What a fantastic community! read on, you won't be disappointed 
And what a fantastic device the Arduino is!
I haven't even got my UNO yet but after all the research that I've done, watching youtube vids etc. I know it is going to be a pleasure.
What a delightful IDE!!! Welldone to the creators!
Did you know that your Arduino uses the Atmel microcontrollers? Of course you did. Did you see the bit about 'shrinkifying your projects' ? Matt is a great tutor!
The latest version of that allows you to use more ATTiny chips with more pins!
And thank you for reading this.
Oh, here's where I give back 
On the Atmel.cc website you can request FREE SAMPLES!
I requested these:
Shipment Contents
Part Number Description Customer Ref Quantity Shipped Backorder Cancelled Notes
ATMEGA328P-PU MCU AVR 32K FLASH 28-PDIP 1 0 0
ATTINY44A-PU IC MCU AVR 4K FLASH 20MHZ 14PDIP 1 0 0
ATTINY85-20PU IC AVR MCU 8K 20MHZ 8DIP 1 0 0
And got an email shortly after that they have been shipped via DHL WW EXPRESS.
Wo! I hear thousands of clicks of people going to the atmel.cc website but before you go read on.
Atmel is a noble company, the low cost of their microcontrollers seems to me to indicate that their main concern is to provide us with the tools we need to make amazing things!
Look here for info about them Atmel
AVR is not supposed to stand for anything but maybe it stands for Alf-Egil (always pronounce both parts of the name, Alf_Egil pronounced Alf Eygil will probably correct you if you don't) and Vegard (actually its Vegaard where the double-a is usually an 'a' with a little circle above it and pronounced vee-gor) these two are Norwegian dudes, and the R may stand for the Risc processor, the jury is still out
Tips:
Don't use uppercase in your email address when you register on Atmel.cc
You may have to try several places to register on the site before you are in
They won't let you ask for free samples if you use a generic email address such as gmail
Let me know if you appreciate this message
Happy hacking! (hacking here is mean't in the good way)
ian in Bournemouth, England (newbie member, this is my first post)