Skins, codes , idea's ? Sharing, paying

[snowofman]

Over the years i have been following and sniffing around in the skinning forum, this year more then before as i have tried to "skin / code in xml myself"
it was something i had never done before and it all started with me reading that Bluestilidie00 didnt had time/energy to update the TCS3 this year
so i wrote Bluestilidoe00 a short message asking for permission to update it for myself and a few friends and so it began. (i've seen that there are multiply variants of the TCS3 skin out there now)

Just to add this to the above aswell, i ofc agreed on that i would not say it was my work (and that was a no brainer for me) 
also later on as i had added, changed so much i asked what his opinion was on me releasing it was. and i would accept any opinions he had.
And he gave me a valid one and as i had said, i would not do it, if he felt it was a bad idea..

Anyway, now to the point of this thread..

As i understand there has been some mumbling in the corners this year in the skinning forum, about ppl using, stealing or what you wanna call it "people's idea's / codes etc"
and i have been wondering if thats really a thing?? maybe i'm just too old, but for me it's a given that if you use something from another Skin, you credit the maker
tho it must be hard to know who's the original maker is, as skins are and have been made from diff skins over the last few years and only the overall layout has changed
and you have people that now and then comes up with a brand new way of showing things in the skin, which will be the new foundation for new skinners, as not everyone have the same creativity
to be able to make something from scratch.

But for what content goes, personally i don't see the reason to invent the wheel twice, but if you publish a skin, you credit the people that rightfully deserves it

also i just wanna touch the subject of sharing
am i wrong in thinking that those who spend time making skins and publish them "mostly" do it for free and because they like it and to make FM a better experience for those who want more data or a better look etc.??
or are we seeing a new start where people will have to pay for extra features in a skin if they wanna use that skin (dark skin, more info, more data shown etc)

what are your thoughts ?

- Mods - if the thread is not okay i'm sorry, and just delete it
 

[Olas Nick]

I review all the skins that exist. Good, bad, just awful ... And sometimes it's really hard to determine the original author of the code. I know if the code structure is beautiful then it's probably FMEnhanced, and if the code structure is absolutely awful and unreadable it's Flut

[Tyburn]

Good post!

I struggled with this last year. Basically, to get the game looking the way we want it, 9 times out of 10, someone has already coded it before. Multiple times.

Some ideas are original but the vast majority have been around forever, and the confines of how skinning works really means there are only so many ways something can be achieved.

Without a shadow of doubt, if a skin author has borrowed an idea from another skin, and certainly if they have borrowed code verbatim they should absolutely credit where that came from. If they are releasing that skin into the community anyway.

In my opinion monetising skins, in any format, should not ever be allowed, because the code is NEVER unique. 95% of it is SI’s anyway. Just rearranged. 

Personally, any unique ideas I have had, or implemented in a skin, that get used by others, I feel flattered by. But seeing as I’ve only ever had, like, 2 original ideas, I may feel differently if I had more.

The sheer number of people skinning seems to be increasing all the time. I always thought this community was exceptional at sharing. Would be a real shame if people started getting silly about it.

[BuzzR]

1 hour ago, Tyburn said:

In my opinion monetising skins, in any format, should not ever be allowed, because the code is NEVER unique. 95% of it is SI’s anyway. Just rearranged. 

This is very well put ! What we do around here is to fumble around the same xml tags - use this one widget here instead of there, make it red or blue or transparent, add another label with data from another panel.

What we could argue is that the ideas were original at some point - so we should credit the creator, if we can . But there are common bits and pieces in all of the current major skins, maybe tracking down to some mod from 2-3 years back and it's hard to find the "original" creator.

I do understand the work behind a skin or a mod is sometimes overwhelming, I felt it myself digging in the dark for that silly property id, or rewriting that damn container that doesn't work in THIS panel - and this could be another argument to give credit to.

But this is the extend of "skin property" that I see, because credits are not mandatory - it's just courtesy.

So we can ask people to be courteous and give credits, but if you "published" it - it's common use, that's the reality. And about monetization :

11 hours ago, junkerne said:

am i wrong in thinking that those who spend time making skins and publish them "mostly" do it for free and because they like it and to make FM a better experience for those who want more data or a better look etc.??
or are we seeing a new start where people will have to pay for extra features in a skin if they wanna use that skin (dark skin, more info, more data shown etc)

Maybe giving a donation / buying a coffee to a guy who's "published" skin one is enjoying, to appreciate his hard work - could this also be considered courtesy, but definitely not mandatory! 

If we get to a point that we pay for skins, I think SI will step in and stop it. This sub-forum is a knowledge sharing community - and I love it like this.

On the other hand I've seen the topics of published skins- dear god, the amount of stress inducing demands: " this is ugly", " this is not like I want it ", " why isn't that like the other ?", " can you do it like this?". I would never ever put myself through something like this, if I could manage to build a decent publishing-ready skin.

 

Maybe a little off-topic: what I would like to see is a little more organized knowledge - maybe we could start building a wiki: screen-panel name relations, screen- widget- files relations, how to layout, layout options , container classes etc .. slowly we could build something useful and help each other, instead of constantly  reading the same " what's this panel?" posts every 2 days.

 

 

Edited January 24, 2022 by BuzzR
spelling

[EnigMattic1]

I will be totally honest. With this version of the game being my first real attempt at skinning and actually trying to understand the coding and how it actually works, I would struggle to credit the original skin author, purely because I have borrowed pieces from here and there for my own personal skin and could easily lose track of what I got from where.

One thing I have noticed on my journey is that a LOT of skins have a "TCS" folder in. It just goes to show what @Tyburn said about how few ideas are original, but at least it would still be easy to credit that particular portion of the skin.

Credit should definitely go to the original creators where possible though and I don't believe skinners should be charging. If, for example, a skinner had a Patreon for donations, I would view that differently as donations are optional.

[keysi]

1. it's so easy to make notes what file(s) you took from.
2. it's also very easy to make notes straight to the files to know what part of the code you took from. I for example saw a couple of people took something from my player overview selector and they noted it "from FM Rensie skin". It really is a small effort in comparison with "I would struggle to credit the original skin author" - that's nothing against you EngiMattic1, that's just an example.

I learned a lot thanks to skins as CFM, TCS and many others but I always credited the authors after asking them about permision to use their work.

The FM22 skin was my last one I shared publicly. It doesn't matter if the developers of the game will fix all the issues for next editions or if they will say the same phrases "known issue" or "we are looking into it" as every year before the same issue will be in the game again. It's not worthy anymore to spend a lot of time to fix something I paid for. So, the combination of many broken things in the game and people stealing my work did the work for me when I was considering what next.

I wrote something about it here as I needed to put some words together about it some time ago. I won't copy/paste it here in full so if you are interested, feel free to read.

12 hours ago, junkerne said:

also i just wanna touch the subject of sharing

am i wrong in thinking that those who spend time making skins and publish them "mostly" do it for free and because they like it and to make FM a better experience for those who want more data or a better look etc.??
or are we seeing a new start where people will have to pay for extra features in a skin if they wanna use that skin (dark skin, more info, more data shown etc)

I had donations button for three years, not for the whole of time making skins. I always sent all the donations to food bank or somewhere else who needed it more than me. That was always the only point why I set the donations up.

[EnigMattic1]

1 hour ago, keysi said:

1. it's so easy to make notes what file(s) you took from.
2. it's also very easy to make notes straight to the files to know what part of the code you took from. I for example saw a couple of people took something from my player overview selector and they noted it "from FM Rensie skin". It really is a small effort in comparison with "I would struggle to credit the original skin author" - that's nothing against you EngiMattic1, that's just an example.

I learned a lot thanks to skins as CFM, TCS and many others but I always credited the authors after asking them about permision to use their work.

The FM22 skin was my last one I shared publicly. It doesn't matter if the developers of the game will fix all the issues for next editions or if they will say the same phrases "known issue" or "we are looking into it" as every year before the same issue will be in the game again. It's not worthy anymore to spend a lot of time to fix something I paid for. So, the combination of many broken things in the game and people stealing my work did the work for me when I was considering what next.

I wrote something about it here as I needed to put some words together about it some time ago. I won't copy/paste it here in full so if you are interested, feel free to read.

I had donations button for three years, not for the whole of time making skins. I always sent all the donations to food bank or somewhere else who needed it more than me. That was always the only point why I set the donations up.

See, if I ever get into a position where I am confident enough to actually attempt a skin for release, that is something I would do. But, at the moment, I am still trying to get a handle on things and I'm still getting to grips with xml files. Obviously, for seasoned skinners such as yourself, you can recognise your own work and, in all honesty, I couldn't put any work up as my own, knowing full well that it isn't.

I've got a lot of respect for the guys on this forum and all the time and effort that is put in to create so many varied skins which offers variety to the base game.

[Olas Nick]

1 hour ago, keysi said:

noted it "from FM Rensie skin"

It is very easy to write "from FM Rensie skin"... But if Rensie took it from Kensie, and I just don't know about it?

[keysi]

1 minute ago, Olas Nick said:

It is very easy to write "from FM Rensie skin"... But if Rensie took it from Kensie, and I just don't know about it?

Not sure who is Kensie but if you meant keysi, it's the same person as FM Rensie... but you are right, of course, you can't know 100% if it's right or someone just rewrote it etc.

[Olas Nick]

Kensie, Mensie or Bensie  it's not important. If the panel is not super original, it is almost impossible to identify the author.
I'd rather see my panel unsigned than one signed with a incorrect name.

[(sic)]

12 hours ago, BuzzR said:

On the other hand I've seen the topics of published skins- dear god, the amount of stress inducing demands: " this is ugly", " this is not like I want it ", " why isn't that like the other ?", " can you do it like this?". I would never ever put myself through something like this, if I could manage to build a decent publishing-ready skin.

If there are things that can be improved (or just general bugs) I usually do go out of my way to fix them, but far too many people come in with endless personal requests. And it never stops. You might think, "oh I'll just add this, it doesn't seem like an issue", after that you'll have someone asking for another thing, and then another, and another... This year I did fix issues and add some bits and pieces for a few weeks after the beta, and I've tried to ignore some of these requests. If someone really wants that background selector or whatever feature they were asking for, maybe they should learn how to add it themselves.

I design my skins to my personal taste first and foremost, then I make sure that everything works properly and maybe add some features that a lot of people find useful. I will not go out of my way to add something to the skin that I myself wouldn't use, it's just a waste of time for me and I get nothing out of it.

 

11 hours ago, keysi said:

I wrote something about it here as I needed to put some words together about it some time ago. I won't copy/paste it here in full so if you are interested, feel free to read.

 

I feel you. I can't say I've had too many issues with people copying my stuff (not that I know of at least, besides one instance).

I did notice someone had uploaded a skin, basically copying my whole player and home panels, the club page from your skin, and some other stuff from other skins, under their own name. "The author" has credited the original authors after I have contacted them about it, but nothing about that skin was theirs, everything was taken from other skins and just mixed together by that person. The explanation I was given was that "I've put panels from other skins to a make a skin how I like it. I've just published it because someone else might like it too". I'm sure the person didn't have any malicious intent, but it really comes off as stealing other people's work. Why should I spend hours and hours making something and figuring out why a certain piece of code doesn't seem to work the way I want it to, when a random person can just download my skin, take everything and publish it under a different name.

 

Because of these two things (endless requests and people "stealing" work), I do understand why some creators want to monetize their work. Hell, I've even thought doing it myself.

 

14 hours ago, Tyburn said:

In my opinion monetising skins, in any format, should not ever be allowed, because the code is NEVER unique. 95% of it is SI’s anyway. Just rearranged.

Sure you could say you are just rearranging the code SI have provided, but at the same time it still requires a lot of time and effort (and it usually isn't just the matter of rearranging it). After all, we as users cannot magically create new code, we can only use what already exists.

In general, with design (webdesign especially), the same argument would be, "You are just using different colors and rearranging different shapes that aren't unique and that already exist, you aren't creating anything new".

 

However, if monetization is allowed and many more skin makers start utilizing it, you could have situations where some people might just take other people's work and profit off of it. You, or the SI can't really do anything about that, unless they forbid monetization outright.

 

[keysi]

13 hours ago, (sic) said:

I design my skins to my personal taste first and foremost, then I make sure that everything works properly and maybe add some features that a lot of people find useful. I will not go out of my way to add something to the skin that I myself wouldn't use, it's just a waste of time for me and I get nothing out of it.

This is something what 9 from 10 people don't understand. 95% of the "feedback" is only about why this is not in the skin or when it will be added. And if you don't do it, your skin is not good enough.

I'm old enough to not be harmed by these things but it's surely pain to make something again.

[MeetTheTwinAndreBen]

On 25/01/2022 at 05:19, keysi said:

This is something what 9 from 10 people don't understand. 95% of the "feedback" is only about why this is not in the skin or when it will be added. And if you don't do it, your skin is not good enough.

I'm old enough to not be harmed by these things but it's surely pain to make something again.

I must say, the FM community is extremely demanding and often rude to the people that put a ton of work in to make the game more enjoyable and for the most part ask nothing in return. I try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt because a lot of the community aren't native English speakers, but the amount of people that don't even attempt to follow instructions and just immediately comment "doesn't work" "broken" "fix this for me" etc. is honestly staggering. Like they want you to fly to their house and install it for them... It's 2022, there are almost infinite resources on the internet to translate instructions, and even if there weren't all you have to do is follow along with one of the 100s of youtube videos showing how to install graphics, skins, and editor data. I browse the flayus forums fairly often and guess what, I don't speak a word of Korean! This stuff really is not very complicated. If you can't figure out how to find your user data folder, make a "skins" folder, and unzip a folder into it I just don't understand how you can play the game considering it's way more complicated than that. I would, and do, gladly explain things when some asks politely but it's infuriating when people act as if you owe them something because they couldn't be bothered to even scroll through the thread and see their question has been answered 5 times on top of being in the OP.

sorry for the rant, it's just really frustrating. I used to read through the show your skin thread and couldn't understand why people wouldn't publish their skins, but after seeing how they're treated I don't think I'll post anything I've made

[(sic)]

2 hours ago, MeetTheTwinAndreBen said:

I must say, the FM community is extremely demanding and often rude to the people that put a ton of work in to make the game more enjoyable and for the most part ask nothing in return. I try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt because a lot of the community aren't native English speakers, but the amount of people that don't even attempt to follow instructions and just immediately comment "doesn't work" "broken" "fix this for me" etc. is honestly staggering. Like they want you to fly to their house and install it for them... It's 2022, there are almost infinite resources on the internet to translate instructions, and even if there weren't all you have to do is follow along with one of the 100s of youtube videos showing how to install graphics, skins, and editor data. I browse the flayus forums fairly often and guess what, I don't speak a word of Korean! This stuff really is not very complicated. If you can't figure out how to find your user data folder, make a "skins" folder, and unzip a folder into it I just don't understand how you can play the game considering it's way more complicated than that. I would, and do, gladly explain things when some asks politely but it's infuriating when people act as if you owe them something because they couldn't be bothered to even scroll through the thread and see their question has been answered 5 times on top of being in the OP.

sorry for the rant, it's just really frustrating. I used to read through the show your skin thread and couldn't understand why people wouldn't publish their skins, but after seeing how they're treated I don't think I'll post anything I've made

I'm not sure if it's the language barrier, the fact that a lot of older people play this game, or that people are just lazy, but there's a huge number of FM players that just don't know how/refuse to search the internet for something.

I spend a lot of time hanging around on the FM Scout website, which has a live chat. I can't even tell you the number of times I've seen the same question asked over and over in chat. I feel like people are just lazy and expect everything to be served to them on a plate. A simple google search with the same question you just asked in the chat would've given you the answers you need. Even worse, the answer is sometimes on the exact same page they're on, but they just refuse to read and their first instinct is to go and ask in chat. I don't have a problem with answering the question, I just have a problem with people being lazy and not looking for the answers themselves, without involving other people.