landfills are not for composting biodegradable materials! Especially as this creates big problems and unstable fills along with methane generation in fills intended to be stable. Opps, but that assumes a knowledge of the dynamics of landfills as well, doesn’t it. Gee, life is so complicated.

I love how people take quotes so out of context. Giving you the benefit of the doubt, maybe you had overlooked the "I won't use google results to make it look like I know, as I am sure you can" and "But from google result I would guess". If you hadn't overlooked those, maybe you wouldn't have been quite as confused; but then so many people seem to have problems with qualifiers anymore, maybe I should go back to simple sentences so everyone can understand them.

“working on AIX machines”…hahaha, yeah right. If that were only what I have actually done
You claimed so yourself just a couple weeks ago, are you saying you were lying or that you are an expert on the sum of human knowledge?

But you sound like so many engineers who repeatedly say ‘oh, physics…that’s the course that almost kept me from becoming an engineer…but we don’t do any physics here…’
I had no problem with physics, I just found it no more interesting than the prospect of becoming an accountant. Calculators and programs can do that stuff, just because I am good at plugging values into formulas does not mean I want to do such tedious work. Granted experimental physics seemed somewhat interesting, I just leaned toward more tangible results (though you can't really call programming and software design an activity that results in something "tangible").

But then few on this forum have any idea of what constitutes the market structure and/or forces in the IT marketplace, ... little understanding as to why companies such as Dell, who refined a BTO standalone computer structure...
Maybe because it is not a forum for professionals, and neither they nor I find it the place for these in depth discussions you wish for?

And like the others, you say you claim not to know more than me or others, yet you do not discuss the possible causes of global warming...
I'm sorry, I thought the topic was about Vista's and Office 2007's packaging

And who was it that pigeon holed me into being a conservative Rush fanatic?
I dunno, you tell me. I may have insinuated you were a conservative lemming, but I don't know Rush (Limbaugh, I assume) from the guys from the other 5 billion tv shows I do not watch. I only did so because you seemed like so many other of those lemmings to spout the term "liberal" like it is a dirty word.

you do not discuss the possible causes of global warming, instead you repeatedly posit the cause of global warming as if it is monolithic and settled (which it is NOT!)
How can I "not discuss the possible causes" and yet "repeatedly posit the cause"? Take a look back at my post. Did I make any such claims that the causes were definite, let alone suggest any causes? No.

correlation between solar variability and earth’s heating and cooling
Gosh, you mean the sun getting hotter or colder and the earth getting closer or farther from it, makes the earth get warmer or colder? Who could've guessed? /sarcasm

But don’t let that confuse the conclusions of a few who have only woken up to the idea of climate change in the last 30 years and have jumped to the conclusion that it must be due to man.
You act like global climatology is a centuries old science. 30 years is approximately the age of the field.

And yet the fact that a single volcanic eruption renders mankind’s contributions to the atmosphere negligible still confuses you.
Do volcanic eruptions of sufficient magnitude occur regularly enough to keep mankind's contributions negligible? Ever hear of the butterfly effect? I am sure that with all your physics knowledge you understand the concept of harmonics, and would hope your massive intellect would help you to see how similar properties would apply to minute additions to a system to topple its equilibrium.

But for one who assumes that mankind’s contributions are so significant, discovering that a natural occurrence ... can render the sum of humankind’s contribution to the atmosphere as negligible must suddenly make you feel pretty small.
Nope, not really, I know we are all little more than ants in the grand scope of the universe. Maybe a little smaller, and probably a lot less humble; but still less significant to the universe (or even our own solar system), than an ant is to our entire race.

And it threatens ALLOT of the so called experts who have built their careers on a singular causal explanation.
I was speaking more of the experts that doubted it, and have now changed their opinion.

...you have shown to be very closed minded.
I have a personality trait that causes me to reflect those around me. If you think I am closed minded, perhaps you should take a look at your own posts...and mine when I am not responding to yours.

...except to mouth what a vocal group of politically motivated climatologists have claimed.
Perhaps I am guilty of assuming that most scientists are not politically motivated when not in the pockets of large corporations.

[Maunder Minimum] lasted for more than a ‘season’!
I was not using "seasonal" in its yearly since, I meant to imply a cyclical pattern between two extremes. I thought about spelling that out as my post was running rather long, but I assumed you would know what I was trying to imply.

It would be wonderful if people actually wished to have intelligent discussions reflecting various opinions.
My desires for the type of discussion varies from topic to topic, and greatly depends on how much time I have to spare to discuss it. Often times, I am only in the mood for a "light" discussion of the topic. "Food for thought" or a simple exchange of idea, if you will. Other times, I like an in depth discussion of something. If a poster seems to know more about it, and is more interested in imparting that knowledge than brow-beating those less knowledgeable or less interested, then I ask them to share/clarify/point towards resources. Pretty much never do I try to impose my desires for discussion on those of others. It is usually fairly easy to gauge how interested, knowledgeable, and/or serious about a topic a particular poster is by their first post or two..at least if you have browsed the site more than a few days. If I think they are wrong I do not try to browbeat them into submission to make myself seem smart, I don't need to. I simply point out my differing knowledge, knowing that my knowledge could be wrong, outdated, or not apply in the particular context. Often, my educated guesses (usually based off of logical reasoning) happen to be right; sometimes they are wrong and I learn from it. Sometimes my knowledge is wrong and I learn from that.

...if you are going to bash products on some infantile emotional basis, don’t expect to be immune to criticism yourself.
I really do not recall a single post where I have done so. I would like you to point one out, really, I would. (One where I am not obviously joking around.)

And this recyclable versus compost...
Trust me, I am much less ecologically friendly than you might assume. For one, I am not interested in "saving the world", it will still be here long after I, you, and the entire human race are gone. I just hope they have affordable gas-masks and water purifiers if we ever have to resort to them.

One last note, just to point something out you may not realize. My claims often use un-cited sources (I am sure someone will take that fragment out of context at some point); but I don't speak those claims as if they are gospel. You often sight your own education and experience as a reference; but you must realize that is no better. Short of posting proof of identity and your degrees and travel documents, your sources are less reliable than mine...as I make neither claims of absolutism in the concepts nor expertise in them. I have no interest in defending another person's knowledge save from baseless illogical attacks. Sighting one's self as reference only works to an audience that trusts the speaker. With the almost schizophrenic or bi-polar pattern to your posts and ever present aggressiveness, you have done nothing to earn anyone's trust. In fact, you've done the opposite. When you do site sources, you are likely to cause people to doubt those sources as well.

That's exactly what I do. It makes me so happy when I open a new game and find that the only thing I have to toss is a paper sleeve instead of a whole damned CD case.

“working on AIX machines”…hahaha, yeah right. If that were only what I have actually done
You claimed so yourself just a couple weeks ago, are you saying you were lying or that you are an expert on the sum of human knowledge?"

I can see I must go slower with you. Perhaps you would want to sit down first. Yes, I routinely work on AIX machines. I suppose that you work on a Windows or Apple or Linux box. Does that make you a technician? It is amazing that you think anyone that works on a computer or uses one as a tool must be a tech. It is the OS I most routinely access. But then I don't spend most of my time playing video games or downloading MP3s. I mentioned this as I am not pushing Windows or OSX or Linux as a personal issue. I also routinely access all of those platforms, but I 'live' in AIX. (Oh no, now he will interpret this as a town!) But I don't care which platform you prefer. And I do get very tired of the Windows and Linux folks who are ignorant of the Mac platform constantly misrepresenting them (and many have never used one except for 10 minutes in a store!), as well as those who attack others for having a different preference. And I also get tired of the Mac nuts who bash MS simply because they are MS. So, Was I lying? Only someone incapable of reading for meaning would come to that conclusion. So, just for you, no, I was not lying.

And you idea that real world physics is simply plugging values into formulas? Really. The irony is that is what folks who don't know physics do in class and in homework. Real world physics involves just a bit more than solving book word problems. But I must admit to laughing that you consider yourself more than the author of calculator or accounting programs! As if stenographers authored the Constitution.

"You act like global climatology is a centuries old science. 30 years is approximately the age of the field."
Unfortunately many have extrapolated a minute amount of data based upon foregone conclusions into catastrophic predictions. The fact is that there are other legitimate scientific opinions that disagree with your so called experts. Just as your ignorance of the research on such topics as solar variability (the sun getting hotter or cooler???) suggest.

"I just leaned toward more tangible results (though you can't really call programming and software design an activity that results in something "tangible")."
Yup, we use them, but the most qualified are in Romania, the Ukraine and in Russia. Ironically math is fundamental to their training, unlike in the US. Architects also employ draftsman.

"And like the others, you say you claim not to know more than me or others, yet you do not discuss the possible causes of global warming...
I'm sorry, I thought the topic was about Vista's and Office 2007's packaging"
Try reading all of the thread! Believe it or not you aren't the only one posting. Nor are you the only one to which I refer in the post. But I guess your inability to read and your ego simply don't acknowledge any other posted ideas than your own.

"Maybe because it is not a forum for professionals, and neither they nor I find it the place for these in depth discussions you wish for?"

Give yourselves more credit! Unfortunately this place totally eschews the mention of fact or substance in lieu of the emotional platform bigotry.

"Take a look back at my post. Did I make any such claims that the causes were definite, let alone suggest any causes? No."
Amazing! I guess that is why the suggestion that there are legitimate alternative postulates regarding the causes of global warming got your and other's panties in a wad!

"correlation between solar variability and earth’s heating and cooling...Gosh, you mean the sun getting hotter or colder and the earth getting closer or farther from it, makes the earth get warmer or colder? Who could've guessed?"
Sarcasm? That asinine conclusion is amazingly consistent with your position regarding the topic that you are admittedly ignorant.

"And it threatens ALLOT of the so called experts who have built their careers on a singular causal explanation.
I was speaking more of the experts that doubted it, and have now changed their opinion."

Again you confuse the distinction between acknowledging that global temperatures have risen very slightly over the short term (which some have changed opinions on) and the CAUSES of this, where many more have NOT changed. Your repetition of this same tired point illustrates that you still don't understand the distinction!

You have no idea as to the extent of my qualifications to post. And you deserve none. All of the data I cite is independently verifiable if one chooses to look or to civilly inquire as to a source. The irony is that most people here don't care to investigate, and the closest that any come is to simply issue personal attacks.

The bottom line is that despite your ego, my posts are NOT ALL ABOUT YOU! Get over it. Deal with it. My responses refer to many comments in the various thread posting. But your ego refuses to accept that - as evidenced by your ignorance of the other posts in this thread regarding the impending ecological catastrophe.

I don't care what you do with your trash. But if you had bothered to read the entire thread, others have made quite a roe about the size of the plastic case for the CD/DVD as well as debated paper versus plastic and incorrectly advocated paper as they feel it will decompose in landfills (which it neither does nor is it supposed to!).

And yet you continue to refer to others as confused...Yeah. It must be 'them'...

"And by 'seasonal' I meant"... whatever... redefine words to your liking. I guess it all depends on the meaning of "is". But go ahead, extrapolate the world's climatic history from 30 years worth of data. Not only does that assume either a linear or a very well behaved cyclical progression, but it also illustrates that you need to study just a bit more math. As it comes nowhere close to predicting the world climate. Just as we are entering the cyclical period of increased hurricane activity, but this year we had far fewer rather than more storms. Oops.

"...and the majority simply wish to post partisan rants trashing whatever the other person uses that differs from them, this is a futile effort."

In psychology, they call that projection, and your posts tend to be filled with it. You're an idiot and you're going to be called on that a lot here, so you should get used to it. You also make assertions and then try to wiggle out of them by morphing the subject as you go. You'll get caught doing that, too. You also seem to think that if you get the last word, you were right. You should understand that most of the time that will mean that people just got tired of responding to your arrogant stupidity.

Do you really expect anyone to believe that someone with your obvious lack of maturity could attain ONE degree, let alone the multitude you claim? Your delusional grandiosity is getting the better of you.

If you think someone who earned there degree in CS needs to "go back to school for more math", Columbia must have really low expectations of its CS majors. (Then again, I was taking grad courses for my electives.)

If you can't even understand the simple concept that the people whose posts you reply to will think you are replying to their posts, then there really is no hope for you.

Some actually read the post and see to what the reference actually refers, dimwit. Your inability to realize that references to that which others in the thread have mentioned and which you have not renders you the fool.

And I said nothing about Colombia and CS...but that would require reading for meaning. But the difference between Computer Engineering and CS is in large part the more extensive math and the technical knowledge required.

But then again:"If you think someone who earned there degree in CS needs to "go back to school for more math""

The irony that you have missed is that the primary difference between the US CS programs and the superior foreign CS programs in India and the FSU is precisely their rigorous math basis.
What do you need? How about more math AND an English course MrWizard. And many Chinese speak better English than do you. Just one more reason to go offshore.

Has your job been outsourced/offshored yet? Its coming! Can we say Bangalore? ;-) Maybe you should be learning to speak Hindi, Russian or Chinese. Or was that included in your curriculum too?

Your inability to realize that references to that which others in the thread have mentioned and which you have not renders you the fool....What do you need? How about more math AND an English course
Apparently, I'll be seeing you in those classes as well. When some replies to your post and use the word "you", it is assumed the replier is talking to you. Or do you think there is only one person interacting with you under countless pseudonyms? While we are in math class I can show you how 3 is not 300% more than 0, as you apparently never could figure that one out; or were at very least unable to admit you mistated and assumed too much of the post you were replying to. Either way, talking to you has proven less productive and a greater waste of time than talking to a wall, so that is the last lesson I have for you. Enjoy your bitterness and ulcers.