Other reviews of the iTunes 7 user interface are starting to roll in. Andy Matuschak says, simply, “What.” Rory Prior: a “death knell for Aqua”. Michael Tsai: “internally inconsistent and ugly”.
The benefit of waiting a few hours to chime in, I guess, is that you have time to carefully weigh your criticism and make it constructive. You know, instead of being all cranky and grumpy, like I was.
Update: David Chartier at TUAW has a series of articles walking through the new stuff in iTunes 7: big features, small features. Also, Dan Lurie seems pretty pleased about the demise of Aqua.
Update 2: Josh Buhler pokes a little harder at the scrollbars; Bruce Elgort appreciates the streamlined UI, once you get past the little issue of not knowing where your buttons are.
Update 3 (9/17): Daniel Wilson digs deep into color choices, interaction quirks, and lousy dialog button labels.
