A Pound of Flesh

WinAmp, Yahoo Messenger, Netscape 7.0, and several other groovy lookin' software packages all have something in common, skins. I'd like to say WinAmp started the craze, but I'm not sure. Not only did it provide a program that played MP3s and delivered some cool sound related visuals but you could make it look how you wanted. And it wasn't that hard to do.

But the ease and speed with which a skin could be delivered seemed to hurt that function instead of help it, at least if you were looking for some nifty new looks for you player. It didn't take long for all the boys to copy and paste picture of Pamela Lee or Jennifer Aniston, or Metallica into the skin picture files. And as it turned out these two bit hacks at the skin served no purpose and didn't increase the value of the product at all. The good skins became fewer and farther between as these 'quickies' dominated the download boards.

But isn't that the way. After all, we are given a means and a way and we bang away at it letting our baser instincts take control and deliver quick and fast for primal satisfaction. Unfortunately we get bored quickly with such simple skins, and go in search again of something really good to play upon our favorite program and personalize it. We go in search of those promised lands of great design, good artistic thinking, and time spent. We go in search of such fabled skins as WoodAmp, AlgaaAmp, and even SteelAmp. Those were three skins that someone spent some time thinking about. And the reward is a permanent place on many a hard drive and demand for more great work.

So in the skin market, no matter the program, you see the prolific bad and the few good. This is the way it will probably always be, or will it. The exercise this week is to think about those skins. That generally free artwork that we give away not only because it's the kind of thing we want to look at when we start up our browser or turn on our computer (oh yes, Desktop wallpaper and themes fits this idea very well), but because others deserve to be treated to great design as well.

I'm not going to argue with anyone who wants to see Heidi Klum gracing their favorite messenger program, because there simply is no arguing with them. However, I will personally choose to clothe my messenger, my browser, my music player with a more skillfully done attractive design that thinks about the function of the program as much as the purpose of the imagery. Someone who considered what a button looks like when the mouse moves over it and incorporates that into the design rather than having some out of place image pop-up underneath the mouse, will get my precious download time. And in all cases, if I have to look at another poorly constructed "This is my favorite Anime" theme or skin again, I will scream.

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