Summer tends to be a slower time for skinning since people are, well, you know, outside.  Personally, the sun causes me to catch on fire. Or at least smolder and no one wants to deal with that.

This Summer, there's been some real gems. Which is pretty amazing since those bastards at Stardock have co-opted most of the skinning community this year to work on MyColors projects.  So without further delay, here are some of the cooler looking things I've seen this summer:

VStyler has really taken off this summer and became a Master skinner.  His Viena for WindowBlinds works on both Windows XP and Windows Vista and is one of our favorites this Summer. [Vienna]

Skinners from China dominated this year's GUI Championships. So it's not surprising that one of the coolest and most popular skins of the Summer came from China. [Metal Vista 3]

Onix from SKoriginals was one of the most original skins we've seen this Summer and it's also very usable as well. [Onix]

Fresh Attitude comes all the way from Russia via othersnow.  It makes great use of the glass features in WindowBlinds 5.  In WindowBlinds 6, users will be able to apply blur options to such skins which will make them even cooler! [Fresh Attitude]

Plasmatron AI isn't a new skin but the Summer update takes I.R. Braniac's highly original skin and makes it incredibly usable as well. It's a true work of art. [Plasmatron A.I.]

It has not been a very good summer for icons.  Making icons these days is a lot more work than it used to be. Now, icons are expected to be at least 128x128 (Vista expects 256x256 icons! That's about the full screen resolution of a decent LCD cell phone! For one icon!). But mkorashy's Edifice helped brighten up an otherwise slow summer in this area. A great icon package brought to you all the way from Egypt! [Edifice]

Webby's Over the Hills and Far Away comes to us all the way from Italy.  This incredibly cool wallpaper makes working inside almost bearable. [Over the hills and far away]

Boss's Pacifico can make one imagine that they're in a tropical paradise.  It's just a stunning wallpaper. [Pacifico]

Ixium Minor comes to us from AngelicJean in Australia. This is one of the most hauntingly beautiful wallpapers I've seen in years.  [Ixium Minor]

Summer is only half-way over and we've only covered skins, icons, and wallpapers. Stay tuned, more to come!

Our friends over at deviantART are celebrating their 7th birthday this week.  In 7 years, deviantART has become the world's largest art site on the Internet.   With over 40 million pieces of art on the site and rising, deviantART continues its explosive growth.

On behalf of everyone at WinCustomize.com and at Stardock, we wish deviantART a happy birthday! Congratulations!

Stardock is pleased to announce that the beta of SkinStudio 6 is now available for users of Object Desktop to try out and give feedback on.  SkinStudio 6 is a complete re-design from scratch of SkinStudio. 

With a totally new user interface and completely different design philosophy, SkinStudio is designed to make skinning much less labor intensive and welcoming to new skinners.  Check out the linked to preview guide for a taste of what's in it.

SkinStudio UI.

With SkinStudio 6, combined with the upcoming WindowBlinds 6, users can expect a whole new era in skinning thanks to the drastically reduced amount of effort involved in getting into skinning as well as the amount of work necessary to create outstanding looking skins.

Whether it be talking with friends, relatives, or just casual acquaintences, if the subject of politics comes up, I have noticed very specific behavior patterns between those who tend to be left of center politically versus those who are right of center. 

There are plenty of things that annoy me about political conservatives too but not as consistently as "regular" people who are politically left. The list below is not a list of annoyances of politicans or public figures but rather traits of left of center people I have met in real life that seems to come up over and over.

So here's my list of things that bother me about dealing with political leftists:

1. Choose their positions based on emotion and passion rather than through research or investigation
2. Rarely look up for themselves the underlying facts on a given issue but rather rely on "trusted" advisors or editorials
3. Are very intolerant of views that do not match theirs. I don't think I've ever seen a conservative say "I don't want to hear anymore, let's talk about something else".  by contrast, over and over, liberals will (at best) ask you to change the subject because they don't want to hear other points of view or (at worst) try to bully you from giving an opposing point of view.
4. Act as if their positions have some sort of moral high ground simply because their positions are based on "good intentions".
5. Similar to #4 -- take the view that their position is the "civilized" or "moderate" point of view. And that other points of view are simply barbaric "Of course guns should be outlawed" or "You didn't vote for Kerry? You seem like such a smart guy."
6. Have no knowledge of the tax system even as they loudly advocate higher taxes on "the rich". There's nothing quite like seeing a 3rd grade teacher espousing how the rich pay hardly anything in taxes even as they are talking to someone they know pays immense amounts of taxes (because I usually make sure to correct this falacy).  And I usually get "Then you need to get a better accountant" as if they have any concept of the tax structure.  Oh yes, I'll just use the magic loopholes that liberals are so certain exist and avoid taxes...
7. Think that feeling strongly about something counts more than actually doing something.  My $1k contribution to the Cancer Society isn't as significant as someone who did a "Cancer walk" and got $315 in donations apparently.  And btw, it's nice to do a cancer walk, it's even nicer to donate money yourself. Walking, chanting, whatever may make you feel but but it does nothing. It's the people donating to the cause materially that are actually making a material difference.
8. Think that witty sarcasm is a substitute for a coherent argument for their position.  How many times have you made a point only to have a left winger try to dismiss it with a one-line sarcasm "Of course we armed Osama, I guess we got what we paid for.."  That's a non sequitor and stupid to foot.  But knowing little irrelevant pseudo-factoids is not a substitute for knowledge on the actual issue.  It really comes to a head if Iraq comes up. Most anti-Iraq "war" advocates can't put together a coherent argument against it.
9. Massively inconsistent, simple minded positions. There's nothing quite like having a friend in Southern California say "Wars never solved anything".  Really?  You plan to argue that southern California should go back to Mexico?  Because there was one war (US/Mexican) that most definitively and materially solved a particular question. Not to mention the Civil War and slavery, World War I, World War II, Korea, and Gulf War I.  Or some middle class person living in a house in Florida that they inherited from their father arguing for higher estate taxes (why wait? why not hand your house to the government right now?). Or my favorite "There's no excuse for anyone to go hungry in this country." as an argument for more welfare.  I agree there's no excuse, only a total dumbass could go hungry in this country. Welfare ain't gonna fix that. 
10. Problems are always to be solved by someone else.  To left wingers, being compassionate seems to mean being intellectually concerned about people but not wanting to actually do anything.  My uncle, a conservative, drove down to Louisiana as part of his church group to repair people's houses.  Meanwhile, not a single liberal I know has volunteered for anything but they sure have argued for more government spending on Katrina relief -- which is easy for them, I end up paying for it.
11. Believe in equality unless equality is inconvenient.  I try not to flaunt my material success but at the same time,  I am proud of what my family has achieved.  My wife and I started with nothing (and btw, yes you can live on minium wage -- I did).  But if I object to paying more in taxes, I am called greedy by some of my liberal friends.  If I ask if they want to compare how much they donated to charity last year (not taxes, charity) they always come back with the "well you have more to give" argument.  So what?  And I've even tried to do the "Okay, then as a percentage of our income comparison" I still get the "we don't have as much excess money to give as you do" argument.  And on taxes, even though I use the same roads, schools, police, etc. and pay literally over 50X more in taxes than most people and support progressive taxation, I still get implied arguments that I don't want to pay my fair share if I object to paying even more in taxes.
12. Obsess on diversity of skin color instead of diversity of ideas.  What is it with the left and their obession with skin color? Yet, as I mentioned earlier, liberals are incredibly intolerant of other ideas. They want to live in an echo chamber. Most conservatives I know enjoy a good intelligent discussion.  Most liberals get angry and frustrated with people who dare to have different (or incorrect) opinions.  I have one friend named Chris who is liberal who is the exception to this (so if he's reading, kudos to him) who will intelligently and thoughtfully discuss issues without getting angry.  I can't think of any liberal friend or relative who doesn't get angry and frustrated if confronted with opinons that don't match theirs.

Like I said, these are observations on public speakers. These are observations on friends, family, acquaintences that I meet and talk to.  I am often almost made to feel like I should be ashamed for having conservative..uncivilized view points. If only I were as enlightened like them and used my heart more I would be ready to be welcomed into their civilized society.

While on vacation, I read the last Harry Potter book.  It was very difficult to wait until vacation to read it given the challenges of avoiding spoilers.  I actually received spam that listed who died in the book.  I only read the first couple lines so it wasn't completely spoiled but it is amazing how loathsome some people are.

I don't want to give anything away in the book but I felt it did a fine job tying up loose ends and giving readers a satisfactory and even surprising conclusion.  There are a lot of deaths in the book, far more than I thought there'd be but it also gave a great emotional pay off as well since we had come to know many of these characters very well over the years.

I'm sad to see the series end but glad that it ended while it was still strong.  I hope J.K. Rowlings writes more books as her writing talents are just amazing and seem to get better and better.

I recently got the results back on a routine cholesterol check. eGads, I'm dying.  My total cholesterol was 260 which isn't great but the really awful number was the HDL "Good" cholesterol number -- 19.  Any amount lower than 40 is considered bad and normal is 60 or higher.  At 19, I'm at the 1%tile of HDL.

Unlike bad cholesterol, good cholesterol is hard to improve.  Diet has little effect on it.  Excercise can help and there are some natural suplements that may help (like flax seed oil) but other than that, there's not too much one can do to easily improve it.

Since I got the results late last month, I've been dieting and excercising.  I've lost 10 pounds (I'm now162 -- well into my ideal weight area), cut out most red meat, significantly lowered how many eggs I eat (I confess, I ate a boiled egg a day), reduced fast food dramatically.  In another 2 months, I'll be going back in for a re-evaluation to see what sort of prescriptions I should be put on. 

My blood pressure is 110 over 70 so I'm doing well there. I don't smoke. I'm not overweight.  The only theory my doctor and I have come up with is that Acutane, which I was on for a few months about 10 years ago, did something to my liver.  Unfortunately, I hadn't had my cholesterol taken since that time period.  Before I had gone on Acutane, my cholesterol was normal (total cholesterol was 125, don't know what the HDL was other than it was in the normal range). My diet since then is much better than it used to (I used to live on Whoppers practically).  I don't know if it was Acutane or not I just don't know what other things might have changed for things to have gone to hell.

But either way, I have been feeling a lot more energetic since excercising more.  I've been walking roughly 4 miles every other day which is enjoyable. And while I wasn't overweight before, the weight loss has made me feel better and I think look better (my face was starting to get a little full).

I've taken vacations in the past but never anything like the vacation I'm on.  It's pure duration.  Even when I've gone to Disney World, it's been a 5 or so day trip with 2 of those days traveling.

But this year, for the first time since I've had a company, I've taken a serious vacation -- 10 straight days (2 of them traveling).  What a difference a few extra days can make. 

I don't know about you, but for me, the first 72 hours of a vacation are spend decompressing.  It's as if all the tension and stress come pouring out during that time.  Only after those 72 hours am I really ready to start building back up my state of mind.

While I have traditionally worked on average 55 hours a week (40 to 50 in the nice weather months, 60 to 80 in the winter months), I don't consider myself a workaholic. I just enjoy what I do.  But having had some time to relax, I can really feel my focus and drive returning. 

That said, I think next year I will try for a 12 to 14 day vacation and see how that works.

As some of you may have heard, there's been massive flooding in the UK.  This is affecting two of our developers which is likely to result in a slight delay in the WindowBlinds 6 beta on Object Desktop. The new projected date is next week for both SkinStudio 6 and WindowBlinds 6 betas.  The picture on the right was taken by a WindowBlinds developer.

The betas of WindowBlinds 6 and SkinStudio 6 will be available exclusively to users who have Object Desktop.

In the meantime, here's a screenshot of WindowBlinds 6 Alpha running on Windows XP (note the blur effects).

We're already a month into Summer. Can you believe that? The year is gong by so fast.  Some of you may recall at the end I wrote a long flame against Stardock and how it (we) failed the skinning community.  I raised 4 points:

1. Awful documentation
2. Lack of support for skinners
3. Lack of community support
4. Lack of leadership

So where do things stand since then?

 New documentation is in the works and the launch of Wiki.wincustomize.com has allowed Stardock, WinCustomize, and the skinning community to pool resources to put together info on not just Stardock software but everyone else's too in a single combined place.

SkinStudio, is being rewritten from scratch as you saw in the recent preview to provide better support for skinners.  Moreover, the program will integrate into the Wiki so that people can give each other tips and help on particular sections.

Lack of leadership is harder to quantify. My beef was that we weren't being proactive enough in the community.  What we've done this year is bring Jafo on full-time and Zoomba is now full time on WinCustomize also.  Moreover, this year we formed Stardock Design which incorporates the staffs of Pixtudio and SkinPlant together with Stardock's own team.  It's like the Dream team of skinning. The results from Stardock Design will hit high gear later this year with some big announcements coming up.

We also recently opened up a new data center in Troy Michigan which, upon completion of the migration, should make WinCustomize substantially faster than it is today.

That isn't to say the road have been bump free. The forums always remain a challenge and while WinCustomize 2007's design was a big improvement over the previous one, we are looking forward to the WinCustomize 2008 design created by Stardock Design which will have a much better look.  And I am also looking forward to WindowBlinds 6 which is the first version of WindowBlinds in which the skinners were given the opportunity to come up with features they'd like to have rather than just the development team. There are some really kick ass new features going into WindowBlinds 6.

As for traffic, thanks to Google Analytics, we can monitor that much better.  The site gets 12% more page views than last year and about 5% more unique visitors.  This would indicate that skinning continues to grow in popularity and the site's faster performance (relative to the old site, the current site is still too slow IMO) is encouraging people to stay longer and look at more stuff. 

Probably the biggest challenge right now is the stratification of the Windows market.  Windows XP has a whopping 83% of the site's traffic now (Vista only 15%).  Windows Vista really is a big improvement. But migration has not been as fast as the migration to XP was.  So all new development has to keep this fact in mind.  That's why WindowBlinds 6 is getting killer goodies for XP like glass blurring and hardware-assisted animation (Vista skins get these as well).