Neowin and the GUI Olympics


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Next week the first events of the first GUI Olympics begin. Neowin has a pretty good looking skin in there:

mithril.jpg

But they could really use your help. There is a Neowin branded version of SkinStudio to create skins and a Neowin version of WindowBlinds to apply them. The first 3 events are:

1) Most cheerful skin

2) Most depressing skins

3) Fastest skin

On just these first 3 events there is over $700 in cash/prizes available to be handed out (leaving a remaining $9300 available for the rest of the contest).

Note - half of the cash prizes go to the site that you represent in the GUI Olympics. So it is also a great way to support Neowin.

To get started, visit http://www.guiolympics.com.

Good luck!

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this is definately gonna be opening a large, stinky, "6 weeks spent sitting on a loading dock down by the pier to enhance it's 'flavor'" kettle of fish, but, here goes...

brad, what board is this?

right, now, how did this board get here?

right, when the visual style cracks/patches/whatever the hell you wanna call them started coming out, people on this board and prolly arhra on arstechnica were some of the first to start working away at luna and redoing them to make new visual styles.

why does this matter?

well, let's look at it this way: say you go to mexico, and you take a truckload of gyros with you (lamb and beef with grilled peppers and onions wrapped in a pita kinda thing). now, mexicans like burritoes, and they live off them since they're little mexicans. now, mexicans know that there's better foods out there, but they like their burritoes. now, here you come, with your truckload of gyros (by far much better than a burrito) and you try and get mexicans to try them. sure, they'll take a bite, maybe even finish one, but they won't make it a staple of their diet, nor will they move to gyro-land and give up burritoes entirely.

now, what's been accomplished? aside from possible bowel problems from eating something not made with refried beans, the mexicans won't really have changed how or what they eat. at the end of the day, they'll still eat burritoes because it's what they like, it makes them feel warm and fuzzy inside (no comments please) and they don't have to jump through a lot of hoops or move somewhere else to get what they can get already...

no, that really has nothing to do with this, but, how many other people can involve mexicans in a conversation like this? ;)

anyways, what i'm trying to say is, this isn't the greatest of ideas, at least, to me it's not. sure, it's fine if stardock and neowin want to try and scratch each other's back, as can be witnessed with the 'exclusive' interview a while back, the large stardock logo that was emblazened on neowin's front page for months up till the guiolympics logo replaced it, etc. but, this isn't the best place, at least in my mind, to go and try and build up support. sure, voodoo freak and superfula and a few others would prolly jump at the chance, but, most people around here won't, and throwing around dollar signs i doubt will get you any further to winning over skinners.

the whole guiolympics thing in and of itself just seems shady, i mean, marketing's one thing, but marketing 'the olympics of skinning' but only in one event, just doesn't ring kosher...

i mean, it'd be different if you'd done this kind of thing at other places, like skinz.org or lotsofskins. but no, only here, and only because (i'm betting) that this is the largest group of non-windowblinds loving/skinning/using people who still like customizing windows and yet are on a site with 'ties' to stardock...

hmmm, i may have cracked out in there somewhere, but, you get the idea...

i mean, why do you think i released a windowblinds skin in the middle of the guiolympics, but not for the olympics? i mean really, give half the money to a site that i maybe visit twice a day and who really doesn't give any news you can't get anywhere else? (this goes not just for neowin, but for all sites involved in the skinning, though, tweakxp REALLY seems out of place if you ask me...)

:old:

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mephistocorugan: Im glad not everyone shares your views on both Stardock and Neowin.

Neowin, you say is a waste of space because we only report news that can be found elsewhere.

Therefore Stardock is wrong to give cash prizes to people to simply create skins on behalf of their favorite site?

Well we have discussed the possibilty of closing because we got too popular to support the amount of users to Neowin (Hosttyme and our userbase saved us) I spend alot of my free time compiling the best news bits from the web to be called a waste of space? hmm thanks.. I'll keep that in mind.

and stardock GIVING money away cant be wrong in any circumstance ;)

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First off I would like to say "put ur claws aways dude" :hurt: .

A few q's

Whats wrong with cross support?

What does "right, now, how did this board get here?" have to do anything?

I lost u on the burritoes thing (maybe because im uk?)

sure, voodoo freak and superfula and a few others would prolly jump at the chance - u mean me? I dont do skins sorry.

Please remember it is ur choice, no one said you have to make a skin or view any off the olimpics at all, after all we all free right?

oh and yes I use Styles XP & Chaninja 1.5

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Did you ever consider that maybe, just maybe, Frogboy would just like to see more of the many talented sinners in this community participate? He has been a member here for a while and maybe he would like to see Neowin win just like I would. Then to top it off you start insulting Neowin as a site. Quite frankly if you don't like it here there are other places. I do not speak for Frogboy or Neobond, I only speak for myself. As for the rest of the garbage in your reply, I think a trip to the psychlogist would be in order.:s

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Hmm. I posted it here because I like Neowin. I posted it in this section because it's called "Customizing Windows XP".

I'm not sure what "ties" Stardock and Neowin have other than mutual respect and that Stardock people enjoy the message boards and news items here. One could argue that Betanews.com, which is also participating, has the same "ties" or any of the other half dozen sites.

My personal view is that software companies have a moral responsibility to give something back to the communities they exist in. Don't get me wrong, I'm a "capitalist" through and through, but that doesn't change the fact that companies exist within communities -- even virtual ones.

The first GUI Olympics focuses on WindowBlinds. Why just WindowBlinds? Well for one thing, we'd never put together a contest this large together before, we didn't want to bite off more than we could chew. We also wanted to pick something that we could be assured of getting the developer's financial support (and since we make WindowBlinds we could assure our own support ). And lastly, we wanted to pick something that already had such wide range support that no reasonable person would see it as a cynical way to get more skins (WindowBlinds already has thousands of skins, the 50 or so that are likely to be created for this contest aren't going to change the ultimate destiny of WindowBlinds). The next one we'll be able to go to other vendors and see what they'll ante up.

I don't think most people realize how thankless running a tech site like Neowin, betanews, etc. is. People use their bandwidth, use their resources, and very rarely is any appreciation shown. The ones who really beneift from sites like Neowin are the software companies who they freely provide news for. I would argue that those companies have a moral obligation to give something back to those communities. And the best ethical way I can think of is a contest based on merit - the users of the various sites can get together and show their support of the sites whose bandwidth and resources they use. And as an added bonus, have some fun and even make some money and get some prizes. It's a win win for everyone.

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hmm, just wondering but would a visual style ported to windowblinds count? I know I read somewhere on the Gui Olympics page that skins were not allowed to have been submitted previously to be counted. Just wondering cause there is some really good Visual styles around.

Although I've tried some of the skins submitted at the Gui Olympics and they're pretty good.

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They would be accepted but users and judges might take into consideration they were ports. Not sure though, I'm not a judge in the contest. You'd have to ask Neobond actually -- he's a judge.

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Well since its a totally different format, it can be accepted as a new skin for WB. unacceptable skins are previous WB skins that get "updated" or submitted when they already exsisted

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I'm going to be submitting a port with additions from another artist (not the original author). We figure we splitting any resulting prize money three ways is fair - that way a good skin gets ported to WB and everyone gets something for their contribution.

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