Well, just a short while ago, we crossed the 500th listener to Episode 1, and this morning we were listed on the iTunes Podcast directory (you can even search for us).  Not bad for a 30min deal we barely managed to put together in time for Monday! Tonight we're going to record Episode 2 and we'd like to get a few listener questions for the session. Episode 2 will just be Island Dog and myself, as we haven't had a chance to line up any skinners just yet.  So keep that in mind whe...

Island Dog is back with yet another Screencast.  This time he takes users through the paces with MyColors.  He talks about the differences between MyColors and Object Desktop 2007, how to download, install and apply themes.  In the demo he shows off Diamond, the free theme that comes with MyColors and talks about some of the other themes you can snag here . If you're curious about what MyColors is and how it works, head on over and check out the video .

It's always fun, and a bit eye-opening to see what's currently the most popular content on WinCustomize.  Here's a sampling of the most popular stuff over the last 30 days... These aren't all of them, and they're not really in any order, I just picked out ones that caught my eye.  And yes, that is Eminence, a 2006 skin, still in the most popular list.&nbs...

Good afternoon!  Things are kind of slow in terms of skinning news today so I thought it would be fun for folks to share what their desktops look like right this second.  No cleaning up icons, closing out windows etc. to make a pretty clean shot.  I want stuff that's cluttered and lived-in.  What does your desktop look like right at this moment as you're surfing this story? Here's mine... On the desktop: Windows Live Mesh Tech Preview, Fireworks CS3, iTunes (Playi...

Turns out that Microsoft hasn't completely forgotten Windows Vista Ultimate users.  Released with no fanfare or press, you can now grab a soundpack with two new system sound schemes for Vista, and a package of DreamScenes from Windows Update. Could this mean that the Ultimate Extras program is back from the dead?

In case you haven't checked it out yet, you can now grab a copy of MyColors , complete with the Diamond theme from Download.com. This is pretty cool since MyColors is the featured download on the site today.  This means skinning is getting some very high profile exposure right now, with users downloading and trying out customized UIs for the first time. MyColors works on both Windows XP and Vista.  It's a great solution for users who want to just press a button and have a compl...

Yesterday, we posted Episode 1 of the WinCustomize Skincast .  While the reaction on the thread has been positive, we'd like to get some numbers around actual opinion.  Since polls are anonymous, we'll probably get slightly more honest feedback, and give those who were afraid to post negative comments on the thread an opportunity to share their views. So go ahead, vote on the poll, and feel free to share any critical feedback on the podcast with us.  If you don't want to post ...

Media Players seem to be a fading thing lately with the onslaught of iTunes over the last few years.  Unfortunately, iTunes is locked up pretty tight and themes are very hard to come by/create.  Well, if you're still craving a customizable media player, WinCustomize has you covered with skins for WinAmp , Windows Media Player , and the relatively new but super-easy to skin Xion . Here are some great media player skins to get you started... WinAmp ...

Hey, remember that poll about whether or not you ever listened to the PowerUser.TV or Under The Skin?  Well, that was a bit of a prelude to a project Island Dog and I have been working on.  After some technical glitches, a lot of slip-ups and other complications we're finally ready to unveil the WinCustomize Skincast! Where PU.TV was a longer podcast that covered a lot of topics, and UTS was a very infrequent podcast that came up with a new episode every few months, SkinCast aims t...

PowerUser.TV and UnderTheSkin were two moderately successful podcasts run by Stardock/members of the community that covered everything from skinning to tech news and gaming.  However, both are more or less dead now, with PU.TV going off the air at the end of 2006, and UTS hasn't had an episode for well over a year. Last week's poll was to see if you listened to them, and if you did how you liked them.  Turns out that the overwhelming majority of you who voted said you didn't watch t...

I had an absolutely wonderful 3-day weekend, and now I'm recharged and ready to tackle the week.  To start with, here are my picks for some of the best content uploaded to WinCustomize over the weekend.  While it was nice, sunny and warm out and everyone was probably enjoying the start of Spring, these folks were working on, and uploading skins for you to enjoy. InitRegions(); ...

Community member wulfn1 this morning posted a detailed and lengthy review of a handful of skins recently posted that she found interesting.  In her review she talks about skins ranging from I.R. Brainiac's phenomenal Rogue Proton Gold skin to great wallpapers by inception8, a soundpack by RobJK and a "quirky" IconPack by KerLoong. This is the sort of article I come to WinCustomize every day hoping to see.  It's one thing for me, Island Dog, or the moderators to point out cool sk...

ObjectDock is one of those incredibly useful tools that can help you organize your mess of icons and start menu shortcuts into something simple and easy to manage.  But often when you add an application to a dock, you see some ugly, pixelated icon that just doesn't fit with the beautiful aesthetic of your desktop.  The problem is that most application icons, at least prior to Windows Vista, are small and don't scale well at all.  To help with that, we accept high-quality applicat...

If I had to pick three things that Stardock is incredibly good at, of course I'd start off with skinning/desktop experience software like WindowBlinds, IconPackager etc, and then I'd have to say PC strategy games.  But those two sit on top of our third strength; community building. We've taken the lessons learned from WinCustomize, and Brad's own years of running BBSes "back in the day" and applied them to our gaming communities surrounding Galactic Civilizations, Sins of a Solar Empire...

The skinning community is a pretty tight-knit group of people, with a lot of us spending time on multiple sites, working with the community sites spread across the web.  Earlier this month, one of our own here at WinCustomize was promoted over at deviantArt. You know him as Stee03 here on WinCustomize, but over at dA he goes by the name mrrste and as of a few weeks ago, he is now the Skins and Themes Gallery Director for deviantArt! I hope everyone here will join me in congratula...