I've done one of these retreats, it's not a cult, and there are good reasons for those rules being in place. Philosophically I'm much more of a pragmatic dharma person, but if I decide to continue with my practice then I'll do a bunch more Goenka retreats before trying other stuff. If nothing else they're free, and you actually get really good results. I certainly don't agree with all of those rules in my everyday life, but on the retreat itself they are a huge part of the experience.

If you want to know more about the Goenka approach, there are a couple of really good podcasts from Buddhist Geeks:

http://www.buddhistgeeks.com/2007/07/bg-028-entrepregurus-an...

http://www.buddhistgeeks.com/2007/07/bg-029-mass-producing-m...

I think they're pretty much dead on in their analysis.