Sigh another game i wont be buying now fed up of getting shafted with every new game with more and more elaborate extras cough i mean DRM i dont want ot log online to play a single player game. Well guess what i save on not buying the game will go towards more gog games.
Funny how now i look forward more to old game releases than new ones.

Modders getting something from their effort? Sounds good to me. I am sure the prices will be small, like $1-5, and modders will be influenced to make great maps to make money.
Come on people, capitalism works.
As for the online stuff, it doesn't really bother me as long as there is some offline option for when my Internet goes out.

Except systems like this often end up introducing artificial barriers that get in the way of a properly functioning market. The reason for this is because with smaller development efforts free releases tend to make non-free offerings a non-starter when the playing field is level. There will be numerous great maps people make, and many of them will be offered for free because the people who made the maps weren't in it for money, but rather motivated by enjoying making maps, wanting a particular type of map to play on themselves, wanting the recognition of having lots of people play on a map they made, etc; and while there will also be a fair number of maps people want to sell, they won't be higher enough in quality to get a large number of people to pay for them when the free versions are available. And all of this is just fine, it's the market functioning as it should.
But it will likely by the case that Blizzard gets some kind of cut from map sales, and thus they have an interest in promoting non-free maps over free ones. So I wouldn't be surprised if we see something like sections of BNet play only allowing use of maps Blizzard has signed off on (read: non-free maps), or Blizzard actively advertising certain non-free maps to try to get critical mass adoption of them. Now I hope I'm just being overly cynical, but unfortunately companies aren't often willing to let the market work as it should when doing so would mean they don't make as much money.

I made maps for the original Starcraft - it really wasn't hard and it was quite fun. There was a cornucopia of maps for SC, monetizing it will merely reduce the map pool (no one will actually buy the maps).

As far as I know, there's a mandatory one-time online authentication, and an optional Steam-like service that requires online connectivity. Assuming this works well without a lot of unnecessary hoops to jump through (and Blizzard tends to be relatively good with that), I don't see what's so horrible.
Never really got this sort of complaint. Steam doesn't have to be running all the time. I only ever start it up when I actually intend to play TF2.
Even more bizarre is that people also complain about the GfWL client being inaccessible outside of games.

Choose your next words, carefully, they could be your last...
(Esp. when arguing logic about drm)

It's a good thing I was already turned off by the $180 price tag. otherwise I'd be really upset.

The success of DLC on consoles and simulator add-ons on PC says otherwise. People, especially gamers, tend to be spoiled and want everything they can get their hands on. That's why crap sells that shouldn't far too often.
If modders make awesome maps that take a lot of time and are obviously better than free maps, people will pay for them, and really why not? I'm not one of the PC gamers who demand free content, I don't mind paying for things that are worth paying for.
As to someone else's point about paid maps throwing off the community and such, I doubt that will be the case. The best maps will be bought by the majority of hardcore players, and random casual maps will all be free ones, I suspect. Plus, it's kind of silly to not think Blizz has a plan for these things... everything they do is well thought-out and made with quality, remember.

I haven't thought that since they came out with WoW.
As for paying for premium maps, if there's a good map out there that costs money, someone will just create a free version. Unless they changed a lot about the mapping system, all it took was a bit of time to replicate the vast majority of the maps. This is especially true if we're talking about maps that aren't made for the UMS gametype.

wait a second...
so on the release you will be only able to play as marines?
Okay. WTF?
is that real and if yes what is the source of this information?
If it is then this is even more stupid than no lan option.

In this singleplayer campaign you will be playing only as a Terran.
In multiplayer you can play any race.
EDIT: big grammar fail

hahaha. thanx for the info. I so hope S2 fails miserably but i guess hype will be sufficient to make Bliz millions of dollars.
Maybe people will abandon the game and go back to S1... and then bliz turns off S1 servers and people will riot.
can't wait :)

Looking at the screenshot, they have a Play As Guest option. So it may be like UT3.
You can play it without authenticating with the server, but it will default all your hotkeys to "encourage" you to login. And it defaults every time, no matter how many times you set the keys on the anonymous account.
So if you like ESDF instead of WASD, well, sucks to be you, nerd.
On that note, my UT3 (yes, I paid for a legit copy) was completely hosed after I installed the official map pack that should have been ready for release. I just go back to 2004 now, because I'm so disgusted with 3.
I'm getting pretty fed up with the game companies. There are times when I expect to be treated like a thief. Whenever I have to deal with cops or a judge, with the utility companies, or with banks. But as far as software, I can barely put up with it from Microsoft, and I sure as hell don't need it from game companies.

+1 bro, I hope for the same.
Blizzard is transforming into BlizzEArd. Starcraft 1 was 3 games in 1. Starcraft 2 will be 1 game in 3.
This. I'll wait until Blizz will make a collection of all 3 SC2 games and then I'll buy it. Probably.

$60 isn't really typical for PC games, much less expansions. Folks didn't really seem to complain this much about the "$120 price tag" for SC1, or "$240" for Dawn of War 1.
Supposedly that is not the case, going by a comment on ShackNews.