I noticed something strange. When I downgraded VLC to use qt4 after a bug...the icon turned from the familiar orange traffic cone ot an ugly B&W version.
That's when I realized the same thing had happned to classic skype. Did someone apply code to deliberately grayscale the icons of qt4 apps? No bugs that I know of...but it does seem like a pattern and I have a hunch something fishy is going on.