Ever wanted a pieces of metal in a certian unique shape or a decently complicated printed circut board (more so than you could hand etch.) I’ll admit that i haven’t run across too many situations where i could of made use of such serives, but it’s really cool to know the next time i do (if i really want to) i can get the parts. Links in this slashdot post lead the way to E-Machineshop and Pad2Pad, two companies that offer machining and PCB services respectively.