Chicago style wins Duh.

In all seriousness though, other programs are better + more suited for specific tasks, but no one talks about it. This always changes over time, but as a general rule, if you're doing xxx task, you can do it better with xxx program. People that say “all programs are equal” are idiots (in my opinion, but I'm always right so don't bother arguing). Just because that program has the same features as this program does not make them equal. It's the way it's done in the two programs that matters, not whether or not it's possible. I can't stress this enough, this is why some programs are better than others. Technically, we could be hand drawing every single cg image in mspaint. Mspaint can do everything, there are no limits technically. So through technicalities, mspaint is equal to xxx program right? Wrong. Obviously there is a line somewhere, but no one feels comfortable acknowledging it… ugh. This is why these types of questions never get a genuine discussion. 3D people suck.

Well, I'm for Saint Louis Style pizza !!! I can't find any in LA

even if NL-Animation editors aren't used by everyone I suspect it is “a” direction that animation is going, not the only one, but not just a trend either. I'm mainly interested in Houdini for crowds and particles .. this would be a cool way to deal with crowd logic

PS cracker style crunchy is referred to as Saint Louis (MO) style pizza very thin, uses provolone instead of mozerrella, piled with veggis and normally cut into squares … the closest thing I've had to it apart from Saint Louis was in Budapest