As you already know, the source code for Half-Life 2 was recently stolen from VALVE.
I've seen alot of sites concentrate on reporting the leak, but no-one has really looked into the 30/09 milestone.
If one is to loook carefully at console.cpp [Line 849]:
Q_snprintf(ver, sizeof( ver ), "Source Engine %i/%s (build %d - days until 9/30/03)", PROTOCOL_VERSION, gpszVersionString, build_number() );
30/09/03 was a very important milestone, keep in mind that the sourecode was stolen on the 19th of September and the delay was announced on the 24th.
Personaly, I believe 30/09 was the milestone for the HL2 code freeze and from then on the standard eight weeks of QA were to commence.
Everything makes sense now. The release was going fine up until the middle of September, then Valve started to go a bit quiet. Then the delay is announced with a comment relating to “email problems.” And Valve go even quieter. Everyone who has seen a Valve guy recently for interviews etc. has commented that they all looked like shite, and really stressed out. They could not announce that they had been hacked because they were probably hoping that he would try again, and that they could catch him.
The one to blame for HL2’s delay, isn't Valve, Steam, NVIDIA or vivendi. It is the bellend who hacked Valve and stole the source code 2 weeks before the milestone.
They were literally forced into delaying HL2, for all they know the gold source tree could now be tainted. It will take them weeks to go through it and make sure everything is sane.
============================
It is extra evidence in addition to other evidence I've stated. Can't be sure, but it is more reason none of you should support the hacker or say he did something good.
Here’s some more good informative threads (mostly the first post) if you are having a hard time finding them.
============================== Resources for further reading:(generally you don’t need to read past the first post)