So it seems that in addition to the recent game pullings from Steam, the recent pullings from Gog, COD 4 has been pulled from Stardock Impulse (At least you can still download it).
It seems now that publishers want to set their own rules regarding digital distribution, and are allergic to this thing called 'money for a digital product'
So um, what the hell?

Look on the bright side. For every title that is being shat on, there are several other good titles we can look forward to. I'm wary of complaining about the same thing every time, because such things can usually be expected later, if not now.

Wha? They stopped selling what is arguably their biggest single money earner? They detect people were having too much fun or something?

Given the DRM clusterf**k that started in late 2007 and their constant demands to release unfinished games, you're a bit slow to realise this.
Publishers will do anything, anything at all to damage their own sales. They're fanatical about it. There seems to be a competition among them to see who can spend the most on a game yet see the lowest returns.

what games were removed from steam?

"It's a technique called negative elevation. I learned it at Harvard." -Reggie Hudlin, the Boondocks BET executive

The only game I can recall being removed from Steam recently, is Stalin vs Martians (which was pulled from everywhere). But plenty of others have pulled from Steam over the years.

I think they just want everyone to order their new Modernwarefare 2 game when it comes out for its stupidly high price. Stop selling the old game forcing new people to the franchise to get the next more expensive one.

Yeah that does sound about right to me. Still you can easily buy boxed copies and cd keys aren't tied to accounts so I can't see what difference that pulling it from digital distributions sites will achieve.

Its activision it doesn't have to make sense just have hints of being evil for them to do it.

I fooled around with steam, stardock and others, but abandoned them after awhile. Too many strings. What happens if they go belly up? If I don't have net access?
I much prefer GOG's business model. Once I have something, I know it's mine and will play forever (as long as I have the hardware and OS).
I know I'm missing some good games, but there's plenty here and with what I already have, to keep me busy. I'm actually finding a lot of these "old" games to be more fun than many of the new ones.

The Boondocks is an american political satire cartoon. They have an ongoing feud with an american TV channel called BET. They made entire episodes bashing them, especially their inept management and their use of faddish management techniques (among other things).
It's pretty popular here and I know they broadcast it in Canada, Australia and parts of Africa. No clue about the UK. Here's an ep summary.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Uncle_Ruckus_Reality_Show

Why was THAT pulled?

Now that DD is more popular, I'd imagine they also want to control their own channels, rather than use existing proven services with a high subscriber base. O.o
It's not that surprising, but spreading everything out is a bad idea.
Also, there is a new title, why would you want that 'old' one...