WC statement:

Note: WinCustomize works to ensure its download counts are accurate. Some download sites inflate their download counts either intentionally or unintentionally. On WinCustomize.com, we take measures to try to provide you with accurate download counts. These download counts can be assumed to be fairly close to the actual # of individuals who have downloaded this skin, theme, wallpaper, or icon package.

Yes....the download count will be accurate.

Not syncronized to the nanometer via atomic clock....but not INFLATED - [falsified] either.

In exactly the same way the last poster listed on a recent post listing doesn't show immediately in the actual thread....yet is in the list.

The point from where/when a statistic is 'read' from a DB is affected by cache refresh schedules.

Think of it all a little like a car engine's rated powere output....

Do you cheat.... like some countries do...and quote output from the flywheel....with all the engine peripherals powered externally....or do you chuck the whole car on rollers...fire it up and take the reading from the wheels?

Websites have been known to artificially inflate stats like unique page views...number of users online....download counts....to give a false impression of self-importance/success.  Wincustomize/Stardock doesn't do that....hence the quoted statement.

WHEN DL counts are synched...they will be exact, as long as you ignore those still currently in cache and not registered yet.

Wow: from Nov. 1 2011, Jafo's reply when Vampothika posted about the exact same thing;

"Last I recall it was an anomaly due to the complexity of the Stardock/Wincustomize site 'architecture' - multiple servers, etc. It takes time for the counts to synchronize and thus be accurate."

My response to that thread was that, the count for yesterday is more like the last 2-3 days. Jafo's explanation here and on that thread explains why it is more than just 1 days count.

I have have never seen any others more hung up on download stats than Neoene and Vampothika.

This refers to the total download count, the counts for yesterday and monthly have always been meant as just an extra, and not ever stated to be 100% exact as they do not update live as downloads for skins do.

In this particular instance that error was probably over 100%, if your gages have that much of an out of tolerance allowance I'd suggest a review of your calibration procedures to make a better effort to become NIST compliant.

It's a personal choice I choose to make and doesn't really need to be explained but it's the difference between my private persona and my public one. The download count doesn't impact whether or not I continue to like the blind but it's a good barometer of how well it's received. And as such, I do expect that if a download count be provided, that it be accurate. (within +/- 2%)

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.

I resemble that remark also and I'm sure that others do as well, so what?

not a slight cavan1, just mentioning that regadless of anything else it's a personal choice.

Quoting Cavan1,
reply 23
I have have never seen any others more hung up on download stats than Neoene and Vampothika.


christ... sorry for looking at my stats.....

the question was answered. i have nothing more to say

with 37 pages of uploads I can see why it would be difficult to keep up with them. Hardwood is much more than a decent blind, it's a great blind.

Thanks GMC2. That was nice of you to say.      (Better than any count, stat, or star....lol.)

I think this is the only purchased software where close enough is adequate. ?  And shut the front door.  I don't get that. 

This has been years now.    It's turned into something is better than nothing for information. I think that's sad. 

Especially so, Kudos to all skinners out there.      You're all winners in my books. 

All I did was ask about a little siteglitch

Might have been a good idea to ask "site glitch" questions during the work week when someone can take a look at it?

No worries Neone...don't take it personal...it's the internet.

Glitches come and go but an anomaly is forever.

I think it was the way you asked, it, Andy.  If Tom would have made the same post and it was your skin he had used as an example that there was a glitch, would that still be a simple question about a glitch?  You know I love you, and your avant-garde skinning skills, but your diplomacy needs some tweaking sometimes. 

I think it would have been a better route to take, to just wait a few days to see if the glitch corrects, and if it doesn't, to PM a mod.  This is my advice as a friend.

What she said....

I think some people need bashing with a learning stick....

Trying to help here....that is all. 

https://forums.wincustomize.com/413217

I think that about covers anyone that's ever turned on a computer.