Shake Up Shake Down

Wow, there has been a bit of a shake up in the Persona division of Mozilla. You may not be aware but the designs are reviewed by volunteer designers. There have been two designers that have been manipulating the system since at least March and maybe longer. They decided they wanted their designs to be on the Recently Added page so they would have at least 12 or more hours to get top billing. They are good designers and very popular, but now people are wondering if all their popularity is because of the manipulation they have been doing. 

It was brought to my attention at the beginning of this month so I started checking into it. Low and behold, every day these two designers, Lisa and Sassy would have 3 of each of theirs at the top of the AMO page. It became obvious after a few days of checking. I don't take the time to do this usually because I am busy with designing and just life itself. 

It was reported to the person that is the head of the Persona division and the girls got a slap on the wrist but that was it. The Administrator failed to  do anything more than tell them not to review each others designs as they had been doing in the past. Many designers were very disturbed by the lack of punishment, if you want to call it that, even after given absolute proof in screen shots and a spreadsheet of statistics for an entire months submissions.

This has been so unfair to beginning designers because it takes a long time to get a design recognized and become used by enough users to get in the Up and Coming List. I am sure many got discouraged and just quit designing. You work hours on some designs and then have it just sit at the bottom of the pile is discouraging.

To make a long story short, I am thinking about quitting designing for Mozilla because of their lack of supervision over the Administrators.  I have a lot of designs finished so will continue to submit what I have done but I will have to wait and see how the move from getpersonas to the Add On Mozilla (AM0) site works out.

I love making wallpapers and will continue doing that for sure. So we shall wait and see what happens.

I know for a fact that one designer quit making Persona themes and actually switched her browser from Firefox to Google Chrome because of these two "girls"  playing fast and loose with the system.


Sometimes life is fair and other times it stinks. Needless to say we were all disappointed in Mozilla's reaction or should I say non action.


Till next time

 

G Mail Themes

A quick stop in. I just discovered you can choose your own GMail theme. If you want one of my wallpapers as your GMail theme, all you have to do is download it to your desktop. Then after you are signed in to your GMail account, click on the little gear wheel on the far right, hit themes, go down to Custom Themes/change your image background/upload Photos/My Photos/Upload Photos and then just drag the wallpaper you downloaded to where it says Drag Photos Here. Works really cool and if you have any problems or questions, email me and I will try to answer them.

 

Precious Peonies

Precious Peonies

https://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/persona/475639 

I hope summer is going well for everyone and you aren't having droughts or floods. It is almost scary to listen to the news anymore. At least our summer is neither. The thunder and lightning we have had I do not like, though.

I have really been having fun designing lately. I love finding new graphics to work with and I am learning more and more with Photoshop every day. I will never be able to do even half the things that you can do with it but it is fun to try. Although sometimes I do get frustrated. 

As I have said before the getpersonas site where everyone has been getting their theme designs from is going to be changing and moving everything over to the  AMO site: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/personas/ so I will have to learn a whole new system of submitting, etc. And I am not one that really likes changes.

I was with Personas when they were the new baby on the block and had hoped and tried my best to keep it a sight that had class and you wouldn't be afraid for you child or grandchild to come across. But over the years they have changed a lot of their guidelines and really lowered their standards . Anyway that is this old great grandmothers opinion! And who listens to great grandmothers anyway? Right!

Just thought I would pop in and say hi and hope all is well with everyone. Thanks again for using my designs and writing. I love hearing from you and need the kudos every once in awhile.

Have a good one!

NEW BABY

 

Butterfly Browser Buddies

https://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/persona/473770

 Our family has a new baby girl. The first one in over 30 years!! She is a beautiful baby and we want to welcome Lucy Jane into our wonderful family. So we now have 4 great grandchildren. Guess we are going to have to buy more picture frames. They grow and change so fast it is hard to keep up.

Hope everyone is having a great summer.

This would be a good time for me to thank all the great people that follow this poor blog and continue to use my designs. If you didn't use them I would not be working so thanks again.

Where is summer?

Daybreak Over the Mountains

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/daybreak-over-the-mountains 

https://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/persona/474205

http://gallery.brandthunder.com/en-US/theme/3f96065d-db82-4b92-977e-cf84db0792ba

I am wondering when summer is going to come to the Pacific Northwest. It has been cold and rainy here for the entire month of June and so far July is the same. It is supposed to be a bit better for the 4th of July afternoon and next weeks forecast looks like it could be summer. I watch the news and hear about the heat in the east and midwest and am actually glad we are not having that, but it could be a bit warmer here.

I feel so badly for the people and forests in Colorado and other states that are burning up. My husband was a forester with the United States Forest Service for 33 years and fought fire every  summer. We didn't make a lot of money working for the government like so many people seem to believe so we were glad when we could get that extra income fighting fire. Raising 3 little ones took more money than his wages actually brought in. And we were very frugal. We lived in the mountains, close to the ranger station. He hunted for most of our meat, I canned fruits and vegetables, made jams and jellies, baked all of our sourdough bread and we pretty much lived off the land. But it was a great way to raise children and it proved to be so when our 3 turned out to be such wonderful, hard working adults. I wouldn't change a thing.

Our daughter says she can still smell the smoky smell her Dad had when he came home from fighting fires. Fighting fire 50 years ago was a lot different than it is now. 

Anyway, I feel sad for the people that lost their homes. But they should never allow houses to be built in the forests like they do now. I see these big beautiful houses that are built on mountainsides and  know what is eventually going to happen. One lightning strike or a discarded cigarette butt is all it takes for hundreds to lose their homes, trees lost and insurance companies raising everyone's insurance because of all they had to put out in claims. And putting all the firefighters lives in danger to try to save the houses that probably shouldn't be there in the first place.

Don't know where all that came from!

Since I am on a rant I might as well rant about a designer on Mozilla Persona themes that seems to watch a lot of my designs and then copy them pretty much verbatim. They can't be refused for being copies because they aren't "exact" copies. It doesn't take a genius to just look through the designs and figure out who I am talking about. Apparently she checks out my wallpapers, too and uses them for some of her designs. I could and probably should  file against her, but she is a reviewer and I don't want to make any enemies.  So, I grin and bear it, but the grin is not a pretty thing to see!

Still waiting for our 4th great grandchild to be born. He or she is overdue and Mama is very uncomfortable . I had 3 dreams last week that it was a girl and even named her in my dreams. We haven't had a baby girl born in our family in over 30 years so a sweet little girl would be nice, but another boy added to our family will be welcomed just as much. They are one of the few parents -to -be that don't want to know the sex of the baby and I have to admit it does add to the excitement. 

I hope you all have a safe 4th of July. Remember it is not just a holiday for fireworks and barbecues. Most of our families have members that lost their lives and limbs fighting to keep our country free. Think about them while you are chowing down on that hot dog or whatever. We are going to spend a "quiet" Independence Day at home and I think we have decided on pizza! Not a very 4th of July food, but makes it easy!

Be safe, everyone.

 Dragonfly Daisies

https://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/persona/467039