^ Hey man, you're the one who brought it up.
To me personally, the whole "let's just keep mum about it" vibe surrounding this is the problem. I am not on board with that in any way, shape, or form on principle.
Several paying consumers, myself included, observed a very bizarre peculiarity in a company's product and the company chose to respond with misdirection and then total silence without ever addressing our inquiries. Diversion tactics like that should not work. The fact that the peculiarity in question is an anachronistic pop-up in a home media package makes no difference to me, nor does the passage of time. I can't fathom why anyone would want to facilitate such diversion ploys.
Of course, I know posting in this thread won't bring about any answers because Criterion isn't perusing this message board, but my curiosity about this has been reignited so I'm just going to write to Criterion now and ask them directly. Don't worry, I'll be sure to start out by lavishing them with praise for their really excellent G'54 DVD/bluray.