Kane,
I'm glad you aired this. Our team does a single Story-Time meeting per two-week sprint. It does in fact help to stream-line the planning meeting process. I also agree that the Story-Time meeting should be made an explicit part of Scrum (add to the books as formal part of the process).

On the flip side, some team members have voiced a concern with the shear quantity of meetings given a two-week sprint (Sprint Planning, Daily Standup meetings, Detailed requirements sessions, Story Time meetings, Sprint Demo meetings, etc.). Looking at the list, I can sympathize, but unless someone comes up with a way to communicate via telepathy I think we're stuck having to set time aside for face-to-face communication.

I would take the productivity benefits of a healthy Scrum environment (meetings and all) over the alternatives.

Great article.
-- Victor