I agree with you, Rob (and I "do" websites), but it's not as simple as comparing OSX to Windows; even within each of those, there are plenty of examples of apps that don't conform.

It's much easier to define consistency when you start with defined parameters. But the web isn't so confined (which leads to much quicker turnover of ideas and attempts at "getting it right"). That's the lure of it, right - that *anyone* can create, and help shape what all of this looks like? That hope doesn't exist on my desktop until I fire up my browser.

To compare it to food (as I like to do), it's like inviting you to cook - if I pull you into my kitchen, you can get creative, but you're limited to what's in my fridge or in my gadget collection. If I let you define that environment, you're likely to create something different - and something far less consistent with what others would create in similar circumstances.

So how do we define consistency?