This may be kind of off topic, but not.
I have recently stressed for the last time over whether or not DX works for everyone. Like Stardock knows, all apps can't be expected to work for all setups.
So I truly do skin for me. I use the things I make. If they work on your system, awesome, if not, I'm sorry. I no longer support XP.
If it ain't fun, I ain't doing it.
I have one halfway decent WB under my belt, probably the only one. I don't enjoy skinning WB, so I ain'ta gonna do it...lol.
All that aside, Wizard1956 checks my stats more often than I do. I seldom do anymore. Just isn't that important.
I dunno how I made master, but I don't sell skins. Too stressful. If I'm gonna sell them, I have to worry about whether or not it'll work for EVERYONE. Takes the fun right out of it.
I like to sit down, start a skin, and let it flow. If it doesn't try to keep me at the PC until it's finished, I'm not doing it right. If I'm not compelled to keep skinning it, something isn't right. This is why I don't skin for every blind that comes along, unless it's requested. A skin has to compel me, if it don't, I won't be skinning for it unless the author asks me to.
To me, this is the essence of "skin for yourself". I hope the above paragraph should clear up some things for some of my friends here that may ask themselves why I don't do peripheral skins for their works. If it don't turn me on, I don't make skins for it. But that may just be my taste, not to say that you made a bad skin.
You all know that I can do original work, I have several in my gallery. But I love making matching skins for WBs that really rock. It's just what I enjoy doing. I don't take/want credit for the graphics, 90% of them are just my manipulation of someone else's work. A port, if you will.
I don't worry anymore about those who say that all my stuff is the same designs used over and over. Isn't the same true for a WB skin? A rainy? Docks? Same basic stuff just different graphics.
All that said...If I was worried about download counts, I'd have left WC a while back. When I became RND, I lost 84,483 total downloads. I would be well over a million right now if not for that.
Do I care? No. It isn't why I skin.
Ratings? Too open to personal likes and dislikes, grudges, etc. Download bots and such could possibly influence that. Not reliable. I like my stuff, that is what counts.
You should like your stuff. And that should be THE single most important reason you do it. Unless you make things to sell, then you have to think more of what the public wants.
I'll shut up now.