With recent visits of the old guard of skinning, I once again wanted to offer the opportunity for folks to post about their first skin, what got them in to skinning, any interesting skinning related story that they might remember or even a short biography of their skinning life.
Pictures if yas have any, are welcome additions but not necessary.
I'll start.
1997 I find this interesting program called SimpleStep to customize my desktop.. I download it and even tho it was in it's beta stages I saw it had potential.. I poke around and fix the task manager that was having issues, then repackage it and ship it off to it's creator Lonerunnr. He emails me back asking for my phone number. * interestingly enough it is during our first phone call he asked what my handle was. I said I did not have one, so he gave me the handle PhenomTT*. For the next dozen months or so we collaborate, bouncing ideas etc..
Just before the freshly renamed LiteSTEP 1.0 ß23d is released he asks me if I could take over the project as he had other Ideas on the back burners he needed to have a go at. Me with a new baby in the house and trying to start my own business I could not take on such a responsibility, but said I would stick around helping the new development team as a beta tester and help out where I could.. Francis agreed and told me my handle would be an everlasting part the LiteSTEP Development team, to this day I am the only beta tester ever to be listed in the original LS development team..
I suggest we offer the source code to the masses. Francis states he wants the project to live on and grow without being watered down and disseminated, So we come up with the idea of releasing it under a GNU GPL with the stipulation.
Please, do not distribute modified versions on your own or we will end up with a big mess.
If you have made modifications that you would like to see in the released package, contact the Litestep project coordinator and
submit your work. You may also join the Litestep development team, we welcome everybody who is motivated.
I hung around for almost another year and helped with stuff like wharfs etc. and thus made my very first skin..
Made sometime early 1998 for LStaskman.. yeh is not much to look at. but back then I was so stoked..
I would love to hear other stories of how folks got in to skinning, as well as if possible see your first Diamond in the rough..
Would also love to hear again how Brad and the guys started off and built the skinning Empire we all know to be Stardock.. 
Cheers..
