Every site I have been a member of has had particularly unsavoury 'moments'....that includes Wincustomize.com.

My first foray into skinning [as against LS themeing] was at Customize.org....it was effectively the 'original', after all.

By the time I got there it was less than friendly to a newbie already.....shades of me feeling out of place being 40-something at the time...I was 'too old' for it/them, I think.

When Skinz.org kicked into life I saw a chance to be less of a relative 'late-comer' and found it a 'better place to be'....but even with rose coloured glasses there were some unfriendly attitudes that I recall...in fact I think Frogboy might have already been getting barbs his way due to corporate 'skinning' success.

By the time other sites arrived on the scene there was a lively 'us vs them' mentality rife amongst all....inter-site rivalry was alive and festering nicely.

In more recent times, what irks most is the willingness of those 'responsible' for these community skinning sites [Admins] who use their voice of 'position' to attack their 'sister' sites, as if it's an Olympic sport.

I don't get to the other sites much at all these days....usually it's just for rip-chasing, rather than social niceties....which is sad, really.....but it does seem that some sites thrive through popularity and others may just be doing it through controversy...

What's the point? The staff had locked the thread (but not before taking several parting shots). And it makes me sad that a website that I keep, year after year, hoping it will snap out of the "l33t" mentality just can't seem to get its act together.

You are right, it's probably a mistake at this point for anyone to go to Customize.org to try to get constructive opinions.

What we were not prepared for is the kind of illogical thinking from staff.

Cololussus, no offense but who really cares what Customize.org thinks at this stage? From my vantage point, you guys were given an opportunity to participate in something and instead you crapped on it - as usual.

Here's "the logic" of the Customize.org staff position: It is wrong and exploitive for the free program, SkinStudio to convert .msstyles so that they can be used by WindowBlinds (including the free version).

However, it apparently is not exploitive for the msstyles section on Customize.org to tell its users they will need to go to TGT Soft (with a link provided) to get Style XP which costs $20 in order to apply .msstyles.

When this fairly obvious (I think) flaw in logic was brought out, then I get the "Stardock is a joke around here" comments and told how we're just in it "for the money".  It apparently never occurred that if easy money were the goal that we could make WindowBlinds simply read .msstyles in 5 minutes.  So the goal of .msstyles conversion is obviously not intended primarily towards end users.

It was Customize.org staff, not I, who started putting down skin authors. Who started saying how crappy people's skins are.

And btw, I don't claim not to be arrogant. But at the same time, the truth is still the truth. You can't have it both ways - you want to say that we're in it just for the money but ignore how much we've contributed to the community over the years.