I don't really like virtualenv because you have to activate it to do anything and deactivate it if you want to go to another project or work on something unrelated. I'd much rather it work by the project directory so I don't have to worry about the activation part (this is why Node's package manager, for all its issues, is great: you install in a local folder unless you explicitly supply the -g flag). At least I should be able to install packages to my home directory.

Ah yes. Local by default would be nicer.

I still think that the "project" directory is best, but I'm glad that Pip is moving to local-by-default in any case. It won't take away from the necessity of virtualenv for cases of different dependency versions, e.g. Django 1.4 and 1.10, I think, unfortunately, but it's definitely better than global by default.

The problem is not for people like you who already decided, the problem is for beginners who aren't aware of some of the 'envs' and are looking for recommended practices.