Screenshots might not be the best example, since there may be some "shiny cute effects" going around. However, reading your idea sprang another one in my head:

Screenshots might not be the best example, since there may be some "shiny cute effects" going around. However, reading your idea sprang another one in my head: screenshots shouldn't be restrained to the same rendering resolution as the rest of the system/the screenshot resolution should be configurable. I don't require the screenshot to be instantaneous, I require it to appear instantaneous. In that sense, if the whole rendering pipeline is working to give me a framerate of 60 fps, then I could spend ten times as much rendering a screenshot without that delay being noticeable. Also, why on earth does Windows (don't know the behaviour on Linux/Mac) apply ClearType to a screenshot? That has always bugged me, there are some situations where you tolerate it and others where it hurts.