Skeuomorphism
So skeuomorphism is now anything besides Windows Phone style "pure digital"? Shiny = glass, black texture = leather, blue texture = denim, etc? That's going to be really, really boring.<p>I don't know why texture is such a bad thing. Of course you can overdo it like anything, but personally I prefer Reeder with a light paper-pulp backing texture instead of a plain light peach background.<p>For example, what is so bad about this?<p><a href="http://skeu.it/image/24908403424" rel="nofollow">http://skeu.it/image/24908403424</a><p>It almost feels like people are calling it skeuomorphic so that's how they expect the developer to feel about it. I don't think regular people look at these as real world metaphors, expecting them to function as they do in real life. That feels to me like a theoretical user posed by developers that doesn't actually exist.<p>In reality, people see it for what it is. Design flair. Whether or not it's unnecessary or helps the user with the app is missing the point entirely. Design that's pleasing to the eye shouldn't get in the way and cause problems, but it doesn't have to accelerate your use of the service to be positive overall.<p>Aero Glass is a great example. It gets mixed opinions, but I think we can all agree that it's far better than Luna and IE actually looks pretty great with it. There is no skeuomorphic benefit to having glass everywhere. It's simply design flair. With that in mind, I still prefer it.