I beg to differ. 
I not only use it for navigation (with jump-to-click enabled you can go anywhere instantly, no matter how long the document is) but for information. I know where I am in a document at all times, and roughly how big that document is. Naturally, I select the option that keeps them visible at all times.
No, no, and a million times no! I abhor tagging. Or rather, I don’t abhor it, but it’s only something I do very rarely, if I want a particular file to stand out. It’s so laborious and boring, and it requires me to think about how I want my data to be found. Folders are much more natural to me. “This is some writing; I’ll dump it in my ‘Writing’ folder.” Tags could never completely replace folders anyway - or, at least, I fail to see how they could - since so many utilities and tools require files to be in a particular place. Consider an Xcode project - it’s a folder of interface and programming files. I’m not sure how that would ever work with tagging were folders abandoned. The ideal system is one that uses folders but has powerful tagging for those who prefer that approach, so that both approaches can be used.
As for Yosemite… I do like it. Bear in mind that I have a policy in post-WWDC interviews I’m asked to participate in to concentrate on the positive aspects. If you don’t, you look like a spoilsport and you tend to get grief in the comments. But over all, I think the interface is a step in the right direction in many ways. I do think the translucency is a bit much, but along with that they have introduced a bunch of tools that makes it a hell of a lot easier to create interface elements that work against any background. The only thing I really can’t stand about the new UI is that hideous bright blue used for folders in the Finder. In list mode, when they are small, they stick out and really draw the eye towards them - they actually hurt my eyes. I filed a bug with Apple asking them to fix the blue colour, which was quickly closed as a duplicate…
iOS 8: no, the iOS version will not require iOS 8, only iOS 7. But don’t quote me on that. We’ll probably be on iOS 9 by the time it’s finished at this rate… I can’t say the same for the Mac version, though. We will be releasing a Scrivener 2.6 later in the year with bug fixes that address minor Yosemite issues. I think it’s going to look a little dated on Yosemite for a little while, though, given the UI changes in Yosemite. What I would say is that, given the many changes in Yosemite, under the hood too, if we were to release a major update for Scrivener next year (for example), we’d probably go Yosemite-and-above only. I’ve learned from the iOS version never to give away future plans, so this is purely speculative, of course.
Tagging does strike me as a more ‘intelligent’, flexible and powerful way of managing files. That said, the simplicity and the constraints on a folder based system are actually extremely time and brainwatt saving and it gets the job done.
Next time I get fired I might invest in testing out a tag based system to see how it works. Other than that I can’t see me having the time. I’ve been promising Mrs Pigfender that I’ll import our pictures into iPhoto for six months and a day and that’s a big enough exercise, let alone if I had to do it for [gasp] all my files!
Might be best to delay further…given that iPhoto will be replaced in Yosemite. Easier to start with a clean slate in Photos?
KB, my family will likely take a hit out if you make it a Yosemite only release. The amount of ranting and railing and blustering and gnashing of teeth that occurs with each forced upgrade … it would be your fault. Just saying.
As to the new apps… looks like they copied just about everything from other services. Messages looks like skype, mail is sparrow/google mail, Photos is Pinterest/Imagur, Safari is chrome (a major contributor to the OSS webkit Safari is based on).
Still nothing there that really feels compelling. That and the, IN MY OPINION, cheap look of all the widgets mean that the only reason I’d upgrade is KB forcing me to do it.
See Keith, all your fault. Make sure your life insurance premium is paid up.
Has anyone else downloaded the public beta of Yosemite? I’m just wondering if Keith et al would find it helpful if we were to post any problems that we encounter using Scrivener on Yosemite, or whether that’s getting ahead of ourselves.
By the way, I’m liking what I see so far. I resisted upgrading from Snow Leopard until began to fear that the pace of OS change would leave me behind and I upgraded to Mavericks, and am very glad that I did. Yosemite is certainly a visual change, but then again it is nice to refresh one’s workspace every now and then.
+1
ps
It’s a bit early for that, as 2.5 isn’t optimised for Yosemite and there are issues we know of (such as inline annotations not drawing in colour), but mainly because there are still a lot of bugs in Yosemite, so there are certain things that would seem to be Scrivener bugs but which are Yosemite bugs (such as certain PNG files not getting saved when imported into text). Nearer to Yosemite’s release it will be more useful, though.
Grand, just let me know when you’re ready and I’ll send in any problems I have.