I will not ever collect cardboard boxes. They're just not functional as containers for games. I can so easily get clear plastic multi-game boxes and print nice fancy labels for less than $1.50 each.
I'm the same way, which is why my Genesis collection is CIB but my GB/GBC/GBA collection is in plastic cases I bought after the fact with printed labels. Which is funny, since I still have all of the boxes for my GameBoy games, I just don't care to display them. Even the act of opening them to take out the game to play ruins the cardboard a little more each time, cardboard boxes are just too flimsy.
That's what is great about collecting. It's a personal objective. It's the goals you set for yourself and it's the same across most hobbies. I like to collect as much CIB as I can, but sometimes I compromise. We all have different expectations.
Yea, this is really true. I know a lot of people who really care about CIB games with manuals because that is their goal. For me personally, my goal is to display the games on my shelf and be able to play them when I want to, so I don't care about instruction manuals for games. You go after what you personally care about. Though I will say that not caring about manuals has saved me a good bit of money on collecting!