Another thing I notice is that all these desk setups look unnaturally tidy and uninhabited.
Show me your desk setup after an 8-hour workday with two overlapping deadlines, then we’ll talk.
Whether that makes me a deadened robot, or even marginally more effective than the next guy, is of course not entirely clear. It's just a compulsion. But the point is that people who are fastidiously tidy with their workdesks aren't mythical unicorns, but everyday people.
Being paperless, having a nearby bin, using regular cups (as opposed to disposables), and storage for things like extra usb cables, batteries, usb keys, stylus, etc; isn't hard to achieve (paperless being role dependent of course) and makes a huge difference