Hello Alex,
I do really like what John did with it. He really didn't go nuts and kept the BeOS feel while making it look more updated. Quite a few commenter also agree that they like it. There are some in the thread that say the use of rounded corners will take extra cpu time but most of us have more then enough cpu to spare ;) Hopefully someday Haiku will be stable enough for day-to-day use (it's close) and will have a elegant GUI look such as John's, wink-wink-nudge-nudge.
I agree, the mockup has maintained the BeOS look and feel, but has added a more professional and modernized look. I'm not one for eye-candy for the sake of eye-candy, but an appealing UI adds to the experience. What I can't stand is when the eye candy affects media playback, something I don't expect Haiku to have a problem with, but something I deal with in Linux when something fancy is happening on the UI.
Adam
