Umm.... dude... the 20 bucks is WELL worth it. All those files you wanna download, all that 'other stuff', is all part of the site that WinCustomize is. It is an idea, but I dont think its feasible to split up different types of subscriptions. If you're truly wanting to support the site, why not just go all the way and pay it? Heck, not many people use ALL the features... I dont use the premium suites. I rarely use the photo gallery. My personalized home page is a joke... I just use it for my favourite skins and such, and my watch list of authors. However, I'm still 100% confident that the WinC sub is well worth the money. The WindowBlinds skins ALONE are worth the 20 bucks. Thats my opinion on the matter...

Price Breakdown:

Bandwidth and Servers: $19.95
Photo Galleries: $0.00
Personal Pages: $0.00
Admins and Moderators: $0.00
Skins and Themes: $0.00
--------------------------------
Total: $19.95

Black Cat...if we all adopted that attitude, there'd be no place to pay the $5.00 you propose. The costs of keeping this site alive are enormous and it needs our continued support to remain viable, so dust the cobwebs off your wallet and subscribe to what you obviously derive enjoyment from.

I've been a member here at wincustomize for about 4 years now (ever since I found and fell in love with Object Desktop) and I've never really had an issue come across on the site that made me feel so strongly as this one. So I'm going to share my opinion on this one and then be quiet for another 4 years.

I think four key things need to be done:

1) Merge OD/Wincustomize.com serials and put file download quotas into effect
2) Make an official paypal donation address available
3) Make the top 100 skins/themes etc. available on the WWW for bittorrenting each month with all the bug fixes in
4) Raise the cost of the Object Desktop full suite renewal to $50/year instead of $35.

Now read my reason for each of these...

I pay $35/year to keep my Stardock account up (which is bargain basement imho). Its a sweet suite of applications and I'm very happy with it (tyvm Stardock and all your skinners out there). /tips hat

However, to charge another $20 for so-called "premium access" is not a good idea. Here's why ->

The second that "premium skins" come out, they'll be leaked/pirated/ever-so-slightly-modified-and-re-released (kinda like a version of Vista in the last few days) which undermines the primary product being marketed (the premium skins).

So what should be done instead?

First, I think you guys should merge wincustomize.com and Object Desktop so that the number of downloads per Object Desktop serial number are limited on a per-day basis, and limited severely for non-paying site-goers.

Reason #1: Shared Serials

If a person started sharing their serial to friends their daily download quota would be capped and bandwidth would not be an issue.

Reason #2: Frivolous Downloads Cut Significantly

Putting quotas into effect would limit the number of frivolous downloads. If I have a cap of, say, 3-5 downloads per day (as a non-paying site-goer), there's no way I'm going to be downloading wallpapers/skins with a 3-star rating or less. Even if I'm a full-fledged paying member, if I have a cap of 30 skins/day I think that's PLENTY. If there are people who are downloading more than this I think its high time they started paying into the system.

The second thing which should be done is to set up a secure method for taking donations. I hear people saying in other threads that if there were a way to donate some money to keep you guys going, they'd fork some cash over. Let me just say that I'll do the same. Give me the official paypal address and I'll chip in. That may fix the issue right there.

The third thing you guys should do is this: every month you should create a zip file of the top 100-downloaded windowblinds skins, top 100 wallpapers, top 100 icon packages, etc. and put a couple seeds out on the web for bit-torrenting.

Reason #1: Bandwidth

Users use their own instead of your servers and your bandwidth, reducing your overall expenses.

Reason #2: Standardization

The vast majority of the skins will have all of the updates the authors plan to do and are more or less bug-free by the end of each month. Often times the community makes a skin author aware of an issue and the author goes back 3-10 days after the skin came out and fix the issues. All these fixes could go into the once-monthly torrented zip files.

The fourth thing to do is to raise the cost of OD from $35/year to $50/year. If the first three things don't take care of the problem, this would definitely be a valid option.

Reason #1 - People who use the site lots and lots should shoulder the costs involved.

Reason #2 - Many current users will want the kind of access and prestige that a full OD/Wincustomize.com membership entails (large number of daily downloads, premium skins/themes, etc.) and won't mind the $15 hike. I know I qualify as one such.

So there you have it.

/wanders off

20 dollars a year is 1.6 dollars a month! With 1.6 dollars a month you buy just one,maybe two MC Donald burgers. It's that low. Sooo cut a burger or two each month. That's what i did.

Wincustomize works damn hard to make our PC's look primo, so all you tight wads out there, crack $20 out of your wallet and lets keep the best skinning site in the world on its feet.

Perhaps the time has come to get tough: No subscription = no downloads. Why should those of us who pay subsidise those who don't?

Hear....hear!!

We kinda have quite a few threads/news items on this same subject....I think everyone is repeating themselves....[sure seen Ash's one before]...

"All I Want is to Download" For free. Where do these people come from? Unlimited? You don't ask for much, do you?

SOS- Same old ...uh, story.
There will always be people who just don't get it. Bandwidth=$$$ and SOMEBODY has to pay.
This site is not government or ad supported so the funds have to come from somwhere.
Guess where? The CONSUMER. Which is US.