The reason I asked you to post your email to me here is because my reply might also be interesting to others. So, first of all, thanks for posting it here.
Skinning and Windows customization have a story behind it, dating all the way back to the 90's and WinAmp (remember it?). We're talking Windows 95/98 days.
WinAmp, the free MP3 media player, was, as far as I can remember, the first Windows application that allowed you to make skins for it. The default skin was, in my opinion, pretty awful (eheh) so many users took up the challenge and came up with thousands of different skins for it, some of them really mind blowing, especially for the time.
Back then things were a lot simpler and there was tremendous room for improvement. Windows crashed a lot, Explorer used quite a bit of resources (offering only basic functionality) and RAM sticks were really expensive - which left room for alternate, more efficient and customizable, shells like LiteStep (and others).
I remember how Litestep was really popular when Winstep entered the scene, sometime around 1998 (yes, almost 20 years ago!). It had thousands of enthusiastic active users, most of them nerds since Litestep was not exactly easy to configure or install.
As you can figure out from the names (Litestep, Winstep) a major source of inspiration for all of us was Steve Job's incredible
NeXTSTEP OS, which he put together after being booted off Apple. It was incredibly far ahead of its time, and it was gorgeous! While Windows was still shoving horrible 16 color 16x16 and 32x32 icons down our throats, NeXTSTEP featured amazing 48x48 256 color icons, each icon a small work of art!
All Windows docks are also derivations from the original dock in NeXTSTEP (and later the dock in OSX).
At that time Stardock had also already made the switch from its OS/2 roots to Windows, in order to survive as a company after the crash of IBM's OS/2. WindowBlinds was still in beta (and remained so for a very long time) but it already allowed you to change the title bars and frames of windows.
There were lots of sites and forums dedicated to skinnable applications and Windows customization (Skinz.org, Customize.org, DeviantArt, etc...). Even though it was a relatively small community at the time (niche, even!) it was *thriving*.
Not a day passed by without a new skin being uploaded for the most popular skinnable applications. NextSTART (the first application released by Winstep) was among those - in fact, many skinners that later moved on to making professional skins for WindowBlinds started with NextSTART: Treetog, Essorant, etc...
Most of those original themes were unfortunately lost when the Skinz.org and eFront scandal broke (old timers will know what I am talking about) and most skinners removed their skins from the Skinz.org catalog. You should see some of those early NextSTART themes made by Treetog, though - they were terrible eheh! Yet, he later became one of the best skinners around - which shows nobody should ever be shy or ashamed of their early works... we all have to start somewhere!
Anyway, the demise of Skinz.org, at the time the most popular skins repository website, left a vacuum that was quickly filled by Stardock's Wincustomize.org. This, together with the popularity and lack of competition enjoyed by WindowBlinds, allowed Stardock to elevate skinning and Windows customization from a niche market to mainstream, bringing in many new users.
Unfortunately there is a downside to every good thing. On one side, the new users, unlike the old community, were mostly NOT interested in making skins. The new found popularity of skinning also led to a boom in skinnable applications, which further fragmented the market and prevented most Windows customization companies and developers from reaching 'critical mass'. The ratio of skinners vs. regular users took a deep dive and the few skinners that existed were all divided between a large number of skinnable applications.
Most of the original skinners still concentrated on WindowBlinds though, but in the mean time the difficulty and complexity of making WindowBlinds skins was growing exponentially (because Windows too was getting more complex, which much more to skin besides title bars and window frames). While before you could come up with a new WindowBlinds skin in just a handful of hours, making a proper WindowBlinds skin now took *weeks*. It was no longer fun, it became a chore, which explains the further decline in skinners.
Skinning WindowBlinds now required so much effort and time that it was only natural for the hard core skinners to start charging money for their skins. If you do the work and spend the hours, it's only fair you get some compensation for it.
The release of Windows XP almost spelled doom for WindowBlinds and Stardock, as Microsoft intended to make their own native themes engine (basically a copy of what WB already did). WindowBlinds was only saved because at the last moment Microsoft decided to keep their themes engine closed and only allow Windows to run themes digitally signed by Microsoft.
This decision came about because a badly made Windows theme could easily crash the OS, potentially creating a tech support nightmare - with users likely blaming Microsoft and not the theme.
Despite this, somebody figured out that they could still use Microsoft's own skinning engine by illegally patching a Windows DLL to by-pass the digital signature requirement - and thus StyleXP was born, the only real 'competitor' WindowBlinds ever had. Competitor between quotes because all StyleXP did was patch a DLL, there was no know-how or effort behind it, unlike with the real McCoy that was WindowBlinds.
And then Windows Vista came out.
With all its problems, Vista (as well as its successor, Windows 7, which is just Vista 2.0) was undoubtedly the best looking version of Windows *ever*. There was eye candy everywhere you looked.
I remember how mad I was at Microsoft for breaking compatibility with so many applications on Vista (there are a
handful of posts in the Articles section regarding this), but at the same time I couldn't help but admire how good the new Windows version now looked.
Personally I think the release of Vista and Windows 7 mark the exact time Windows customization and skinning in general started dying.
Windows was finally so good looking that most third party WindowBlinds skins actually made it look *worse*. And even if they actually improved on the look, Aero was already 'good enough'.
'Good enough' in an OS usually spells the death of many 3rd party applications that rely on improving a particular aspect of it. If something is 'good enough' and comes with the OS (and is therefore free) why pay good money for something else that might only marginally improve on what is already there? You don't.
And thus here we are. Litestep, AstonShell, Talisman and all the alternate shells are dead (Explorer is good enough these days). Other than Nexus, all the other Windows docks are dead too or haven't been updated in over 2 years.
All the once extremely popular skinning sites and customization forums now look like ghost towns, where you can almost hear the wind blowing between the ruins of what were once tall proud buildings. DeviantArt has turned completely around from being a Windows customization site into a general art site (good decision, since it *thrives* on that) and even the mighty Wincustomize is but a shadow of what it once was.
Stardock still thrives, but only because it turned into games, which was always Brad Wardel's (Stardock's CEO and owner) real passion.
So, getting back on topic, now you might understand a bit better why so many skinners charge for their work these days. And you're also right, it does take away some of the joy in it - but then, what joy would there be if skinning WB became so complex that it now takes weeks to design a single skin? Luckily Winstep themes definitely do not fall into that category!
Also, there is a question of quality. If you're paying money for something, you have the right to expect and demand quality and attention to detail. You can't do that if the skin is free.
Not many of you know, but some of the best Winstep skins currently being offered for free (DarkTech, LightTech and Evolve) were actually work commissioned for - and paid by - Winstep. I wanted to raise the bar and show what was possible if you went the extra mile.