Domain Theft
The registration of similar domains to popular sites is a common, asshole tactic for those looking to profit from the hard work of others. It sucks, but whatever. The cure for it is easy: become popular enough to get high Google rank and some noteriety, so that no will mistake your 'boinkboink.net' for the real thing.
An internet friend of mine is getting doubly-screwed, however, by a site that not only has registered a very similar name, but is stealing his content, layout, and images wholesale. Check it out: his site is EverythingUSB, while the clone site is EveryUSB.com. (Poor man's nofollow.)
It's not just a question of a rip-off site covering similar products—we used to get that all the time at Gizmodo and we always thought it was something of a tribute rather than something to be frustrated by—it's a question of a site actually purporting to be the site it is stealing, down to the same 'About' information and founding date.
So underhanded! I blame Google and Adsense and the entire internet.
It's becoming more and more common. dapreviews is having some troubles with this and I know a number of digital media news sites aren't above copying complete articles without so much as a link back.
However, I don't think I've seen anything quite as obvious as EverythingUSB.com vs. EveryUSB.com. Surely your buddy can bluff and write a nastygram?