Depends a lot on the person!
My daughter loves to get gift cars for Dunks, Stabbucks, and makeup. I think she would be pretty sad if she didn't get any "real" wrapped presents, though.
My wife has a hard time making the decision to actually use the gift cards and I think it took it two years to use one for Amazon (I'm sure she was watching the expiration date closely, if there was one). It's a lot better to just give her something directly.
I don't care for receiving them. My dad had his own version of the gift card, he'd just tell me to buy something I wanted and he'd pay me back for it...this is how I ended up with a really nice Easton catcher's mitt with an integrated thumbguard and an A2000 middle infielder's glove (even though I never played SS or 2B). The mitt got beat into pulp playing adult baseball and then from catching my daughter at lessons, practices, and warmups, and I finally had to go and buy myself the largest fastpitch catcher's mitt I could find...the A2000 still looks pretty new.