I prefer to think of games between humans and computers as human-as-conceptual-thinker vs. human-as-tool-maker.

All the famous chessplayers, "champions" and challengers alike, deserve to stand side-by-side in historical value, as each great player has enriched all those who have come after them. After all, the more recent the player, the more shoulders of giants he had from which to view this amazing game. Alongside the very best belong the great authors of chess tomes, without whom our vision of chess would be collectively darker.

FWIW, a few books have greatly helped me when first starting out. These are Seirawan's Winning Chess Strategies, Alburt's Chess Position Pocketbook (they should make all the other puzzle books the same size IMHO) and Bronstein's Sorcerer's Apprentice. Other influential authors include Hansen, Khmelnitzky, McDonald, Suba and Van Perlo, whose Endgame Tactics has personally garnered more points than perhaps any other book.

Personally, I try to play my own lines, and much prefer playing face-to-face with friends than any other kind of cc or online chess. Some of my own lines come from the Reti set-up, but I get some ideas from the games here as well. One of my favorite ones is 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 d4 3.Na3 or 3.e4, each with different ideas and types of play.