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BlueDev

Join Date 12/2003

+16

MSStyles=clones, clones and more clones?

-or- where is the originality?

This is a geek rant. Yes, by writing this I am totally revealing to the world that not only do I care about the subject, but that I think enough about the topic to decide to write a rant about it. So, yes, this is a geek rant, by a geek, and will probably only be relevant to other geeks. Geeks freaking rule.

It isn't any surprise that I enjoy customizing my computer. I love downloading and trying to goodies, widgets, icons, cursors and most of all visual styles. And lately I have enjoyed working on my own a bit. My fascination with OS customization really started when I stumbled across Windowblinds (back when it was early version 3.something, so I am still pretty new to the whole scene). Being able to change how my OS looks is very appealing to me, and to be honest I can't imagine just using plain old Windows or even being limited to one of the Luna themes XP came with. They just bore me.

But at the same time I don't like to limit myself to just using Windowblinds skins. As I mentioned previously I like to use Skin Studio to convert themes that are in MSStyle format to use with Windowblinds. I am not a fan of using a hacked uxtheme.dll myself, so I opt to convert. Then I can add even more goodies to my visual styles. But my use of visual styles is becoming less and less frequent.

I like to stop by Neowin on a semi-regular basis. I peruse their Completed Visual Styles section to see what is coming out. But it seems that lately all that is coming out is the same old thing. Sure, they change a color here and there, perhaps change the buttons from a box to a circle, maybe just make them lines. But they are clones and clones and clones. Someone comes up with a great idea (like Stefanka's Inspirat visual style) and you get 30 other monkeys who change a color here, make it lighter/darker, and then release it and let the MSStyle lovers over at Neowin heap the praise on them.

Guess what robots. I can do all that with the same skin in Windowblinds. And I can do even more without much effort with Skin Studio.

And when an original Windowblinds visual style comes around there the robots all jump on it with brilliant comments such as "fugly". I think the collective IQ of the whole bunch is probably lower than the measly points this article will earn. They deride the visual style for being too bulky, too busy, to big. If it isn't completely minimalistic, and limited to about 3 colors they rip it to shreds. To illustrate my point let me offer mormegil's elegant, colorful, festive Christmas Time skin. When the news regarding this Christmas suite was posted over at Neowin it instantly met with comment after comment about how it was fugly, bloated, hideous, and so on. One person even had the audacity to say that "Somebody needs to take a couple design courses!" Yet, just look at the page over at Wincustomize. It has well over 250,000 downloads. Over 250,000! And it has an average rating of 5/5 stars. But because it isn't another minimalistic Luna clone it gets shredded. The myopia displayed on that thread alone made me see red.

I love minimalistic styles myself. But not every stinking day. I like some changes, some creativity, some unique looks to my skin. I have seen visual styles that I honestly couldn't have told you what the difference was between them without doing a close, side by side comparison. Yet each one gets praise heaped upon it for being so slick, so sleek, so smooth.

I just want to see some originality. I know there are great artists making some stylish and even stunning visual styles out there. But the second you see one of their works released, be prepared to see 50 clones of the same thing. Me, I am just getting tired of seeing the same visual style, time after time. Perhaps it is the community, perhaps it is the inherent power of Windowblinds over the MSStyle format, but I just don't seem to see nearly the same degree of cloning going on with the Windowblinds skins. So thanks to all of you out there trying to break new ground, to make something a little different that will look great on my screen.

The robots? Let them stew in their own pot of mundane similarity.

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GreenReaper

Join Date 05/2001

+32

I'm just plain amused that they would say that of mormegil, knowing his history as a Disney computer artist.

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You will find people bashing everything no matter how many downloads it has or how many people post saying they like it.
That happens to skins with a couple thousand downloads to a couple hundred thousand.

If the skin works and is bug free, thats all that matters. Just my opnion.

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Island Dog

Join Date 06/2003

+1048

I agree with your Bluedev. I do the same thing and I know what you mean when that "crowd" just creates the same thing over and over.

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Yep,yep,yep-That's why I stopped using styleXp it lacked originality.The only originals seemed to had come from WB. I kept up with windowblinds cause of the lipstick theme( don't ask, I just took to it). Hum it's funny- look at windowblinds now(going somewhere)and look at StyleXp now(going nowhere--I'm speaking only for myself)

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the whole reason (as you probally know) for the one VS, a billion color ports of it is that VS cant do the neat-o color change that WB can. My cousin loves WB, and so do I, but he has stopped using WB and even other VS because he "Does not want to hack his system for great looking skins, and he does not want to use a 3rd party app to do it for him". He thinks that Microsoft should just buy the WB Engine and integrate it in to the next OS.

Granted, while he is a bit of a moron, i think that he is right about getting the skinning engine built in to the OS.

Sorry about the extended rant on top of your rant, but i thought that it was needed.

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Draginol

Join Date 03/2001

+137

People who hack their system files know they can do that for free. So I think a lot of the WindowBlinds bashing is emotionally driven -- they want to justify their unwillingness to pay for WindowBlinds by convincing themselves that msstyles are somehow better.

I'll see yet another Luna recoloration (something WindowBlinds can do on the fly) get posted on some site and see it praised to high heaven. But when someone does something really original and cool with WindowBlinds they start trashing it.

Maybe if these guys came out of their mom's basements and got lives they might be able to broaden their horizons.

They're worse than robots. They're more like drones. Because let's face it, the default Windows XP look is pretty "bloated". The skins they tend to praise aren't exactly optimally designed for performance or productivity or screen space. They're just whatever Microsoft tosses out modified slightly. I swear if Microsoft made the title bar 40 pixels high, I bet half these guys would still drool over it.

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I have to say in my opinion the Christmas theme is ugly, but I also dislike Luna. And about skinning being built into the OS, is that what the Avalon project is (was going to be part of Longhorn, but last I heard MS is planning on releasing it for XP a year or two before Longhorn is released)?

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HG_Eliminator

Join Date 07/2002

+354

i have found that most of those who bash any skin that dont resemble a reclored version of the default windows gui, usually cant build the killer high profile styles of skins or lack the vision to design such themes...i mean its not that hard to tweak a few colors on a skin thats basically a luna clone....those who do step up in to the spot light and hammer out those big juicy, shiny, make your eyes happy skins are usually bashed by those who cant ...
what happened to skinners supporting each other? i remember when we were a tight knit community that got excited over the new and unusual...now it seems the conformists have taken over...

why build a skin that looks like a different colored version of the windows default GUI ???? i mean the idea of desktop customization was to get as far away from the ugly win interface as we could...

mormegil is a icon in the skinning community. the comments he recieved on the christmastime theme are reminsant of jealousy or ignorance... i mean the work it took to build that stunningly beautiful theme is immence ...not 3 min with ms paint like ive seen in many other skins....

i mean at 250,000+ and counting downloads for one skin ...he must be doing something the public likes...

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Drones is an apt description. I've noticed, as you also have, the number of nearly identical msstyles coming out. I attribute it largely to an almost herd mentality, a wanting to belong. I believe a lot of the msstylers, especially the younger ones, see themselves as rebellious rogues living out on the edge of society, and latch on to whatever is the accepted 'leet' paradigm. For the moment, that happens to be minimalistic lookalikes, at least in the msstyle side of the skinning world.
Draginol is probably right, in that it doesn't matter what it looks like, if it is on the 'approved for leet' list, they're prepared to defend it and extol it's virtues regardless of artistic appeal.

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HG_Eliminator

Join Date 07/2002

+354

yes i agree WC is one of the few sites left that is still a community of friends ( with a few nutz like me thrown in)...

but in general you go to many other sites and bamm theres no community feeling .. "its all about me .. screw the other guy" ..seems to be the common feeling at other sites ....

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I am still amazed at how popular clone skins are (even with WindowBlinds). I personally like skins that are original and at least trying for some kind of different look. Change the location of buttons, add extra features to the standard windows and definately change the look. But often when someone does this, they'll get the occasional complaint that it is hard to use or not the colours they would have chosen etc.

I thought this was the point of customization...

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Reaper: No kidding. That was the very reason I found the comment about design classes so idiotic. Here we have some basement dweller telling mormegil he needs to take design classes. The ignorance in the comment was nauseating.

WOM: Very true. It is always easier to tear something down than it is to go out and build something ourselves.

Exactly! Your entire post was spot on Draginol, and expressed the very frustration I have been feeling about the entire issue. Thanks.

Island Dog: I suppose it is just another example of what we see in the popular media. Music makes it big if it conforms to what is big at the moment. How many good PC games died after poor sales because they were original and innovative? Too many to count. Instead, it is just pumping out the same old stuff that gets the praise. Grrrr.

i81b4u-uc: I did the same thing. A coupe of years ago I got into the whole minimalistic, recolored Luna thing (for a few weeks I think

). It didn't take long until I was bored, bored, bored, so I uninstalled Style XP, deleted the themes and went back to Windowblinds. Thanks for the comment.

Solosturm: You are correct. It just blows my mind to see the drones over there (good name Brad!) snagging visual style after visual style, all the time berating WB, without realizing or caring about the fact that, for a really measly $20 I can download one and colorize to my hearts content. I can gray-scale, adjust the gamma, and even (very easily) make the sking have a roll-up feature, go transparent, lock to stay on top and any number of other things.

Thanks for the comments all.

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There ARE people that accepts 'Different' as long it's down the same 'different' route as before. They just don't accept truly different things.

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There ARE people that accepts 'Different' as long it's down the same 'different' route as before. They just don't accept truly different things.

Sad, but oh so true. Once that different thing has become de modo, they will accept all the different they can get. Great observation.

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GreenReaper

Join Date 05/2001

+32

Well, it may be, but then the skin author needs to make it easy for the user to customize. People wouldn't be so annoyed at all the skins with buttons in odd places if there was an option to have them in the "right" place (for Windows).

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I generally put the 'normal' buttons in the 'correct' place. But when you add extra buttons, how can they be in the wrong place? They were never in the 'correct' place to start with

I guess in that case all you can do is create a substyle that doesn't include the extra buttons for those that fear change

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I have to say in my opinion the Christmas theme is ugly

You know, I don't really have a problem with people not liking it. Of course we all have our own different opinions on what we think looks good. However, what pissed me off the most was the total lack of respect for the skill and effort that went into creating the theme. And there was obviously none of that in the Neowin post. Not liking is fine, disrespecting when chances are pretty good you couldn't even come close is another thing entirely.

what happened to skinners supporting each other? i remember when we were a tight knit community that got excited over the new and unusual...now it seems the conformists have taken over...

I haven't been involved in the community long enough to really know about the history. But I can say that I really do still get that feeling of community at Wincustomize. There are so many different types of skins made, and much of the comments and criticism really is constructive to help the skinner make the next project better. That sense of community is always heartening to see.

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GreenReaper

Join Date 05/2001

+32

My point was more related to skins that have the original buttons in nonstandard positions, like on the top left rather than the top right.

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I believe a lot of the msstylers, especially the younger ones, see themselves as rebellious rogues living out on the edge of society, and latch on to whatever is the accepted 'leet' paradigm. For the moment, that happens to be minimalistic lookalikes, at least in the msstyle side of the skinning world.

I hadn't thought about that. But it is an excellent observation. Thinking back, it really does sort of have this feeling of rebellion to it, even though they seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are all following along in some blind herd sort of mentality.

"its all about me .. screw the other guy" ..seems to be the common feeling at other sites ....

It is a shame as well. There have been some skinning sites that have popped up (populated by a lot of the regulars from WC) that are working to change that some, at least it seems that way to me. I think a real sense of community is one of the best things that could happen to OS customization. But I suppose the bitter reactions from multiple sides about widget apps is probably indicative of the loss of community out there. Hopefully we can keep above that.

And, yes, I have way too much free time at work today to not only write this article, but respond to all the comments.

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I thought this was the point of customization...

You would think so, wouldn't you? You are right, there can be a lot of similarity in the WB skins as well. Gratefully, there is also a lot of originality there as well. Helps to keep things fresh.

You make being a basement dweller sound like a bad thing

I suppose it always isn't. Perhaps I should have taken into consideration who lived on the top floor.

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2415

From a technical point of view, uxtheme.dll is essentially the WindowBlinds 2.x engine stripped down and integrated into XP. So they're essentially using an older "WindowBlinds LITE".

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Ah - sorry about that

It's just that I've received comments in regards to my extra buttons being in the wrong place.

In that case I think that offering a substyle with the standard buttons in the standard position is a good idea. That way you have offered originality and normality for those that prefer it

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Not only is stylexp not going anywhere anymore but if you go go tgtsoft's site, the forum is gone and they offer no support for it anymore. So it looks like they have realized that a modified uxtheme has won. It amazes me how people ripped on the unorthodox skinpack at neowin but when someone releases a longhorn clone, everyone is quick to download it. VS in general today lack the originality from when XP 1st appeared and when WB became mainstream. Everything seems to become cookie cutter themes that lack thought and personality.

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I think it is ridiculous that they thought they could make it by charging for something that was (and always should have been IMO) free. It doesn't surprise me in the least.

And I agree, anything that has some personality is lambasted over there. You don't even need to read the comments, they are always the same, memorized lines of crap.

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I like the Luna look, but the .msstyles produced are mostly crap. Perhaps that's why really good ones, such as Reluna, garner so much attention. Meanwhile, literally hundreds of skins on the WindowBlinds side are of that caliber.
People might have had an actual reason to prefer StyleXP and the msstyle format over WindowBlinds before, but considering how much it can do now (even I, somebody who's very anal about the tiniest button, am in awe of how much it skins these days), it's simply denial.

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