Of course, I never participated in using such icons myself throughout that time period, and being a 'nix user, neither did my (OS + DM) of choice, although you certainly can achieve that look quite easily if you so desire it.
How funny I found it that MS, one of the largest pushers of that flat lifeless look, suddenly decided maybe it really *does* suck as much as I (and many others) have been saying.
Hopefully, now that the industry giant who pushed that for so long has decided maybe it wasn't so great, we can go back to not having our dev tools look like flat black rocks again toohttps://www.engadget.com/2020/02/20/windows-10-icon-update/ wrote: Microsoft refreshed Office's icons last year, and now it's Windows 10's turn. The software giant is rolling out updates to the icons for Windows 10's core apps over the months ahead, starting with the Calendar and Mail apps in a new Release Preview for Windows Insiders in the Fast ring. The company's design team explained that it wanted to break away from the flat, colorless icons you see today in favor of ones that are at once more consistent with newer branding (including apps available beyond Windows) and different enough that you'll have an easier time finding the one you want.