Acar, When you look at this, check out the times that they where updated too.
~Ian

Acar probably shot himself already from all the frustration lol. At this point, I don't care if I win officially. Just as long as I eventually get the right answer haha

If i got the right answer, and he checks the updates, I WIN!!!
~Ian

oops... maybe I shouldnt have updated it to add my extra comments in it... efff =[

1 pack of orbit gum weighs .079 pounds (as per amazon).

2 packs weigh .158 pounds.

The case plus DVD weighs .188 pounds (as per Jeff).

The weight of 2 packs of gum + DVD equals .346

John is carrying 49.824 lbs of GUM

Sally is carrying 110.72 lbs of GUM (to get the above 2 numbers, multiply the weight of the DVD + 2 packs of gum times the amount they have).

To make it fair, each of them would have to weigh 150 pounds, meaning that John would have to be left with 14 pounds of GUM and Sally would have to be left with 29 pounds of GUM (what a waste of perfectly good GUM ).

To find out the weight of GUM needed to throw out, subtract the amount they are able to carry from the total amount of GUM they have.

The amount of GUM that John would throw out would be equal to 35.824 lbs. It can be found with the following equation: 35.824 = .346X , with X being the number of GUM packages needed to be thrown out. X = 103.54, which gets rounded up to 104. John would have to throw out 104 cases of the GUM + 2 orbitz gums packages.

The amount of GUM that Sally would throw out would be equal to 81.72 lbs. It can be found with the following equation: 81.72 = .346X , with X being the number of GUM packages needed to be thrown out. X = 236.185, which gets rounded up to 287. Sally would have to throw out 287 cases of the GUM + 2 orbitz gums packages.

Sally would have to throw out 183 more than John would.

EDIT: I just posted this in the holiday promo thread and saw there was a thread devoted to the contest, so am copying and pasting my answer.

Weight limit - persons weight = extra weight camel can carry

John:
150 lbs - 136 lbs = 14 lbs

Orbit Gum weight x 2 + DVD weight

34.2 gm x 2 = 68.4 gm (converted) = 2.41 oz + 3 oz = 5.41 oz

Extra weight for camel / weight of gum + DVD

14 lbs / 5.41 oz = 2.58 or 3 DVD’s

___________________________________________________________________________________

Weight limit - persons weight = extra weight camel can carry

Sally:
150 lbs - 121 lbs = 29 lbs

Orbit Gum weight x 2 + DVD weight

34.2 gm x 2 = 68.4 gm (converted) = 2.41 oz + 3 oz = 5.41 oz

Extra weight for camel / weight of gum + DVD

29 lbs / 5.41 oz = 11.24 or 11 DVD’s

___________________________________________________________________________________

John will be able to carry 3 DVD’s which means that he will have to throwaway 141 DVD’s

Sally will be able to carry 11 DVD’s which means that she will have to throwaway 309 DVD’s

“Or they could send me the ones that they are going to throwaway and I will sell them on EBay”

SO

“Sally would have to throwaway 168 more DVD’s than John!”

Has any1 won yet?
~Ian

As much as I wish it were different, I believe that Hikeeba got the answer first, followed by Kolada41 (hopefully with me in 3rd place ). While all 3 of us got different answers, they might all be right based on where we each rounded off the decimal points (for example, in the short range, a difference of .1 is small, but when you're dealing with quantities of hundreds then it starts to add up).

So...it comes down to the accuracy of the weight of our orbit 14-pcs pack.

Congratulations to Hikeeba, the winner! I was keeping a close watch on all submissions and hikeebas was the first to be right.

And by the way, it was not about the exact weight of the gum and DVD but how accurately you showed your work.

Girspiggy, I actually thought for sure you had it at first, but then your work started to get funky. I saw that you fixed it soon after though. Nice work!

Great work everyone, this contest was fun.
Acar

YES! I was right!

(I'll celebrate the small victories when I can get them