looking around I came across these two pages.....
http://code.google.com/p/arduino/issues/detail?id=392
http://code.google.com/p/arduino/issues/detail?id=459
anyway. on the 392 link is a fix for the firmware which stops the !!! bug.
so people you can request the code from the developer, or patch your own local code, compile and burn a new hex file.