Warning from the Rainmeter Team

[CybOrSpasm]

I reported that Enigma skin 2 days ago... and checked the box to be updated.. never heard a peep and it's been downloaded over 100 times last I looked.... sigh

[sgtevmckay]

It is a bit of a shame that we can not just turn .rmskin off in the interim.

query:
Can the .rmskin's be changed back to .zip with out damage, visually inspected, then manually installed?

Do we know if this is an embedded additional exe file or something in the skin package that could be looked for?

I ask, as some folks like may self may wish to do this, many will not, but I do?

[jsmorley]

This guy is not bothering to make .rmskins, I doubt he knows how. He is mostly just creating an "installer.exe" and expecting folks to run it.

[Waldensamkeit]

Hey, Kinda new here... well more just that I've been lurking and not really chatting. Lurkers lurk...

Anyway, I reported one of the enigma skins as well (more than a few days ago, submitted by someone called coldballz or some such nonsense), though I am not very familiar with DA's reporting system and it took me a while to find the link, then I couldn't find the malware option I thought was supposed to be available since this whole issue started.

I've been trying to think of ways to make it so that people would know that what they are downloading is a bona fide RM skin, such as a kind of "verified!" badge/graphic watermarked and such but then again, people have a tendency to just DL anything that looks cool without thinking, myself included at times... :/

Then I thought perhaps there could be a way to restrict uploads until the skin has been verified but I am not really sure how the whole group thing at DA works, plus any kind of restriction seems to go against the whole idea of skinning/coding/learning.

Maybe halt all DA RM activity until this issue is cleared up with a link that redirects to a dedicated site where you would be able to sift through the skins for verification, but again that seems like a restriction which seems like a step backwards and in the wrong direction....

Well I've offered up enough of a whole lot of nothing here but at the very least, I find that I have become a very dedicated RM lurker, (and I am not really one to hang around forums, yet I find it hard to drag myself away form anything rainmeter.) and if there is anything I can do to help, ie., deciding to reroute all uploads through a dedicated space would cost $$, i'd be more than happy to donate toward hosting.) and anything I can do to help make sure this nifty little program doesn't go away, im always willing and mostly able....

Sorry for the broken tangential thoughts...
- Michael

[jsmorley]

The trouble with any thinking that involves changes to deviantART, is that first, they are not excited about doing changes that are "area specific", unless it is something that is already built-in and is just a setting. Second, it takes a very long time to get any kind of change through the process there. We don't have a lot (really not any) pull over there to get this solved by things like redirecting a deviantART page, or halting immediate posting of uploads so they can be "vetted".

All we can do at this point is warn folks as much as we can to pay attention to what they are downloading over there, keep reporting bogus skins, and hope they get their process for dealing with reports of virus / malware fixed.

[karmat]

Personally, I don't see this situation being resolved unless the asshole that's doing it gets bored and stops uploading. It's frustrating that varelse, morley and I have to keep testing and reporting, and then getting asked to make another list and report it again.

It is obvious that Otis can only provide very minor assistance and now we know that we can just contact Fiona ourselves. Though that is proving almost pointless as well. She doesn't see the harm in what's happening, and frankly her replies are really starting to piss me off. She makes it sound like we're asking for favours!

I work in a MLA office and she is starting to sound like all the bureaucrats I have to talk to all day long, telling me why something can't be done - instead of trying to pinpoint the problem and helping to resolve it on a permanent and not temporary basis.

So, what's involved in setting up a website where people can download their rainmeter skins and screenshots? Could it be an extension of this site? How much does it cost? Do you need a volunteer to help moderate? If it was possible, we could keep 'advertising' it at dA to get people to switch over, at least for their rainmeter skins.

[sgtevmckay]

As much as I would love for us to have our own gallery.
It is a matter of space, DB Space, and bandwidth issues.

We did do research on this sometime ago, and our findings broke our heart
As many of us know, our entire site is donated (the forum, the CMS for the homepage and manuals)
Morley does an excellent job of holding this together, and Niteshdw is our generous benefactor of our server space.
As we have already seen we have hit our limits at least twice. We will hit them again.
We are even discussing cropping of the forums as a solution to the ever expanding issue

My recent research shows (in a rough mid-range ball park figure) that it would cost us about $800 to $1200 a year, to start, and potentially upwards of about $1800 annual (in USD). This would also include our current forum and CMS front page.

I meticulously maintain the accounting and donations, and I am transparent about this as many know, and as you can see, that although Rainmeter is distributed by over 200 resources worldwide, and we are the #1 product of our kind, we simply do not generate the necessary income to develop and maintain a site that can handle teh massive DB and space requirements of a Rainmeter Community run gallery.

Due to this, and the many years that DA stood by Rainmeter and not deleting the Rainmeter gallery as a dead project, Bendenfield gave us our best alternative solution.
Although we held our breath and hoped for the best.......the dark side of that decision finally caught up with us

DAMN IT!!!! If I had the money, I would pay for it all and never bat an eye

I am just curious if this is some joker that is angered at our popularity, some ex-Samurize user getting revenge, or just some jerk who found what may be considered and easy target!?!!
Totally irrelevant I know, but I am curious

[karmat]

I'm very curious to where it's coming from as well. At first, I thought it was someone that was banned from both sites, but I'm pretty sure that guy doesn't have the intelligence for this.

Sorry to hear how expensive it is to run a site, I'm purely ignorant of the process and unfortunately just a working stiff who can only afford subscriptions here and there.

But if I still have a job after the next election in October, I'd be willing to donate some money if it looked like we had enough donaters to actually be able to do it.

[jsmorley]

I'm sure that a combination of a "slightly" better process being put in place by deviantART, with the new "malware" flag for reports, combined with the fact that I think this is just one guy who will sooner or later tire of his fun, will get things settled down before too long.

There really is no good alternative to deviantART. We have a lot invested in the "Group" there, our users know that deviantART is the place to go for skins, any alternative from an existing site is not going to be nearly as full featured and popular, and setting up our own site to support a half a million or so Rainmeter users and host all those skins is just not in the cards.

[JpsCrazy]

Just a possible suggestion:
Could we talk to someone at DA about sending the warning image we have as a notice to everyone?
I think that would at least make sure some Rainmeter user's get the message.
I mean, DA already sends me notice's all the time that are completely and utterly meaningless to me, so if it gets sent to non-Rainmeter users oh well.

And I'm also curious as to who would do this.
My immediate thought is it was a Samurize user who dislike Rainmeter gaining such popularity, but now that it was mentioned it might just be some guy who see's Rainmeter as an easy way to distribute his virus.
If it is the same person is there any way that DA could block his IP address from making a new account? I know wikipedia can do something similar, if it's not exactly that. (This is of course if he's not using proxies...)
Of course we'll (And by we'll I mean you'll) have to attempt to talk to DA about this and see if they'll oblige at all.