Frogboy Frogboy

Discouraged. Is our community as we know it coming to an end?

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Discouraged. Is our community as we know it coming to an end?

from WinCustomize Forums

A large percentage of you who read this are already WinCustomize premium subscribers. You've already done your part to help this site keep going.

But I must say, things are grim this holiday season here. 2 expensive servers are down. We must get 2 new servers in here. We need to get another 2 servers on top of that for redundancy but that can wait a bit. But it's depressing knowing that millions visit this site each month and we've only gotten 156 new subscribers since the subscription drive began. It definitely makes a strong case that perhaps the days of free skins are over. That the skin authors and web masters, who pull their weight, should move towards a more commercial model that benefits primarily those who contribute (skinners, subscribers, and developers). 

My friend Scott (Jark) has much the same problems over at deviantART: http://news.deviantart.com/article/12039/

That is, the problem of having massive MASSIVE traffic but only a tiny fraction of those users paying the bill. Many people think, incorrectly, that massive traffic == money. It doesn't.

I can tell you, those of you who have purchased premium subscriptions here have helped the community in ways that the average user can't possibly fathom.  Premium subscribers combined with the volunteer efforts of this site's administrators (Jafo, Boxxi, DavidK, Treetog, Alexandrie, Kaosati, MikeB, Hippy, and others) are what keep things going.

Without the premium subscriptions, I can tell you right now what would happen.  This site would slowly morph into being a purely Stardock oriented site with bandwidth caps for all users (including Object Desktop users - though theirs would be higher). Support for non-Stardock sections would slowly disappear or be restricted to subscribers only.  The wallpaper section would only be available to those who either have a wallpaper on there that got accepted or subscribers (in all these exaples, anyone with apprentice access or higher would be treated as a subscriber).

There would be banner ads, and things would become vastly more commercial. Instead of a free Christmas suite, it would be a $8 Christmas suite. Instead of free skins, a new system would b eput in place to allow authors to sell their skins as part of te library once they had achieved a certain access level. One-click purchasing by users with the skin authors getting a percent.

That is the commercialized future of skinning. The alternative. It's not necessarily dark and evil. But it is a much different world than what we have now. I suspect many skin authors out there would jump at the chance of being able to get paid for their skins.

I've posted for years that our community is made up of 3 co-equal groups: The skinners, the web masters, and the users.  We webmasters are doing everythign we can.  The skinners have done their part.  The users have to do their part as a collective.  Which means of the 75,000 unique visitors this site gets each day, 500 more of them need to contribute back too.  As the alternative to voluntarily helping will be paying bits and pieces here and there for skins and themes.  The alternative is a smaller community, a more commercialized community but a sustainable one too.

Personally, I hope some balance can be found. While some people think we represent the commercialization of skinning, in reality, we don't. We simply want...must find a sustainable model that allows our community to grow.  We have all seen the instability Deskmod, Skinz.org, and even Customize.org have faced.  The site has grown beyond what Stardock can pay for via Object Desktop sales.  While Stardock's revenue has grown, the traffic to this site has DOUBLED this year.

Like I said, a large percentage of you have already done your part. There's nothing more you can do.  But hopefully, the millions of people who come to this site will have some infintesible number of them that recognize that someone has to pay for all this stuff. 

The end of the year may end up being the end of this site as we know it. Those new machines will be purchased one way or the other. But if Stardock ends up having to pay for any of those two new machines, it's going to come with strings attached. Ones that will certainly benefit subscribers but the casual users of the world will probably not like.

95,872 views 522 replies
Reply #326 from WinCustomize Forums Top
no, visitor/registered user hasn't paid a thing
Reply #327 from WinCustomize Forums Top
#319 by The DJ - 12/11/2003 11:42:48 PM

i was giving sugestions as to a way to limit dls.. i wasent sure on the variables like if it was weekly daily or total. so put it at a 8 meg total cap then...i thought it ws a weekly cap.. i wouldnt know since ive always been a level 3 til recently .. iv never had a cap to know

Elemental: Reforged
Reply #328 from WinCustomize Forums Top
a level 2 is a registerd user but not a subscriber or a stardock customer .. stardock cust is level 3 .. no caps .. subscriber is level 4 .. no caps ..
[Message Edited]
Reply #329 from WinCustomize Forums Top
IPlural: I see where you are coming from. My point was that there was a level of comfort until the servers went down. Perhaps WC should first be returned to that level, and one that directs every downloader to a place where they have to decide to buy or not. As it stands, you never need to make the decision.

Here is how I see it.

- If the unregistered downloads are stopped, a certain percent of those people won't register, and will wander off. They weren't gonna contribute monetarily anyway.

- The rest will register, and some will eventually hit the cap.

- Of these, some will subscribe, and others will leave, and some will cheat. In this step, you have spurred subscription, reduced traffic, and at least gotten the remaining freeloaders in a less anonymous place that you can, perhaps, find a way to control.


It is possible that if enough new people are forced to site-register, and some of these eventually subscribe, Stardock might benefit enough to be comfortable with the expense without implementing further changes. I think many just never consider subscribing because they have an unlimited amount of free skins.

I guess what I am saying is why not finish the drive, get the servers up, bar unregistered users from the libraries, and then see if the expense is still prohibitive? If the drive buys the servers, we are back where we were, right?




Reply #330 from WinCustomize Forums Top

I guess what I am saying is why not finish the drive, get the servers up, bar unregistered users from the libraries, and then see if the expense is still prohibitive? If the drive buys the servers, we are back where we were, right?

I think Baker got it in a nutshell...

Reply #331 from WinCustomize Forums Top
BakerStreet: sounds like a solid plan to me and along with some of the other incentives to promote with positives that have been suggested it very well could be a total solutions or as close as will be reachable...

I really think there are some very good ideas in this thread which could amke a huge difference if filtered through for the keepers and applied in the right way with the correct timing...
Reply #332 from WinCustomize Forums Top
well all i can say is that i hope the drive goes as planned ..id hate to see the site change content ...
Reply #333 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I think anything *positive* will be great, like new content for subscribers and such, but I am not certain at this point that anything prohibitive should be enacted until the dust settles. If you furthur stratify legit user's status you could alienate some people that might have subscribed down the road.

If the drive proves anything, it shows that if you have them here, logged in and happy, you can spur them to contribute. It is Christmas, after all. A drive like this would be more productive when people have a bit more loose cash, maybe after tax-refund time in April or May. Perhaps a drive like this twice a year would be in order?

Plug the holes, get it floating, and then see if further changes are necessary.


[Message Edited]
Reply #334 from WinCustomize Forums Top
/me SHC comes out of the shadows

Well this seems to be a sticky wicket. I really dont know what to say about it, i like the idea of buying downloads like 10 gets you 100 mg or something like that. I havnt visted ina while and as a matter of fact still havnt purchased a subsciption which i need to do very badly, now that i havea job i can do so, so here comes my contribution.

This is an issue thats just gonna take time. This site has adapted in the past and will continue to do so. There is a way to fix the problem, could be free, could be subsciption service, whatever wincustomize does i will be behind it 100%
Reply #335 from WinCustomize Forums Top
maybe after tax-refund time in April or May.


what are you talking about? I file taxes in january and get my money back in january!
Reply #336 from WinCustomize Forums Top
the whole 2 dollars
Reply #337 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Auctally should be over a grand this yaer. gonna spend it all on a bicycle.
Reply #338 from WinCustomize Forums Top
maybe on a kona
I want a lightspeed.
Reply #339 from WinCustomize Forums Top
The hell with titanium, bends to easy.

Your right. A kona.

Back to topic!
Reply #340 from WinCustomize Forums Top
If you can afford $1000 for a bike you can afford a $20 subscription...
Reply #341 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Kona, in Canada, we have until the end of April to file out taxes, and most employers don't give you your T4's (tax papers) until March.
Reply #342 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Why not redirect the unregistered user to a download site where he/ she is blanketed with advertisments that bring in money for the site?
Reply #343 from WinCustomize Forums Top
#273 by BakerStreet
I think the best method available would be to offer a few sample skins and make the libraries available only to the site's registered users.


I tend to agree with this method. A wallpaper site that I have used has something like this and if I had wanted something bad enough I would have paid for it. They have a free section where you can download what you like but then the other sections are for members only. Visitors can still view what is in the other sections but they are not able to download and you can only enlarge the thumbnails to view better detail but not large enough to make use of the wall.
Link to site I am referring to http://www.digitalblasphemy.com/
Then I also have another though to add to that. Authors are kind of used to the number of downloads they get and they would definitely go down with a set up like the one above. So I was thinking, maybe have all the new additions available to everyone for a 2 day to one week period. That way people have the chance to get everything but they would really need to frequent the site. Through this method they may become part of the community and decided "like many others" that they would like to stay and pay for a subscription. Think about it, in a case for some, they may keep forgetting to come to the site often enough and end up missing things they really would have liked to have. It would be easier for them to just pay for the subscription then have to worry about missing anything.

Anyways, just my thoughts. good luck to Wincustomize/Stardock to what ever it is you may need to do to keep this site running properly.
Reply #344 from WinCustomize Forums Top
In addition, I would imagine that an extra front page for the site for non members explaining the new rules for the site. Also "hopefully" it could be set up that members do not have to view this front page every time and wait for an extra page to load.
Reply #345 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I've read this whole thread and comments like those made by paxx and elvee really disturb me. Unless I missed something they want to delay certain people's ability to download skins?!? As an ODNT subscriber for the past 4 or so years and a WC subscriber my user level is 4. I don't contribute skins to the site because I'm about as artistic as a rock and I'm colorblind to boot, however I do try to help out on the message boards when someone has a problem that I feel I can help with that hasn't already been answered by someone else. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I would consider myself an active member of this community and definitely not a troll or leech, and the idea of having to wait 7 days or even 24 hours in order to download a certain skin really ticks me off..

I personally like how digitalblasphemy.com is run in terms of members vs. non-members. The non-members site has only a small selection of things to choose from and they don't get the newest releases as soon as they come out. The members section has access to all of the latest releases more choices as far as resolution is concerned and a larger library to choose from. I know that this is not an apples to apples comparison but it's an idea for how separating the two sites could be used. I'm not sure whether there is any kind of limit to the amount that can be downloaded but there's probably a huge difference between offering only wallpapers and offering the variety of downloads that WC has..

Hopefully everything will work out for the best.

/me saunters off to contemplate renewing WC subscription a year early just to chip in what he can..
Reply #346 from WinCustomize Forums Top
f0r3 - I've read this whole thread and comments like those made by paxx and elvee really disturb me. Unless I missed something they want to delay certain people's ability to download skins?!?


this is a suggestion, but since you already have a wincustomize subscription it wouldnt effect you.

also, note that this is a suggestion from members of the community, rather than a statement from Stardock of what is going to happen.

there are a lot of ideas being thrown around here, and not all of them will become reality.



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Reply #347 from WinCustomize Forums Top

f0r3, I don't quite understand your post. First you say that you don't think non-members should have to wait to downlaod newest skins, then you say:

I personally like how digitalblasphemy.com is run in terms of members vs. non-members. The non-members site has only a small selection of things to choose from and they don't get the newest releases as soon as they come out.

??? That's pretty much exactly what I was suggesting, although I didn't suggest the small selection of things. Having non-subscribers wait 24 hours for newest releases, and having non-clients wait 7 days for newest releases is what I had in mind.

And again, I'm speaking as a user here. I'm not a Stardock employee and I have no more words on this than anybody else here. This is just my personal suggestion.

Reply #348 from WinCustomize Forums Top
paxx, actually it seemed to me that you were suggesting that all users with access level less than Apprentice (I think) should have to wait. Also, I absolutely think that non-members should be SEVERLY restricted in what they are able to do, but I don't think that SD customers should be considered non-members..

Here's an idea. How about if SD customers get unlimited or less-restricted access to the sections that are appropriate for the products they own. For example, if you own WB you have more access to the WB library than you do to the rest of the site. Now, I'm not sure how this would be handled for OD subscriptions but it's possibly an interesting way to give the folks who have purchased an SD product but not a WC subscription a little more than your average every day visitor to the site.

I realize that you aren't a representative of SD and I'm not upset at you or anyone else for suggesting solutions to this problem. I just felt that I needed to say something because if I remain silent I have no one but myself to blame if a process that I don't like becomes the new accepted process.

No hard feelings at all here, and I wasn't trying to single you out paxx it's just that you made the suggestion..
Reply #349 from WinCustomize Forums Top

What I said was a combination of levels and classes. I feel that people who contribute with their involvement are just as important than those who contribute financially.
So I suggested that people below Apprentice class AND people who never bough anything from Stardock (level 2) should wait 7 days before they can download new skins. I also suggested that non-subscriber (level 3) who are not class Journeymen and above should wait 24 hours.
Therefore a citizen who is level 3 would wait 24 hours only. A Journeyman who is level 2 would not wait at all. A citizen who is level 4 (subscriber) would not wait at all either. Etc.

Reply #350 from WinCustomize Forums Top
OK, I'm with ya.. Anyway, it seems like this may all be moot as the subscription drive looks as if it's going pretty good. almost half-way there and close to half-way through the month. Hopefully more people will step up. I'd really hate to have to go back to DA, their color scheme gives me a headache and I really can't read someportions of their site because of the colors. Red-Green colorblind + DA color scheme is not a good combination..

Take care all!