What I recommend probably has something to do with my socioeconomic circle - I live in a very working class area, so I try to recommend the most cost-effective way to *try* vaping. I vape 4-5 mls a day *now*, but when I started, I was still trying to figure this whole ecig thing out, so it was pretty much 2 ml or less because I was running on 808s and cartos and still learning *how* to vape. Once I hit about the one week mark, that's when I knew I was going to be able to *stick* with it (and that I wanted more power, and that I wanted VV/VW, etc), so I picked out a mod and tanks, and some more juice at the same time. Once I had the gear that was going to give me my perfect vape (for now anyway), *then* my consumption went up, both because I enjoyed it more and because I had VV/VW to play with. So I stand by what I said - I think *at least* 30 mls in *at least* 3 flavors is enough for most beginners to try it out for long enough to see if they like it. The key words there are "at least," at bare minimum. 30 ml is what will give you a decent sampling period if there's no extra money around and you're giving up your analog budget for a few days to try it, as is the case with most people in my area.
If for whatever reason a beginner is going to start with a VV model, I'd recommend at least 60 ml, because higher voltage can affect juice consumption pretty drastically... but I don't know many people who want to start off with VV. It's too much for most people to learn and worry about fiddling with when they're used to "light up and breathe in" to get their nic fix.
I have a friend who's in IT and computer repair (so he's a tinkerer by nature, as am I) and I actually *tried* to get him to start with a Twist... even he found it too intimidating to consider, and wanted a cig-a-like. Two weeks later, I was helping him shop for a VV mod.
I'm not saying that *makes sense*, because it makes no logical sense at all from a person who builds computers for a living (him) or for me, a person whose first task when I got my power chair was to crack open the control box so I could remove the limiter, to be intimidated by the dial on the bottom of a VV Ego... but what can I say, we were. We both love VV now, but we needed that cig-a-like to get going. My mother, father, stepmother and grandfather want *no* part of VV, and rarely even hit 2ml a day yet - it's been two months for my mother and about two weeks for the others, and they're all still dealing with the learning curve. Even when they figure it out, I don't see them moving on from 808s and regular Egos. My mother won't vape anything other than an automatic 808 because she maintains hitting a button is way too much hassle just to get her nic. (Her words, not mine!)
<snip>