except The Skins Factory (that never sold skins to the user) they´re all gone though.
so it seems the only way of making a living from skinning Stardock software is getting hired by Stardock.

Apparently not.   

The thread I started, being as oversubscribed as it is I'll bring the theme back here.

For me the issue is in resolving the title of the thread to the point where we can feel that Stardock's success in the market, compliments/is complimented by, the work that's put into it's partnership with the community.

I don't know why it's framed as an either or thing. A lot of it for me is about making sure communication keeps pace with change.

If that's what this thread is about, then that's a good thing.

This could be true. But at the same time it could be wrong.

He stated it is the companys best month ever. Not an individual products best month ever. Being part of a company that has several different divisions, just because the company is having a great month does not mean every product they have is working out profitably.

For example if you make 5 different products and you make very good profits on 2 of these products, a little profit on 1, and are usually at a loss on the other 2, then at some point you have to say to yourself "Okay do we keep taking the profits from products 1,2,and 3 to keep products 4 and 5 afloat or do we cut our losses on products 4 and 5?"

I'm not complaining about costs. I'm lamentind the slow marginalization of the skinning community that I know and love. Our costs have gone up only because there are fewer and fewer people who come in and become involved in the community.

Kenwas wrote how he doesn't understand how Stardock can suggest raising prices or what not when it's having its best month ever. But that's precisely the issue, Stardock had its best month ever despite WinCustomize losing money and community-related software sales and content representing smaller percentages of Stardock's revenue and becoming only marginally profitable.

I remember in the last days of the OS/2 market (and I'm not suggesting that the skinning community is dying) that even as the OS/2 market was dying, the user base was increasingly shrill and demanding on us. That we "owed" them for our very existence and thus had no right to make Windows software. The other thing we noticed was that the users left on OS/2 behaved with increasing levels of entitlement.

It is that sense of entitlement that I see quite regularly nowadays in the skinning community today that realy gets on our nerves. I see people buy a $10 to $20 program and complain and complain about issues that are, sorry, just petty and trivial. I have bigger issues with Photoshop than I see in some of the shrill posts I sometimes see on WinCustomize and that's a $500 program.

I think I can speak for a LOT of skinners here when I say that it's pretty obnoxious to see some guy who bought a $20 software utility bitching that not all the skins are free (only 95% plus are) and treating skinners (whether they be third parties or Stardockians) as virtual slaves to them. It's just as if someone who buys a DVD player complaining that the movies aren't free. Except here, the "DVD player" is $20 and virtually all the content IS free.

Thanks for the clarification of the profitability split, although I am not sure what is included or, equally as important what is not included, in "community-related software sales". I never thought that you had any expectations of WC giving profit performance equal to the gaming side of the business or the other areas of SD but rather as a vehicle for the skinning community and product awareness/exposure. My impression was that it served its purpose well as long as it did not significantly hurt the performance of the overall SD enterprise which was my point in that the overall managed to have the best month on record. I gather the negative impact is becoming significant from your reply.

I do not think that the occasion "entitlement" customer that is so annoying is reflective of the base of WC but might indeed be growing from the data you see.

vStyler,

The basis of my statement is that at least on one occasion a few weeks back, while looking at wb skins there was/were at least 1 page of 12 skins that were at least half or more pay. Now I dont care and didnt care then and never took note of the particulars of it because I didnt think it important. I just continued browsing through the skins (all 500+ pages worth I think it was).

However, I simply pointed it out because it may be possible that a new user (who might already have some disgruntled issues or skepticism regarding something to begin with) may chance to happen upon a similar circumstance while browsing a gallery and simply think... "wtf! its all pay!" (Which we know NOT to be true.)

As far as that last part goes... I agree with you. I have already stated previously in this thread that I think it to be a nice incentive for the master skinners to be able to sell their hard work and that I dont think they are unreasonably priced either.

Furthermore, I stated before that I dont understand what all the fuss is about when it comes to paying for the commercial/master skins since its up to whoever as to whether or not they want to pay for em.

There just seems to be a lot of "everybody wants something for nothin" going on to which I am just trying to approach the subject matter from a neautral point under a pretense that the situation can be resolved easily between all partys (skinners/stardock/cunsumers) through clear communication.

In the case of free vs. pay skins... clear communication upfront to John and Jane Q consumer that although there are some really well designed commercial/master skins that you have the option to purchase for a reasonable price... There are also hundreds if not thousands of free skins available too.

In my previous reply... I suggested perhaps separating the commercial/master skins from the free ones in the galleries because it would on a psychological level clearly communicate the above statement to John and Jane Q consumer with little to no wriggle room for doubt.

I know it should be obvious to anyone already, (it was to me) but then again... it should be obvious to the lady in the 10 items or less checkout in front of me at the supermarket that it is an express lane... but it still dont stop her from poppin up there with a cart full of goodies and copping an attitude with the clerk till she gets ALL her items rung up.

Thanks for your time in reading my previous reply vStyker and anyone else for that matter. I hope this reply goes to help clear up any misconceptions about my previous one.

If I had a buck for everytime...I...typed vStyker..   

Zubaz... wake up.. wake UP!!!   

If anyone wants to send me some money back for any of my ported skins and / or my bug reports since 1999 i'm OK [ whistling smiley ]

I got slider but I did not see a demo with it. I did comment on the slider and you have 5 pagers of comments and to that you’re the only Master skin I bought (Slider). So you’re saying you only sold 200 sliders I myself, find that hard to Believe. For the pre-release clicking that button I thought that was for OD subscribers to get the newest update before everyone else. Did not, ok ok was not thinking that it was for Beta Testing, so if that’s the case for BT where do I post, in the forums or do I send an E-Mail to SD? I have no problem with BTing. As for DesktopX I love it, but don’t use it as for it sucks my resources pigs my CPU to 100% As for ObjectBar just can’t figure out, how to use it. So I don’t use it. As for RightClick love it, and do use. As for ObjectDock Love it a lot and use it, just don’t know where some of the Skins go into as in Starting with, Backgrounds folder  Non-Tabbed, Tabbed, Tabbed-Only, Tiles. Now on the tiles that one is easy. And most skinners don’t tell you which sub folder to put it into. So if it is not a tile I just put them all into Backgrounds, except for the ones that the skinner knows that I am too dumb to know which sub folder to put it into... This might be off topic by I just have to ask/state. I got it that you can install OD on more than one computer (as long as you’re the only user of that computer) that said then way dose Stardock put skins in  C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\Stardock.

If people want to make money doing graphic work then go to school and train like the rest of the world has done for ages. If you really think that sitting at home in front of your computer is going to generate any lucrative results you hit the bong a few too many times.

I started a reply to this thread, and then thought I should maybe read a little more first .... glad I did. My first reply would have been a bit off topic.

I'm new to OD/WB (very new), and never thoought about skinning before. I just used whatever came with Windows. However, after purchasing the programs and then discovering all the great stuff posted on this site ... I got really inspired. Granted, some of the free materials are not exactly what I want ... but then that just makes me want to learn to create the missing parts. So, instead of spending quite as much time on SecondLife modeling furniture for my store, I'm learning how to create OD backgrounds and icons for use with Tiggz's marvelous K-TEK screens.

There is some remarkable stuff out there that doesn't cost anything ... and $5 for a master skin is reasonable.

To take the car analogy and beat it to death with a stick, I've bought the car ... has tires and it runs ... but I want a really killer paint job, super custom. I can either pay someone for that extra, or I can learn to do it myself .... or get it done cheaply and tweak it (which is what someone like me generally does).

Now, granted, I'm not about to throw beta testing into the mix at this point ... I'm having enough trouble just learning to create content without bug hunting. Doesn't mean I won't ... just means I wouldn't be much good at it right now because I can't tell the difference between a bug and my own stupidity.

Of course, all of this may end up being an expensive proposition in the end - because now I really (really) want to purchase Cinema 4D so that I can create some really magnificent renders for my icons and wallpaper. (I'm sitting here with a giant case of K-TEK envy at the moment).