I'm one of those people who prefer to have objects physically in my hand, which is why I have avoided Steam in the past.
But last night one of my sons told me Fall of Cybertron and its expansion packs were on sale, so I weakened and joined Steam.
Purchasing was easy, then it said I had to download Steam. Fine, did that and a Steam shortcut appears on my desktop.
Double click.. "checking for available updates". After a while, "extracting package" and the window closes.
Hunky-dory, so I click on the shortcut again. And again, checking for updates.
Finished again, click again, checking and updating AGAIN!!!
And that's all it's been doing all night and morning!?!?!

Am I missing something or have I just lost my money?

I'm going to put this in the comuting/game console thread too. Any helpful advice would be welcome.