Actually, even if Firefox kept an encrypted store of what DLLs it had told the user about, there really isn't any way to prevent a malicious program from simply replicating the code used to create the store, so it would be pretty hard to always notify the user.

Google update is initiated here on my system (it looks like it is intended to facilitate installing updates to Google software while using Firefox, I would be surprised if it was doing anything nefarious):

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MozillaPlugins

I guess the DRM plugins are loaded because Firefox treats the Windows Media Player directory as a plug-in directory, by default:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Plugin_scanning

The first computers was as big as supercomputers are today. Today these computers would fit inside a peanut.

The day today's supercomputers will fit inside a 19" box, will be the day an everyday user will need that kind of power.