I liked the intro from Cliffski's email so much that I am going to paraphrase it here:

"Why are you reading this when you could be playing Gratuitous Space Battles 2 right now?"

Sure, it is in Beta, and there are some things I miss from the first one (namely the sarcastic and amusing weapon and race descriptions) but overall, it is a significant upgrade to the original on many levels.  Definitely worth a look if the first one interested you at all, or you like the concept of ship design and battle preparation without micromanaging (or even any managing) once the battle starts.