I'm working through Barry Zundels videos on charactor rigging. The videos are from 2005 so that raises a few questions.
Fan bone = cosmetic bone, I believe these are the same but just different naming. Correct?
Control bones, naming has not change, Correct?

With the advent of smartskining and cp weighting how important is it still to add a lot fan bones and control bones. I know that smartskin and cp weighting can't care of everthing but in Barry's tutorials he sure has a lot of different fan bones(cosmetic) and control bones. Do you still have to add that many or now can you reduce the number of fan and control bones with the use of smart skin and cp weighting? I'm sure their are many ways to skin a cat ( sorry cat) so any anwsers for this newbie rigger would be helpful... thanks in advance.

If you want to practice your CP weighting skills, you don't need a ton of fan bones and smartskin. These days, I only put fan bones at the ankle, knee, hip, shoulder, elbow, wrist, and each finger and thumb joint. However, the old techniques still work and are useful on occasion.

I have pretty much stopped using fan bones, except when the model is really crying out for them, usually in the shoulders. I get as far as I can with weighting alone and then add extra bones to do what is otherwise impossible. Discovering weighting was a very liberating moment.

Thanks Homeslice andf Paul for the information, very helpfull to know.

here's a movie illustrating some differences in using fan bones versus different weighting schemes - it may or may not help

here's the post where the project and discussion is located