I'm kind of curious of learning more about IC (and similar things), and the Arduino sounds like a simple and fun way to do it.

I'm thinking about getting a "starter kit" containing: Arduino Duemilanove USB board, 840 slot breadboard, a few different "input"-like things like potentiometers, buttons, photo-resistives (or whatever they're called), wires, LED's and resistors.

I will probably just play around with making LED's change when you push buttons and things like that to begin with.

Can you guys think of any other fun, small, projects (and what I would need for them)?

Back in school we made traffic lights in a junction and an elevator with 10 LEDs and 10 buttons

The Arduino is to electronics what Lego is to engineering.

Real men get a PICKit2 starter kit instead. Or an Atmel equivalent if you're a cheap bastard or an open source zealot.

I got an Arduino for Christmas!
The first thing I did was hook up an LED and had a C# application change the brightness of it on-the-fly. It was incredibly simple, basically one step up from the blink tutorial...

This looks like an interesting starter project as well.

Bought a starter kit and some other misc stuff (a 7 segment led display, a few more buttons and potentiometers etc).

I've also coded a simple code-lock using the 7-segment display (displaying current value), a potentiometer (setting the current value), a led (to indicate lock status) and a button (to enter a value).

Obviously I very much want to see if it actually works, so I hope they get it shipped ASAP.

Whats wrong with LEGO

There are a few question marks that need straightening out (I am a bit of a newb when it comes to electronics... I have taken it ages ago, but it was only at a pretty basic level); in some tutorials, a led is connected directly to a pin (http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/Blink), in others there is a resistor before (http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/Fading). Why is this? What exactly will be the effect of a resistor? I would guess it reduces the strength if the LED. What could happen if I don't have a resistor in between?

EDIT: Actually, never mind. I just read the blink tutorial again and realized there is a built-in LED and/or resistor on that particular pin. Still; the pin is 5v, and LED's are usually at specced at 6? So would it really hurt them? How can I calculate how strong a resistor we need?

Time to brush up Ohm's Law?

Look up the forward voltage (V_f) and max current in the LED's datasheet. The forward voltage gives you the voltage drop over the component. Subtract it from your pin voltage and apply Ohm's law to calculate the needed resistance for the given current: R = (V_pin - V_f)/I_f. Then pick a resistor that gives you at least that resistance.

Map a web application that can check and change the status of your board the has lids hook up to it

Got the stuff today, turns out I ordered the wrong 7-segment display, so instead I display the current number with 4 LEDs (in binary).

A clip is attached (sorry for mov...)

What does it do other than display "numbers"

Oh yeah, a description might be useful

When the button is pressed, the current value is stored. If the inputted values correspond to a stored code (how many and which ones is hardcoded but easily changed) , the light will go on and the sound will be on for 2 seconds (simulating a door opening or something).

It took about an hour and a half to put together, including the code, so it's certainly not a large project, but fun to make

Tic tac toe with LEDs. Play a midi file.

At work we got ARM processor evaluation kit. And it really kicks ass. There's some kind of maze game preinstalled. You can adjust volume by controller that is connected via CAN and optionally you can hook it up to the computer via ethernet cable and see the whole maze up in the javascript application running from an embedded webserver.

You should check out Sparkfun and The Electronics Goldmine for your components. The Electronics Goldmine has a wide variety of products.

Also, check the Arduino forums for help.

Those sites aren't much use in Sweden

But yeah, I'm lurking the forums