Zubaz: My guns are always cocked and loaded. You should know that by now.

The mods have been around skinning...as skinners and have seen 'decades' of all these same issues.... the only difference being newer WB releases are more intricate than the older...but the potential for quirk and bug and error remains.

I for one have no interest in sucking eggs.

The correct location for this 'conversation' is the skin's comment section.

The correct location for 'concerns' relating to originality of included components/images is IN PRIVATE via PM.

The correct location for Masters' egos to joust is offsite, if anywhere.

And Jeff's both right and wrong....yes, it's refreshing that TSF isn't the focus of the 'drama'...but the actuality of the 'drama' is specifically due to its being voiced in the wrong arena, namely the forum.

I totally disagree with you Jafo. How can something be voiced incorrectly in a forum when a forum's definition is to be an avenue of discussion?

I don't think this type of thing belong's on a skin's comment section. It's too conversational. Why muck up a skin's comment section with dialog? Plus one person's bad experience can influence others when in fact it can quite possibly be an isolated incident and just affecting that user's PC.

Because, like it or not some people have no interest in a civil discourse as to the whys and wherefores of a skin's details/anomalies...but grasp any such opportunity to have a 'dig' at others' expense.

Remember...how often does a thread relating to whether or not Hyperdesk 'looks kewl' end up as 'Jeff is a bastard'?

It's a balancing act at best keeping 'most people' on the straight and narrow...and reminding them to be civil....without coming down on them like a ton of bricks and simply kicking them offsite.

It is easier [for all] if people adhere to a few 'simple' rules and minimize the opportunities for drama and flame, hence the 'appropriateness' of various communications....

Something ALL skinners should welcome...someone taking the time to point out a bug...god bless them,seriously.

I can not count the number of times I have sent skins to others asking for testing just to hear"its great".

I KNOW its great,I made it...now tell me whats buggered up thank you.

It wouldnt bother me in the least if it was here in the forums...others can learn with me and make their skins better.

And yes Z,you are handling this pretty well...none of us are perfect skinners,its just about imposssible to catch everything...thats why I let vStyler look at my skins before they go up.

Ahh but see, everyone has the ability to not read and follow a forum thread if they find something not to their liking. Or even to "walk away". I'd prefer someone bash me on a forum thread than on a skinner's gallery submission which like I.R. Braniac said, would live on that piece of art's page permanently, while forum posts live and die. Because if the nastiness happens here, it will certainly happen on some poor artist's submission. Until you have a feature like DA has where you can hide comments, then the artist has no recourse that i'm aware of.

The artists are the lifeblood of the skinning community. They are also the lifeblood of Stardock's customization applications because without their work, the apps' appeal would be limited. When you start peppering the submissions with some of the nasty s**t that goes on in the forums, then tainted something that was supposed to be untainted.

And besides the job of the Forum Moderators is to "moderate". A thread should never get out of control with as many of you as there are. A temp ban for a week or two would do wonders to stop some of the hostility that goes on here.

hey! i already say that:

sometimes i think you are just ignoring my comments at all...

Yes, that's what we do...., typically taking the specific requests to stop/move on, etc. to Private Messages, however it's not uncommon for public forum comments to attract respondents who are oblivious to the specific skin/issue who tend to hijack the thread [just like me here] to expound some not-quite-related discourse....

Stardock/Wincustomize has a policy of 'minimal intrusion'...that is...it's a last resort to lock or otherwise alter/edit a thread just to keep everything 'rosy'.

I think back to the early days of Wincustomize.com [and Skinz.org before it] to the verbal stoushes that were the norm.

We're all veterans of those... but since then skinning [as an entity] has matured...and so too should the conduct/behaviour on our public forums, both here AND any other skin site venue.

Is not having an 'ignore' function such a bad thing?

Heck, just the slightest hint of revisionist history through an edit, sanctioned or otherwise is seen as both draconian AND blatant censorship of 'free speech'.... hence our great, new feature of being able to see/review a post's edit history.

The status quo is quite good, really.... though I've always thought a separate forum strictly for skinners to interact directly, warts and all.... removed from public scrutiny could perfectly accommodate a thread such as this one....with far less potential for public embarrassment to those involved....better than open forum AND better than the skin comment section.  Somewhere where skinners can nut out issues that may be skin failings...and/or failings of the skinnable itself.

The general user would just see the end result and not the machinations of that result...

That seems an excellent solution...although this thread has been quite entertaining....

true...tho I'm sure if he has any freinds one would tell him 'dude they are trashing yur skin'

But it gives us something to read, late at night when there's nothing else to do. Better than Leno...

Hey, you made the comment Jeff, you should buy....