This video shows that people can't really taste the difference between bottled water and tap water and the loop holes within the bottled water industry within America.

What Mike A said about the infrastructure question is undeniably true. If the government were to exit the market on water, it is likely that some of those infrastructure problems wouldn’t persist. Why would they? Every wasted drop would be wasted money for a private company.Mr. Sprague, the link I put up links to a pdf, which is from where I cited.I would also point out that in Third World countries public ownership of water hasn’t been a net positive as water is used as a political weapon. Fortunately, there are efforts afoot to privatize it even in the Third World. (http://www.reason.com/news/show/32902.html) (http://www.reason.com/news/printer/34992.html) But hey, it’s not all bad. Part of the good news (at least for me) is that government owned water means that in a lot of countries Coca-Cola sales increase. (I happen to be a share holder.) In turn, Coca-cola sales give a good assessment of whether or not the regime is stable. http://www.economist.com/world/mideast-africa/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11670946

Last night at Snack, the Environmental Crusaders held an event for their Tap Water Campaign. Everyone hates the stuff that comes out of the tap at CMC (cloudy with a funny taste), so many students revert to the environmentally harmful bottled stuff.The Crusaders ran a taste test– providing both bottled water and filtered tap water for students to sample. Club member Joe Swartley ‘11 reports, “We got a surprising number of people to stop by, and most of them found the filtered tap water to be tastier than the bottled water. ”Okay, so this wasn’t exactly scientific, but still great news if some people were convinced to start using a filter.The Crusaders hope to hold more events at Snack in the future– stay posted for their next move.Not convinced of the ridiculousness of bottled water? Check out this video from water experts libertarian comedian magicians Penn & Teller: addthis_url = 'http%3A%2F%2Fcmcforum.com%2Fnews%2F03302009-and-the-winner-istap-water'; addthis_title = 'And+the+winner+is%26%238230%3BTAP+WATER%21'; addthis_pub = 'geltoorch';

We cover tech news here at TechCrunch, so I was surprised to see a 5 lb overnight shipment arrive from Pepsi containing three half liter bottles of Aquafina water. The reason for the special delivery? The company is launching a new plastic bottle that contains half the plastic content of the old bottles. Less plastic = less landfill weight, less carbon, less bad stuff in general, they say. I’m concerned that Pepsi decided to promote its new “eco-friendly” product by shipping, via Fedex overnight, 5 lb boxes of the water to press around the country. And then sending a second batch either in error or to reinforce the message. That’s not very eco-friendly (if anyone knows the carbon cost of sending these boxes, let me know, then multiply it by hundreds or thousands of press). It all seems a little wasteful.Anyway, after all this carbon spending, I thought I should at least put the product to the test. I don’t drink bottled water myself, since it’s less safe than tap water and way too expensive (see the clip from Bullshit below). But Laguna, my 105 lb chocolate lab, loves bottled water. And she loves to chew on stuff. So we brought her in for a special assignment. She reluctantly agreed.First off was the taste test. She doesn’t look particularly enthusiastic in the picture above, but once I started pouring, she was definitely into it. She didn’t even wait for it to hit the bowl:Next was the durability test. It took her about ten seconds to destroy the bottle, which isn’t good. Pepsi removed about half the plastic from the new bottles, and they clearly aren’t going to hold up to any kind of sustained attacked from a large, well-toothed canine:Overall I’d say that Aquafina water is absolutely good enough for my dog to drink, and the bottles make fun albeit short-lived chew toys to distract her. Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.