The problem I think you’re likely to encounter with gradients (useful as they are) is providing the level of support designers are requiring. CSS isn’t Photoshop, and I don’t think it can be expected to provide full gradient support. Support for gradients at 45 degree angles and filling the specified element would be fine, somethin like:
div {background-gradient: #FFF #000 top bottom;}
Which would go white at top of element to black at the bottom. More complex gradients could be:
div {background-gradient: #FFF #000 bottom right;}
Which would start from the bottom left, and go to the top right of an element. Although you couldn’t do things like stopping the gradient mid-way through the div, you could always use an image.
Incidentally, if you can provide gradients for element backgrounds, it should _definately_ be possible to set gradients on a border. If you’ve just set a gradient on the background of random-box-one, then setting a border with a darker version of the same gradient would look *amazing*. A flat border would look pretty pants, and you’d find people producing nested div hacks to produce that same effect.
Great work opening this up for us all to comment in. Let me know if you have an opening on the working group : )