.........oh i forgot to mention, no fistacuffs please, i didn't bring any sparing equipment and I have no money to place bets......   

A lot of people just don't comment anymore or just give  the looks good, nice, because they see how people don't like it if they give an honest evaluation.  You either get the skinner crying or his fan club or both.  Same goes for rating, the fan club gives you stupidly high ratings, then ya need to update it a couple times because of the many things thats wrong.  Sometimes the ego gets in the way.

I'm not a skinner and I don't just come here to download all I can for free. I paid for my programs and my subscription, so I do download some, but not everything I see. I like coming here and looking at what's new and checking out the forums. I jump in and help when I can, but I don't know that much about the programs to the point where I can say, "Hey, go in here or there and do this or that". I do have room for improvement as far as commenting goes. I guess I should comment on whatever I download, that's only fair. Yep, I'll start doing exactly that.

I try to do that. A lot of time, talent and especially persistence goes into the creation of any form of graphic art. When you add in the coding, debugging, and certainly the many hours, days, weeks, and yes, months(!) of intensely focused concentration to make sure every bit and piece is interdependent and cohesive and just runs like a well-tuned machine, it's astounding that so much is put up for FREE(!) for us to just pick up and use! For me to just grab something and run away with it is really, well, I don't have the words to describe that at the moment... just not right, to say the least. These works posted here and other places are special. To the creators/publishers I say thanks. You make my days a little brighter and more fun. Peace.

OK. Let's see if I can explain a few things without (pis...upsetting) anyone.
Some of us do care. I've taken lots of people under my wing and shown them the ropes. Some give you credit, some don't.
Sometimes you get burned. I took someone under my wing, and after a year and a half of help, they went thier own way and started thier own website. Alot of wasted hours on my part.

I do leave comments on newbie skinners, but you have to remember some of the kids these days. Everyone is a skinning god or so they think. Been shot down by alot of first time skinners, so I only comment now if I know they have been here awhile. I've even emailed people with suggestions to help them out. No reply of thank or nothing but I do see the changes I suggested later. Hmmm...

In closing, I don't think it should be a given that long time skinners (HAVE) to give advice.
I think we should be given the (chose) to help. I don't know what your life is like and you don't know mine. So, if any help is given, smile and soak it up. If not, then be a little independent and try to work things out for yourself. That space between your ears isn't there just to hold your hair up. There are tons of tutorials out there.

Here is a big piece of advice. When making skins, always check your "margins". That one is the root of all the problems, 9 out of 10 times, from the emails I get.

Starting off a comment section on a skin with back to back,   's and nothing more is simply rude.
Calling someone's work "Anti-Skinning" when it was indeed skinned is also simply rude.
Doing all this just because it was a minimalist style skin was uncalled for completely.
The 2 involved should have a little higher scruples than that, especially since one has reached Master Status and the other is fast approaching it.  



Have I been guilty of doing it in the PAST.. yep, but not for quite awhile.

I totally agree with this philosophy Murex!

To touch a life, any life in a positive manner is always it's own reward!

Cp

  

Anyone can look back at my comments since i have been here and see that in no way do I approach commenting in a negative or rude fashion. If whoever thinks whatever I said was rude.. so be it. I'll also stand by it, Minimalism in general TO ME is anti-skinning. What that means to me is as little effort as was possible was put into the making of the skin. Some people may disagree but after years and years putting every ounce I have into my work, I honestly find mimimalism as mentioned IN the thread.. almost offensive. Yes it's my opinion, BUT I have my right to it. If you don't like it I suggest don't read my comment or go get a tougher skin.

Fact is, nicety is just that.. nice. No one ever helped me along the way by saying nice work!!. THE most effective comments , the ones that affected me the most and caused positive change in my work were in fact the brutal ones. This community, while being a great one and I love it here, definately has a group hug mentality when it comes to commenting. I have heard from many a skinner "If i see one more 'nice work!, I think i'm going to be sick."

I typically try to be constructive in my commenting, If it hurts someone's feelings, so be it, it also may help them. When some replies, sounds like you need a hug..then I would consider patronizing me and I will reply in kind. I notice no-one noticed ChrisDarwins smarmy little attitude and slam him for it... but that's ok, I'm not here to make everyone feel better about mediochre work. I will try and help ANYone I can to the best of my abilities as I think I have shown so far in the forums, but to be blasted as rude and obnoxious for stating my honest opinion is to me equally rude and obnoxious.

I might have apologized if I had thought anything I had done was THAT bad , thinking back though I don't rememeber any such apology issued to me for any MUCH worse comments on my work. If your going to skin, learn to take criticism, good or bad or your going to have a REALLY hard time with it.  

From now I'll say GREAT WORK! and move on or won't comment at all.

Bigger fish to fry n' all that good stuff.

Thats generally what I do...or I just say 'Thank You'

Thank you doesn't say I liked or or I disliked it. It just means thank you for contributing your time and effort for free.
You had a right to dislike his skin, you had a right to say why you disliked his skin. But, to see the first 2 comments were nothing more than a smiley ( ) that is supposed to be a 'frown' but just drips sarcasm to most of us is what made it seem rude. Perhaps your right in the tough approach, perhaps your wrong...but the bottom line here is WC has fewer and fewer skinners making WB's. I have no problem purchasing premium skins but with the increase in 'Masters' if the site doesn't encourage new skinners to upload their windowblinds here , pretty soon all there will be to offer are the paid versions. I think in the end that may not be such a wise move. The general anonymous users are not willing to pay and will just stop coming to Wincustomize.

If I were just starting out and I read those comments I'd be put off even bothering to upload a blind.
Its easy to see the good stuff in a good skin, but much harder to try and see the potential in a mediocre one.

I got 2 cents,
but first, Thanks to Boss0190, Sir Bichur, vStyler, Bebi Bulma, I.R. Brainiac, Murex, Alperium, Quentin94 and anyone else that has helped me in any way.
I'm not a WB skinner but plan to be when I learn it. I'm sure you've all seen the crap in my gallery, even I know some of it is, but the the thing is... some people like it and those are the people I do it for. I've only been making stuff for about 2 months so I'm learning it as I go too.
I've never had any rude comments (knock on wood) but I have seen some on others works. I think what everyone needs to remember is that we are all trying to be good, some already have it and some don't.
Good criticism always starts with a compliment to the work or the effort.

Personally, I read all the comments posted to the download before I get it, then test drive it, then comment on it.An excellent point made by Fairyy. The internet world is a huge place and business can be done elsewhere. I respect your comments and opinions as do alot of other people, so we should try to be a little professional about it since what it all will boil down to in the end is hurting the status of the site.

as long as people are nice about it...then critacism is okay.

I still consider myself an amateur wb skinner, I know what really great skin work looks like (as do we all I'm sure) and what my personal preferences are (we each have our own). That being said, I appreciate almost all feedback I receive: good or bad.

The feedback I/we don't need is when someone makes a point of telling you that it looks like !@#$%, etc. That is useless feedback, profanity won't make my skin or any other skin on this site look better - I'd like to see that type of hurtful profanity removed (but again that's just me, I can't force that type of rule on anyone).

If you don't like a skin that someone has made, I think it's good to say so but don't just leave it at that. If someone tells me that they don't like one of my skins and leave it at that, I have no idea what I've done wrong, what area I should focus on to improve, if it's just a general lack of artistic ability on my part or lack of technical ability that turns a success into a failure.

The comment section on a person's skin can definitely handle a few words, so I would say make use of the space (but that's just my humble opinion, no one is forced to do anything and should never feel that they are). Help can come in many forms, you don't need to be give a person a skin tutorial but you can tell them what you would have liked to see that would have made a certain skin better or more appealing to you.

This discussion has had many different viewpoints, one thing that stands out as a good thing is that it remained a mature discussion; I've been on some other forums where stuff can get downright ugly, I'm glad I haven't seen that happen too much on this site.

to answer that 2nd question (which I could have added to previous verbose post), I pretty much download as much as I want, I have a wincustomize subscription which entitles me to limitless downloads on the site so any skin I have ever commented on was tested by myself before leaving feedback.