You luckily corrected yourself in the second half of the sentence. The prettiest websites are not equally the greatest websites.
Although it The prettiest designs end up in the galleries. Which is one reason why these css galleries are mostly nonsense (one other reason is that they are counter inspirational).

We should not forget that we should use our ‘make it pretty’ and ’style’ ingredients should be used with reason and stragegy, based on the principles of design.

None the less, there is a trend that we must use this use this pretty ingredient all over (fuelled by css galleries). Luckily the are designers who stand above this all, and truly understand design. These individuals make thoughtfully use of the design elements, like a chef cook uses his ingredients.

On the other side of the whole, reddit ignored the ingredient asthetics and graphic design.

” How many video games have you played that when all the technical achievements for their graphics and game of the year awards for their gameplay? ”

There was far too much buzz around Crysis’ advanced graphics, which no coumpter could run. There was no attention whatsoever for the cinematic gameplay. Here again, funky graphics are an element/ingredient cinematic gameplay (good design), but there are a lot of other ingredients that make up cinematic gameplay (good design).

There is indeed too much emphasis on the ‘graphics’ ingredient. We must should pay attention to all the ingredients that make up good design, and use these elements with care, thought and reasoning behind them.