Shawn, I think it was you who mentioned Concrete 5 about a year ago. I rather liked it, but there wasn't near the support and freebies for it that I have found for Joomla. I still maintain that most websites look alike. The nature of Content Management tends to demand that. If you change the graphics and colors, you could be the New York Times, a church site or a puppet site. I haven't seen anything yet to change my mind on that. The only thing that is really different from CMS are flash sites, like some of the big movie sites. I'd love to be able to use that kind of thing, but I can't begin to afford the software to create that.

I love the look of this site, in part because SMF looks a little retro. I kind of miss the wild wooly feel of the internet 15 years ago compared to today. What standards do is standardize everything, and I'm just not orderly enough to like all that similarity.

If you change the graphics and colors, you could be the New York Times, a church site or a puppet site. I haven't seen anything yet to change my mind on that. The only thing that is really different from CMS are flash sites, like some of the big movie sites. I'd love to be able to use that kind of thing, but I can't begin to afford the software to create that.

A website is always going to look like a website: there are only so many ways you can present images and text.

But I disagree that they all look the same. A website is more than graphics and colours; as I point out above, both of my websites use EXACTLY THE SAME TEMPLATE. But do they look anything like each other?

As for flash, it's pretty and all, but there are two major flaws. One is that the content is embedded within the file, which means no search engines will even know what your website says or is for; this hurts you when people search for your services. (Added to that is that many people who are visually impaired have a harder time using your site)

The second is a new problem: iPhones. Most people have one and iPhones do not allow flash. No Youtube viewing capabilites, amongst other things.

However, I'd contend that it's not all that expensive: I've even taught myself a bit of flash with the use of a cheap program (Coffeecup... something similarly named) and some of their free tutorials. Although it's much harder to learn, it's doable - if I can pick up a few things, someone else could.

PS. Standards are there for a reason. They're not just there to make everything pretty, but to make everything useable. Everyone has a different (and different version) browser, different operating system, different screen resolution, different skill levels (age, education, exposure, etc), different abilities/disabilities (visually impaired, etc), and so on. What the standards do is try to reduce the difficulty on the part of the user to figure out what the site does.

And actually, standards are good for you because they also increase the likelihood that the visitor will stay interested and pay for your services.

Take a look around at the examples at Smashing Magazine.com of good designs. You'll see an awful lots there that go against typical web design and still remain up to common 'standards'.