There's nothing wrong with gradients or bevels or gloss or rounded text or vector graphics, of course.
Yes, there is
But it's been done to death already.
Yes, it has
Is that really a bad thing?
Yes, it is
Graphics on sites look nice now.
No, not really. I guess it's easy to whip out a coherent design that's easy on the eyes, but I wouldn't say the graphics "look nice". They're just "safe" given what's currently in style.
The main reasons the annoying buzzword "Web 2.0" has splintered off into an design/art direction is because the community-driven nature of the sites forces most people out there to conform to the often tight set of restrictions required by the CMS, Weblog framework or whatever. Because these sorts of sites have been successful, people view their designs and art direction as also successful.
Bevels, gloss, etc. These things were around when I was a kid--we're talking 10+ years ago when Internet access (and even computers in general) wasn't really a common thing to have. Still, even then, 13 year old kids would pirate Paint Shop Pro over IRC and pound out the same shit mentioned here. Back then it would have been laughed off of the stage, but these days it's "trendy". Just because it's trendy doesn't mean that it's "good"--it's still garbage.. people are just more willing to accept it now.
I'm not sure why people embrace "Web 2.0" as a design decision. It's lazy and stifiles creativity. It hurts the community as a whole. It sucks, but imo web development has really gone from being a respectable blend of art and development to the "you can always teach" of the computing world.