Bungie's own madmax has put up a facebook gallery of photos from Bungie's Halo 3 launch party. You can see Louis Wu doing shots, Bill Gates playing Halo 3, and, of course, the Master Chief hugging Cortana.

Man Demon says he's found the first Halo 3 box acronym on his Limited Edition copy:

JLTLEBLC

Gentlemen, start your engines.

With Halo 3 unleashed across the East Coast about half an hour ago, the Internet is still teeming with Halo-related... stuff. Here are a few items:

News.com knows people who are waiting in Times Square right now.

XBL subscribers will be able to get some exclusive Halo 3 content starting on the 27th. Included are videos, gamerpics and themes.

BusinessWeek thinks Halo 3's social interaction features may be the future of gaming.

Shacknews takes a nice look at Halo 3's map editor, Forge.

bigC24 in the Xbox forums has put together a Halo story summary that spans the games and the novels (Halo 3 not included). Gabe at Penny Arcade suggests it for those Halo players who have been prone to skip cutscenes to get to the next bit of blasting and therefore aren't getting the full benefit of Halo 3's plot.

Xbox.com has pics and videos of the NYC launch, courtesy of Major Nelson.

The Halo 3 launch in New York upstaged George Clooney, says News.com.