>That's great, really, but I am asking myself what is behind this sudden outburst of anxiety to report things on behalf of others????

I regularly surf the UT for bug reports, and have done so for years. A non-trivial amount of the bugs that I enter are gleaned from the UT (free bugs! Woo, hoo!) What specifically would you like to see addressed as it concerns bug reports?

>That still leaves, though, the issues of:
>1) knowing that the bug report has been ACCEPTED AS A TRUE BUG by MS;

Whether I can repro or not, I give feedback on bugs that I see reported here. I'll admit I don't spend a lot of time trying to repro a bug, especially if the bug report is poor ("the easier it is to repro, the more likely it is to get fixed"). I make it a habit to state, "Yes, it's a bug, I entered it" or "Nope, can't reproduce it". What further information would you find helpful?

>2) getting it into some publicly available list so that others have the benefit of learning of its existence so that they can save frustration and hair.

There is a publicly available list, and the URL has been published several times by myself and others (don't have it handy right now). How might this list be improved?

>And of course it adds a burden to our esteemed MVPs who are essentially making up for poor customer relations by MS.

Are you aware that you can call Product Services and Support with a problem, and you won't be charged if it's a product bug? That and the support professional will work with you to find a workaround? I only ask because you sound as if the only way to report bugs is to go through a volunteer third-party, when this is not the case. If you find a bug, call it in. Or for that matter, you wouldn't be the first to ping me with a bug (publicly, please; see my .sig). I try to track them all down as best I can, though remember that I don't work in support anymore, and may not have time to find a workaround. If you need a workaround, a call to PSS is your best bet.

Having started with at Microsoft with frontline Product Services and Support, I'd love to hear suggestions on how customer relations, as it concerns bugs reporting, might be improved. I may not be able to do much about it (hey, I'm just a grunt tester), but maybe I can pass ideas up the line.