Shoutbox

I think skinning has died after the release of WLM 2009. Version 8.5 was so easy to skin and many found it difficult to skin the new Messenger. Personally, I was bored to try to learn again the whereabouts of each thing and skinning stopped being a pleasure for me.

Of course there are still skins for the new Messenger. But, they only change one picture and do not have the quality of the skins that were released for 8.5. They do not offer the options many skins had and certainly there are only a few designs that are good for WLM 2009.

I want your opinion on this matter. Do you think skinning will die, once and for all?

I think the skinning requests section should be removed. When was the last time this actually happened?

You should suggest that in the Forum & Website section.

I actually fulfilled a couple a while ago

Largely the requests are just for people wanting a skin of a particular person/band......and that can kinda be achieved through the same means as my SexySkin.....the couple I did were just kinda building on that framework and replacing the pictures of women for pictures of whatever had been requested.

I agree though, the skinning community certainly seems to have died down a bit.  It was quite a big task updating my skin for WLM 2009....obviously I thought it was worth it as I use the skin myself, but I can see why it would/has put a lot of people off.

Hopefully WLM10 will be easier to skin and look so bad people will take the time and skin it.

Well, i was thinking of making a skin called "MSN7 Clone" for WLM 9. Also i forgot to tell people here, that i've stop "WLM 8.5 Clone" skin.

Anyways, i decide to stop skinning until WLM 2010 comes out. If i start skinning again, wlm 2010 comes out. I have to update my skin.

Skinning community is dead because:

1. the new generation kids/teens have no interest
2. no one have time, school, job
3. too hard to skin, given up
4. lost interest
5. lazy

ps. Snow Leopard skin will be slowly convert to WLM 2010 once it comes out.

Most skinners, specially the good ones like Willz, are extremely busy with their personal lifes. And, unfortunately, there aren't that many people interested in making skins, only in requesting/using them.
I myself will have about 10 hours/day of free time, which about 5 will be for sleeping (because nobody's of steel =P), and clearly will not update any project of mine, be it my blog or a skin.

I think more people will eventually do something and start new skins, which includes learning new tricks, so that skinning doesn't die.

I had Life of Vista 3 in development...but I lost if after all the computers in my house died ._.

And coolzee does sum it up quite well. School is being intense and I kinda lost interest xD.

Most likely be back for at least one skin for WLM 2010 (I have to admit, all my WLM 2009 ones sucked.)

Like most things, without the developer base, projects just aren't going to be produced. Back in the day of MSN Messenger there were several developers of skins including myself. Names such as the unknown, Terill and Satin may not ring bells for some of you, but these developers were at the fore of innovative design in Messenger and have since moved onto other things.

The decline of IM in itself fails to attract new developers, and although the skinning platform is now more open, there is a lack of talent willing to exploit it. Windows Live Messenger 2009 has been the worse major Messenger build in terms of skinning developers and much of this boils down to the lack of designers who know what they are doing (excluding Willz).

Then again, it may be the case Windows Live Messenger is visually appealing enough for it to no longer warrant skins.

As for the above comment for the requests board, I believe it was primarily added so that all the requests wouldn't clutter the other threads. And I have just set the messageboard to hide that particular section.