Isn’t one of those screenshots by the same developer of POPdiary? I agree with the statement about Diraium somewhat looking boring, but you also have to remember that boring is subjective.
I think Diarium is the best and most functional journal app, which is why I won’t ever leave it for any other app, but it’s not necessarily aesthetically pleasing and it definitely does seem boring in comparison.
That being said, I think that those fancier looking apps also make it a lot slower and heavier. I tried POPdiary a few weeks ago because I remembered I had some old entries saved there and it was definitely slower than Diarium. It got me annoyed because it took forever to accomplish the same tasks that I can do with Diarium in seconds. What it took Diraium 10 seconds or fewer to do, took a minute or more, given the same amount of attachments and so forth. It is not to say that the app itself is slow. But that Diarium is faster than any app I have ever tried in the same category because it is streamlined and well thought out.
Timo has said before that he makes specific choices for a reason and to me, that’s why Diarium is as snappy as it is.
Minor face-lifts could happen, for example... I like the design of Diarium on iOS better than on Android, but the layout is still the same. Any heavier design changes would most likely make the app slower. This is normal to me though. I don’t like iOS, but when the same apps are on both platforms, the iOS one usually looks better for some reason.