The idea behind Steam is good, if only it was managed/maintained elsewhere. It makes releasing new content much easier and quicker (if the content servers could cope). If it had more development, I'm sure they *might* be able to make it decent.
i've got nothing against steam, he's a good buddy of mine, see him every few days and catch up on events. when it comes to reshacking him i just don't bother, his sys.tray icon is auto-hidden anyway (such an ugly icon). if you don't like steam because you didn't bother to buy a half life cd key then join a hacked russian server.