Coupla things -
I agree two years (even one year, even 4-6 months) is too long to wait for a skin to get in game. The experience of waiting for so long for skins has left me thinking the custom skinning aspect of AH is broken, and I'd sooner see skin management decentralized and left in player's hands. We would have many more offerings if players had control of what skins they used in game. But i would also like some feature added to let me know how many times I run into a skin in an arena that I haven't installed - so I can make sure I download all the skins most people are using.
I'm even thinking turning skins into a profit center for HTC might not be a bad way to go. HTC pays skinners some $$ for great-looking skins, then makes them available singly or in related skinpacks (all skins necessary for a scenario, for example) at an iTunes-like store app, accessible from the O Club- you can preview and download the skin for a small fee, added to your monthly bill. Paying for extra content is the direction a lot of games are moving. I'd consider anything just to encourage HTC to move along with skins! We just seem to sit dead in the water month after month with nothing happening. The new 32 skin limit per plane should've helped, but we haven't even had a skin release since that became available.
I think the way it is now is almost worse than not having custom skins at all.