Common sense wins in the end (that or massively reduced sales volumes):

[ Editor’s Note: Due to the overwhelming response of our distributors and readers… as of March 2002, O’Reilly book spines are reverting to the traditional, colorful design as depicted here, on the far right. ]

This has been bothering me since I first noticed the change and I haven’t bought several books because I didn’t want to visually pollute my shelf. Design that doesn’t consider human emotional response is decoration.

This is an excerpt of a letter I sent them in January:

The design of the O’Reilly book spine is as distinctive as the McDonalds
arch or the Coca-Cola swoosh. Aside from the high quality of O’Reilly
publications, another unmentioned pleasure of buying your books is how great
they look on the shelf, and how easy it is to distinguish subjects by color.
I believe this move to redesigned spines is a mistake and one that I hope
you will reconsider. Glancing over at my O’Reilly library is satisfying, the
new spines look naked and feel out of place.

Maybe I exaggerate, but within the tiny little world of computer books, I think the first line holds true. I guess this means I can start buying O’Reilly books again though it’ll be a while before the white ones clear channels, so no Amazon purchases for now.