So I'm curious... how exactly will this work?
Since the Northern Barrens will still be a "training" area, of sorts, how does this impact new WoW players? That is, if they opt not to buy the Cataclysm expansion? Or even veteran players.. will the game still look like "pre-cataclysm?" to those players? If the Southern barrens is going to be a 30-35 zone, what then becomes of Thousand Needles? Will that still be a low-level zone or will it move up a notch on the leveling system?

Even if you (I) have vanilla WoW, you'll get to see all this amazing stuff.
I still wonder if I gotta need to buy the other two expansions to enjoy Outland and Northrend.

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So much will change in the barrens, but I predict that so much will remain the same.

SupahGamuh:
Even if you (I) have vanilla WoW, you'll get to see all this amazing stuff.
I still wonder if I gotta need to buy the other two expansions to enjoy Outland and Northrend.

yes to have access to beyond lvl 60 content and to be able to lvl to 70 you need burning crusade. same with wotlk for over 70 content and to make dk class. so you need both bc and wotlk to be able to play cataclysm and have access to lvl 80 and higher content and new zones.

sneakypenguin:

John Funk:

HyenaThePirate:
So I'm curious... how exactly will this work?
Since the Northern Barrens will still be a "training" area, of sorts, how does this impact new WoW players? That is, if they opt not to buy the Cataclysm expansion? Or even veteran players.. will the game still look like "pre-cataclysm?" to those players? If the Southern barrens is going to be a 30-35 zone, what then becomes of Thousand Needles? Will that still be a low-level zone or will it move up a notch on the leveling system?

The game changes for everyone whether you buy Cataclysm or no.

Do new players still have to buy vanilla, BC WotLK and Cata? Or can they buy cata BC and WOTLK -vanilla. It seems like it would be very tacky to make players pay for content they won't see (vanilla)

Ive actually never been to barrens since I only role alliance but I might swing by for a before/after.

You misunderstod. Blizzard are saying that the world will change for everyone. Once the Cataclysm hits, all the vanilla content will be changed, so that if you are a new player buying only WoW without expansions, it will still be the post-cataclysm WoW you will be playing.
The vanilla content will have been removed from the game and replaced with the new version, so you will not get access to the old experience. But you didn't pay for that, you payed for WoW, which you will be able to play untill you hit 60. Just the Cata-version of WoW.

Buying each expansions will then give you access to the accosiated content and level caps (BC for 60-70/Belf/Draenei, WotLK for 70-80 and DK, Cataclysm for 80+,goblins and worgen).