Or member.

I still feel, Master Skin's should be posted 'here' first and be exclusive to the sight for a short period before posting anywhere else. I understand that part of making someone a Master is to 'give back' to the skinner as it were..but if the share that WC gets for each sale is really going into running the site, the skins should be exclusive to the site for a period of time.

The ' or member ' part was to be just a 'given' Besides most of us that are here a lot would have already known that Harmony was a master skin.

The part about a Master skin being released on WC first was I believe, the initial intent when it first was written about by Frogboy. I recall reading about it - but , since the initial introduction of the sale of Master skins that has changed.
If you read the final post by Master Skinner Z71 on the " Never Mind " thread - he has written that he has had an email discussion about this with Stardock and while they would 'prefer' that a Master skin be released exclusively on WC - they realize this may not always be possible.

So, as much as I agree with you on that aspect Po' they call the shots on that.

And I have only one squiggle yet its misspelled constantly...

Because it's EVIL!

I read the first 2 or 3 posts, skimmed the next few then skipped the rest. Quite ridiculous that something as insignificant as this is being argued over. It's not like some middle east peace treaty fell through, or someone has the cure for cancer and won't share it.

Some skins are free
Some free skins are by Masters
Some skins cost money
Some skins can be gotten here at WC
Some skins need to be gotten offsite
As long as they are produced by members of this community for members of this community they are community skins.

It would be polite for the artists (or news reporters) to be clear on what is what (free @ WC, pay @ WC, free offsite, pay offsite, part of a mixed suite) but I don't think it critical.

There is no bait an switch here.  There was just a uniformed user base.  I still don't believe we need hard and fast rules here; just a little forethought and lessons learned by precedent.

But what do I know . . I can barely type.   

You said it  

I do understand the problem of definition we're having here.  What I think needs to be understood is that to some extent, definitions shift over time, especially in the online space.

Heavy Equipment is the ultimate Community Skin project that everyone points back to because of its scale.  And the recent Halloween project from theAVMAN and crew.  These are great projects and should definitely be held up as some of the best examples of what can be achieved when members of the community come together to work on something.

But to be a community effort, a skin or set of skins put together by multiple members of the skinning community, it doesn't necessarily have to strictly adhere to how those two projects were handled.

Does it have to be an open invitiation to everyone?  No.  But the projects that do that will obviously be more successful and more fun for more people.

Does it have to accept anyone that wants to be involved?  No.  But those that do will likely be better for it.

Does every piece of it have to be free?  Again, no.  But those that are 100% free will have a more lasting impact on the community and be more fondly remembered.

Just like every skin is not created equal, the same is true for community projects.  And I'm not talking quality of artwork necessarily either.

My goal has been to bring focus to any efforts made by the community to do bigger and better things with skinning.  I see the MaxStyles sets as a wonderful example of what the community could be doing as far as skins and cooperation.  The fact that they get a lot of coverage is partly because not many other groups are stepping up and doing the same.  If 4 out of 5 group projects come from the same group, then 4 out of 5 news stories about group projects will be about them.

I originally hoped that by bringing attention to skin sets like Harmony, Whitefire2 etc that it would inspire and encourage more people to get together and work on more large projects like that.  Not that it would turn into anger or jealousy over being excluded/not invited to the party/not warned beforehand etc.

I also see a slippery slope with people asking us to start more narrowly defining what does and does not constitute community.  Clarification is one thing, but I do not for one second believe we should start to limit and scale down what we consider worthy of being labled as a community project, skin, effort, site etc.  The more inclusive, the more broad we are in what we consider community, the more inviting we are to newcomers.  The more encouraging we are to people who want to try something new.  We're here to grow skinning and the skinning community, not whittle it down to fit the desired definition of any one user.

Zoomba, I read your post twice. Well said.

Yeah, thanks for clarification Zoomba.

Yep zoomba hit the nail on the head with the last paragraph,because even i at first thought when i saw this thread that kitty made a valid ponit coz i had'nt seen any topic or advert that members were wanted to help build a suite etc now after a couple of days of think'n what my def of a community skin might be (applied quite liberally of course) decided that it can be two or more people either from an established group or not, now everyone else can make up there own minds as what defines a community skin, bought or free or both

Wrong... at least five, minimum.

Yep...

So sorry Jafo  

I am not a skinner in any way shape or form, but I am a long time visitor to this site and an enthusiastic user of many of the skins available on here. I've followed this thread with interest and find it incredulous that so much rhetoric has come out of such a small and imo petty comment. However I am pleased to see Zoombas post which speaks so much sense. I hope that the skinners involved can sort out their difficulties and continue to provide us mere users with many more Solo, Combined, Community 'call them what you will' skins