WinCustomize in 2011
Sunday, January 2, 2011 by Island Dog | Discussion: WinCustomize News
Tomorrow (Monday) begins the official first day of 2011 work for many of us here. Aside from having my wisdom teeth removed last year, I didn’t take much time off so I tried to make the most of this break and stay offline for much as I could. I was able to do that because of the great staff we have here – Jafo, Hankers, WOM, DrJBHL, HG_Eliminator, Snowman, Lantec, and the other names who are escaping me right now. They truly are the best to work with and I personally appreciate everything they do for the site and skinning in general.
Getting back into work mode one of my first goals for 2011 is to make WinCustomize even better than it is. Site traffic has declined over the last year or so as skinning is moving back to its niche “roots”, and getting more people involved here and download/submitting is a top goal. Looking back at Win98 and WinXP when I first got involved into skinning, Windows was terribly bland and skinning was almost a necessity. Now that Windows is more physically attractive skinning has also gone from just changing the look of Windows, to changing how Windows looks and how to boost ease of us and productivity. This is not a bad thing in my opinion, and an app like Fences is the best example of what I’m talking about.
Taking lots of things into consideration I made a short list of things I’d like to address in the first half of 2011.
- Address lingering site issues. WC 2010 is brand new, but there are still some issues that need to be worked out. Yes, the delete skins button is one of them.
- More/better tutorials. Skinning isn’t necessarily the easiest thing to do, but it’s definitely not impossible. We need better tutorials and a better way for new and old users to find and use them.
- More contributors. We have a great core group of skinners that submit to WC, but more would be even better.
- More content. Mobile wallpapers maybe? Any other apps that can be skinned that should be added? Let me know!
Community is important as ever, and looking at our user groups here it was a fantastic decision to bring on board DrJBHL as our article/news poster for WC. He has been doing a phenomenal job at keeping WC users up to date with the latest tech and PC news, and I think doing this is a great move to broaden appeal to new users. In trying to address the tutorial content we definitely more people to contribute. Over the years I have written what seems like a countless amount of tutorials, but many are outdated and there are many others on WinCustomize that are more “experts” at specific apps than I am. If you would like to dedicate some time to helping update/write tutorials, once again let me know.
Getting more people over to submit to WinCustomize has been more difficult. Many just don’t know about the site, and others I have spoken with just don’t have the time to submit to multiple sites which is understandable. We “recruited” some people this year who are well known on other sites like DA who just didn’t realize that WC gets millions and millions of visitors each month. WinCustomize is a great way to expose yourself (no pun intended) and since we do obviously focus more on customization, it can be easier to get your work noticed. I’d like to see what the interest is in some type of referral program. Introduce an artist to WC and once they become a regular contributor a reward is given. Thoughts on this? Would you take part?
Well I think I have rambled enough, so let me also take this opportunity to thank you for your support in 2010, and I know 2011 will be even better than last year was!
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Reply #82 Thursday, January 13, 2011 7:22 PM
Reply #83 Thursday, January 13, 2011 7:39 PM
Ok Paul...sounds good. And it's gonna take a bit...I'm updating them as I go. I'm starting from the beginning and also trying to consolidate ones that were already updated. I'll pm you when I get to those so we can see how we can do this. And I'm also noticing that some skins I did docks for are no longer there...but I'll update them anyway for anyone that might still have the skin. You know those darn XP users. 
Reply #84 Friday, January 21, 2011 5:18 PM
I already said that the 5 NEW string positions on the WC HomePage give the top visibility\exposure to the skin but the permanency it's like a lottery: 1 hour or less for the unlucky skins, 10\20 hours for the lucky ones ( in downloads count 10\20 or 200\400)
as at the moment we have 3 direct links, everybody is going to click on the skin thumbnail or on the skin name: 2 direct links to the skin not to the gallery yeah at the very bottom there is a third direct link to the category but just nobody will notice it !
what about to provide only 1 direct link to the Category just clicking on the new skin thumbnail (no more links needed and also quite easy to be implemented by a programmer I think ) naturally the new skin will appeared always at the first position in his Gallery, but all the gallery especially the new libraries will have more visitors ! 
Geezus...give it a rest already!
Reply #86 Friday, January 21, 2011 8:57 PM
frankell, the way docks are being transferred just now, you're lucky to get any exposure at all. Webgizmos have been making docks for seven years....over 450 or so sets (from one to 12 docks per set).
When everyone's docks are transferred, then you'll be able to judge the "visibility" time. Until then, why not just relax? The original purpose for this thread was to discuss WinCustomize in 2011, not just ObjectDock Backgrounds Gallery.
I understand you spend time in creating your art. So do others.... be patient until things reach an equilibrium or steady state.
As for Home Page visibility, representation is given on a first come first serve sequence. There are (thank G-d) many contributions, and each gets time depending how they come out of Moderation.
Reply #87 Saturday, January 22, 2011 5:48 PM
No doubts about the WebGizmos mastership, he is for me one of the 3 top dockskinners, just not the first (always for me) because he never created "perspective" docks (my preferred).
Actually with my new idea I wasn't referring to the 4 replies posted 8 full days before, but to the main Island Dog topic, I really didn't mean to be over-stressing aw this is not my problem, also to declare that, again all evidence, I was caring only about the OD galleries is not my problem.
Probably I should improve my English language but I can understand that there is no use for my proposals regarding Wincustomize in 2011 
Reply #88 Monday, January 24, 2011 8:41 AM
I have already explained this 5 times over. It is a NEW gallery. Kinks will need to be worked out, and it will take time to build up.
Reply #89 Monday, January 24, 2011 2:13 PM
... my first alert for what a consider an HomePage issue was this post on May 7, 2010
Reply #90 Monday, January 24, 2011 4:05 PM
which ones would they be.?
Reply #91 Monday, January 24, 2011 4:14 PM
I had the same thought, Rick. One man's junk is another man's treasure ...or something like that. 
Reply #92 Monday, January 24, 2011 4:41 PM
That's BKGarbageman's motto.
frankell.... why don't you just pm those ideas? Honestly? You say you understand that proposals now won't change anything, but you're still proposing changes!
Let it rest for a couple of months and then post a thread with your ideas. I'm sure they will be worthy ones, but now the focus of attention has shifted. O.K.?
Reply #93 Monday, January 24, 2011 5:01 PM
as WC is not a one man's site but a commercial site IMHO it's not my\your\our business to eventually decide which ones would they be. 
opps I was late on replying to Rick and Navigatsio so at least I was able to change this reply with the "Save Changes" button adding
OK DrJBHL
Reply #94 Monday, January 24, 2011 6:04 PM
The 5 skins on the front page are just used as an quick look at what is new and updated. These are going to cycle through quickly and aren't intended to be a lasting showcase of skins. Most people aren't using it as an entrance to the galleries, that is the Explore tab that people are using.
Reply #95 Thursday, January 27, 2011 11:16 AM
Perhaps a native phone app could be created to view and pull content. I'm also an Android developer in my spare time and even wrote (then sold) a home replacement app that was skinnable and was toying with the idea of animated wallpaper, but Google beat me to it by creating live wallpapers. I currently run my Asteroids Dream on my Android phone using the Video Live Wallpaper app that plays video as the wallpaper.
This is a great idea, TMB (and great to see you here, lurker!).
TheAVMan and I'd also love to see iPhone/iPad and Win7 Phone apps developed which could notify owners of new skins/walls/docks, etc.
I believe this could draw an incredible amount of traffic.
Making some progress of course this is only temporary untill we can talk more about it with the bosses
Reply #98 Thursday, January 27, 2011 2:45 PM
Thank you both very much these phone apps are new to me so having to figure it out as I go ! However I have been doing a little research iphone users are now over 21million and WP7 is growing fast as is android. Quite literally the number of potential new customers for Stardock Products and exposure to WC is enormous . I would like to help tap into that potential .
Reply #99 Thursday, January 27, 2011 7:11 PM
Lets see. 21 million divided by however many years ... hmmmmmm. doable i think. That's a lot of potential guy.
Reply #100 Wednesday, February 16, 2011 5:28 PM
One thing I would really love to see is a lot easier access to peoples home sites here. It's near impossible to get to anyone's unless they have a link to it in their submissions. I click on someone's name and all I get is one page. I really don't understand why something like this hasn't been fixed from day one.
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Reply #81 Thursday, January 13, 2011 1:23 PM
Jafo suggests we circle the wagons......
My wagon got a flat!
But seriously...I will take my time moving things over and try and do some updating along the way as well. And with something like 450 sets to move it will take some time doing this. So is there a comfortable amount to move at one time?