Is the popping actually bad for a monitor or is it just annoying?

Would love to know about the actual damage too

the popping can damage the speaker cone by loosening it from its suspension.  popping is due to a voltage spike which basically would be the same thing as a very high volume input for a short period of time which will cause the cone to move too fast and far in that time (milliseconds).
 
PROBABLY most near fields are not going to have a problem because they're not designed for higher volume and the cones can probably withstand a lot of abuse before they start separating.  the larger the wattage of the amp the more likely damage will occur.
 
but it is very annoying on the near fields!

Thanks for the info.

Would something like this:
http://www.tcelectronic.com/level-pilot/

or this:
http://goo.gl/8z5SQZ

when turned down before booting up solve this issue?

I think having a volume knob of some kind (what you have listed above or even through a small mixer) is always an intelligent approach for many reasons.  However, it really depends on your specific situation if it will help with pops or not.  as in my case, I'm 99% certain the design of the amps in the speakers are at fault.  after all, they've had a rev B out for several years!  I just need to upgrade to get the better design! 
 

RSMCGUITAR
Would something like this:
http://www.tcelectronic.com/level-pilot/

or this:
http://goo.gl/8z5SQZ

when turned down before booting up solve this issue?

These won't help at all since the problem is between the speaker drivers and their amp and power supply, all of which are inside a powered monitor.  Turning down the volume control on the monitor itself during startup may help, but this is often impractical or impossible.  I see that some powered monitors have some sort of soft-start circuit - they should all have one.  The problem is the surge/spike caused by switching on the monitor's power supply which then ripples through the electronics, gets amplified by the power amp to then pop the speakers.  Once the monitors are on, the same situation can happen if you then turn on something upstream and a startup spike from that gets sent to the monitors.

I did not see anyone mention the quality of the switches on power strips. In my experience some of them are so poorly designed they sparkle very easily when used. That might be one factor in the popping.

It is easy to control all the devices by one button. but that is not good for devices. You can switch off the power strip to power off all the connected devices and save energy after all the devices have been turned off. My bestek and each can be controlled individually. But I just find it hard to remember switching off the power strip every time I don't need the computer or TV.