It seems entirely reasonable to me for them to optimize the driver to run particular programs faster if at all possible. I would only consider this cheating if the software is not being rendered entirely ( I think nvidia did this? ), or if it somehow degraded the play experience ( such as jerky with higher average framerates versus smooth with lower average frame rates ). By this logic, would the special drivers ( like SLI or crossfire ) that have to be optimized per application also be cheating?

Well since it is GSM I would say in the United States, no. Elsewhere in the world, you will probably fare better.

What do I need this service for? I use windows, so when I pass away the malware on my computer will continue to send thousands of emails every day.

This is well demonstrated in Penny Arcade's series of games "On the Rainslick Precipice of Darkness". The artistic quality of the game improved my enjoyment of it far more than the high polygon counts of modern shooters and other such games.

I think that with the success of games like this and the latest Paper Mario games we are finally starting to see that it's the story and artwork that we are paying for, the technology is secondary. I hope the future holds more games with a strong story focus like these and Silicon Knights' Eternal Darkness.

Google also serves image ads, and I'm pretty sure I've even seen some flash ads, though I could be wrong about the last one.

I also think you are confused about how google ads work, or adblock works, because it is quite simple in adblock to block all google text ads.

Abblock for me is necessary, not because I have an aversion to seeing advertisements, but because I block content which distracts me from the page I am reading. I use adblock, but I do not subscribe the massive "catch-all" lists it tries to get me to install. I simply use it as a tool to remove content that annoys me as I browse.

This technology sounds like it would be very beneficial when we see wider use of assisted movement robotics for humans.

I admit there is a fine line between condoning such activity and trying to make it safer for the parties involved. You could say the same for groups that give out clean needles and groups that feed illegal aliens. Certainly these are activities that shouldn't be going on in the first place, but by keeping them out of sight you make them many times more dangerous.

Seriously, there are quite clear click-through warnings on the site, if you don't want to see adult advertising, don't go into that section. As for illegal activity, it's a public forum so you can expect a certain amount of that sort of thing.

This is the sort of thing that is going to go on regardless of the existence of craigslist. Now at least there is some kind of paper trail if something bad goes down ( kidnapping, murder, etc ) since most people don't secure delete their emails, but if we make sure this all keeps out on the street corner at night, it just makes it all that much more dangerous.

The mention of device drivers makes me wonder. Are they going to start limiting the kinds of devices you can install based on the version of OS?

They already limit how many CPU sockets you can have based on the version, I wonder if they'll start limiting the kinds of video cards and such accessories based upon the version too...