Haha, @DanRathbun, that is wonderfully creepy. We wore those in Alaska, but they were called “Ski masks.”
Back to Layers, though: I retract my idea of multiple tags. I like only having one hiding attribute per group/component/object. After all, you can always nest things to have them be affected by multiple “layers.”
After talking to someone who makes SU extensions, now I know that SketchUp’s Layers (SLayers?) are indeed attributes of objects, just like material. No one says that they are putting an object “on” a material. They are assigning the color to the object. Same with SLayers. (Yes, hmmm… I like that word… it fits the effect they can have on newbies’ models). In Entity Info, what’s happening is we are assigning a SLayer to the object.
I’m on the fence as to whether it’s worth the trouble of reframing and renaming the action, though. After all, we still say that the “sun is setting,” when really, our position on earth is rotating away from facing the sun. We know the facts about sunsets, but it’s just cumbersome to say “what a beautiful obscuring of the sun due to the movement of the earth”. Not very romantic. Similarly, it might be enough to simply better educate the SketchUp newbies about SLayers, rather than formally renaming it. I don’t know, though. Haven’t figured this out.