In a move that will leave future generations either snorting in disgust or doubled-over with laughter, Netscape 6 actually requires the skins, completely ignoring the look-and-feel of the operating system it's running on.
But who are we to judge if someone's got a thing for nubile teens? Unless, of course, the desire to serve that fetish starts to interfere with our ability to use the damned software. In a more aesthically advanced republic, most people wouldn't be allowed to decorate their own homes, much less design their own user interfaces. If you're willing to ignore the fact that the software becomes unusable because you can't see anything, then a few clicks of the mouse will set you right up. Can't stand to choose between the equally alluring sirens of ICQ and Dragonball Z? No problem. application-specific skins are a fairly new development, especially for the Windows-based mainstream. Though extreme software customization can be traced back to usability nightmares like desktop themes and X window managers - What should happen when you right-click? When you center-click? When you left-click? When you Shift-right-click? When you. You may recall that even Suck was dragged into the skin game about a year ago, and the scars on our own skins still haven't healed. In a scenario that undoubtedly leaves DeTocqueville twitching uncomfortably in his grave, an unthinking Jolt- and marketing-fueled push towards visual freedom - is leaving 15 years of common-sense progress in user-interface design bleeding in a ditch. The computer equivalent of back-ally chin tucks, skins allow a growing number of applications to change their looks in a growing number of ways, almost all of them bad.
“Skins” are a recent product of the hyper-democratization of code. Exhibit A: the newly prereleased Netscape 6. Long relegated to the back seat of the software development process in favor of ever-more useless features, usability has recently been chloroformed, hog-tied and stuffed in the trunk. Set adrift in a sea of functionality he can neither comprehend nor control - buried in toolbars, insulted by assistants - he can only look at the state of the average application's user interface and think that things can't possibly get any worse. Pity the poor slob who just wants to get something done.
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