benmanns I agree with a lot of what you wrote. However I want to make it clear that I am not against a "usable blind". If someone wants to bay a few bucks for that style I do not have a problem with it. I also am not saying that skinners that make that style are not creative, I believe they are but for me creativity shines through blinds that are not boxed shape because those skinners are thinking outside of the box. You made references to skinners which I agree have made blinds that exude creativity. What I can say for sure and I have even said it in the comments when someone released a blind that I thought displayed a lot of creativity is that I would have gladly paid for that blind. Now perhaps I in the minority so I do not expect blinds to be made just for myself. There is a saying "the majority rules" however I find it hard to believe that most people would not pay for a blind that was not considered useable for everyday. Surely I can't be the only one that likes to express the kid in our self from time to time and enjoy having fun with themes.
I do not make blinds but I believe I could if I polished up my photoshop skills, I am not suggesting it would be easy because I have done enough editing in skinstudio to know other wise. If I did make a blind I would go into it with the frame of mind as treating it as a sculpture first and an art canvas second, that is just me though.
JC that startmenu shape thing wasn’t against you, and i know you are not against it, i read that you would pay for many skins and i feel the same i just sometimes think that there is little variety in the look, ( I love Mechos for example and would not change its shape) Criminal also looked damn fine... still want to have it

it’s my personal thought that it became "common" to have the square shape simply because the rating system includes usability of a theme and i agree that the square shape is useful, but many stick to the square shape because of the rating or because they are afraid to loose stars if they use a different shape.
Just wanted to mention that this isn’t the case as long as you keep the usability up and
do a decent job like vSytler did on Outer limits or IR. with Slider , No load Limit there won’t be any setbacks in the rating:
+We would all benefit of having the toys we all want and cool skins to play with
The startmenu is the biggest part for a skinner where he can be creative... And in windows8 the start8 startmenu became just a visual extra at least for me/ i adopted to the windows8 Start i mainly use the oldstartmenu to have it skinned while i never use it. Strange isnt it ?
I think many on windows8 will agree the start8 startmenu should be an interesting shape for a home pc and offer a different experience over the square STARTMENU of windows8.
Quoting benmanns, reply 42but craving for a master title isn’t what skinning or customizing is about,
not sure how that was implied by what I said but the intent was quite the opposite.
uhm i didnt wanted to target you with that ,I just came to a similar thought because you said that you uploaded many skins over a long period and still have apprentice title ( little new master announcements ).
While you said you dont mind i simply wanted to say that i share the same thought and dont care about the title that much for me skinning isnt about becomming a master its a hobby where you can relax and have fun with and share the outcome with a wide audience ( if you like ) .Sorry sometimes im unable to express the thoughts in the correct order and mix stuff up and it becomes unclear what i want to say especially on long texts.