There's a reason for this pattern. When I complained to a friend at Google about the new GMail compose, he said that what was driving it was that Larry wanted a beautiful, consistent look throughout all Google's products. That sort of motivation leads to design disasters. The various Google products may have been inconsistent, but each of their designs was the product of long evolution.
Steve Jobs could probably have forced consistency on Google's products without breaking them, but few CEOs have the taste Steve had.
Steve Jobs could probably have forced consistency on Google's products without breaking them, but few CEOs have the taste Steve had.