Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12395&Form.ShowMessage=1324387

Is that why there are two threads there now?

Oh for crying out loud. Ladynimue, I have some serious questions about all this, but don't have time to read through yet another two contentious threads in which numerous non-lawyers claim to have clarity on what seem to be ambiguous legal matters. Is there an appropriate Renderosity employee or attorney to whom I may IM or e-mail my questions in order to save some time? Thank you in advance for any advice.

Post 20, 23, and 26 only shed light on R'osity's take on "legal matters." The fact is, if I buy a product from someone and then discover that it is flawed in some unacceptable way, I get my refund from the place that took my money. R'osity's stance that copyright violations are the problem of the customer and the robbed vendor is as legally "sound" as the BS in your software warranty that says if it doesn't work, that's your problem. Since R'osity does not practice basic principles of commerce, I seldom buy there. And I have not seen a copyright brouhaha at any other place where I buy. It is unrealistic to expect the testers to spot copyright violations, but the nature of evidence (matching code) and the penalties (freezing of all money for that product and refunds from R'osity to anyone who wants them, followed by R'osity taking action against the violator to recoup its own losses) should be simple matters. R'osity set up the commerce relationship with the offending thief, getting their money back should be their problem. R'osity is the one who took my money. And the "have to prove it in court before banning" stance is a red herring, utterly bogus. People and merchants have been banned at R'osity with all the logic of the Queen of Hearts, since time immemorial. It's routine and notorious. No court hearing, and sometimes no explanation, if you can believe the stories. What is actionable is not the banning but how the public announcement of the ban is handled--unsupported accusations, and so forth. A casino can walk you out the door any time they please; what they can't do is post your name and picture in the public part of the casino with a message to the effect that you were banned for stealing. This is not a case of unsupported accusations. The evidence is right there in the files, and intention is beside the point. If you copy the work of others, intentionally or not, you are not allowed to sell at R'osity. What's complicated about that?

What always amused me was that a casino could walk you for "card counting" yup, doing the same thing at a casino as you would when playing cards at home will get you into deep trouble. What I always wondered was, how do they prove it...? Though I suspect what's complicated about all this is the money and that fact that those with it don't want to part with it, for fear if they do it's an admission which could cost them dearly in a a court of law later... Admit nothing, do only what you need to do, let the judge sort it out. Legaly expediant, but possibly costly over time. later jb

"What one chooses to believe is not the same as what is fact." This is precisely my issue with this issue. :-) It's also why I would prefer to consider the advice or guidelines of appropriate Renderosity representitives or attorneys as opposed to the membership or merchants, no disrespect to either intended.

its getting to the point where you'll need to follow the advice of your own attorney... if you want to actually get your money back on a ripped off texture. this is why I don't buy from people that aren't big big names anymore... it sucks for the little people I know but I can't afford it right now, and can't afford to kiss off mistakes like that. They all add up. the people that will be hurt are the merchants here and the marketplace... the big merchants will do well but us little people that are considering becoming merchants will not... and that's not fair.

its not misdirected at Rosity as this is where they bought the defective merchandise. If you have problems with a store its only natural you direct yourself at them, not at... the store down the street that had nothing to do with it. There is such a thing as recalls you know. When something is recalled, you get recompensated. Its a rough place for Rosity to be in. They are hamstrung by the law in many cases. But they can make it very tough on new merchants and drive the point of fear home to them about ethics... its in their best interest to do so. almost makes one wonder if they can buy insurance for this stuff lol.

...misdirected at R'osity: I don't see it that way. If I bought a book and it turned out to be plagiarized, I would return it to the bookstore, not seek out the author. The responsibility to deal with these issues is part of how R'osity earns their share of the money. Where I work, I can be fined $200 for selling to minors. If I don't card somebody, and she turns out to be 17 rather than the 25 I took her for, I don't get to say, "I didn't know." Being responsible for your mistakes is part of selling, just as it is, no doubt to the surprise of many, part of life. If a merchant sells me a defective product, my recourse is the merchant. If the merchant bought the product defective, dealing with his source is his problem, not mine. ..pound of flesh: The fact is, I've never been stung this way; already got all the pounds I want, and some extra. As I said, I pretty much quit shopping at R'osity when I learned how they were were treating this issue and the vendors being hurt by it. So I haven't needed any pound of flesh, thanks anyway. I also wouldn't consider selling products at R'osity; I'd just as soon keep those pounds I already have. And finally, the fact that JenyK is a R'osity financial officer is all well and good. I'm not saying they have no legal basis for their position. They can have legal basis till the cows come home. That don't make it acceptable. I'll shop elsewhere.

more armchair posturing... this is the same reasoning that Ebay uses, of course. But Ebay is actually an auction house. They take a LOT less money in the split, too. So they can get away with that reasoning. They literally only provide a marketplace, and a means for the customer to pay. They are upfront with the customer as to what the rules regarding fraud are. Renderosity has no fraud rules for us to even refer to. Ebay only takes 50 cents from items priced lower than 25 dollars. 50 CENTS, not FIFTY PERCENT. That's a major difference. The onus is on the merchant and the buyer for sure. For items priced higher than 100 dollars, Ebay only takes ONE percent. Renderosity takes half the price in most cases, unless its an exclusive, but even then, its still a lot. What are we paying for in that fifty percent if the customer has no guarantees? You can open a little paypal store on your own for a lot lot less... and use that other fifty percent to cover your own backside, I think. I used to work in the gift trade years ago. Many times we took items on consignment and our return polices didn't change just because it was a consignment item. Renderosity is not an auction house like Ebay, its more like the gift stores I worked in that sold on consignment. Big difference, Illusions. Spend some time actually working in retail... it might be helpful for you. you can make excuses all you want in an effort to schmooze up to TPTB here (my problem is I am too upfront with my opinion... I can't do doublethink like you can), but people like mickmca leave the marketplace if they don't get their consumer issues addressed, if they do not feel SAFE shopping there, and that hurts everyone, including Renderosity.

R'osity is not a mall. I don't give money to the vendor when I want to buy something; I give it to R'osity. By putting themselves in the cash flow, they become complicit in the transaction. That's not law, it's ethics, a concept legal minds find untidy. The consumer issues are: 1. The robbed vendor takes the position that use of the stolen merchandise constitutes violation of copyright. That means I can't use what I bought. In effect, when I get home, the box is empty. 2. If I have my pocket picked in a mall or get sold a counterfeit Rolex (or an empty box), I will assume that the mall managers are not selecting for business ethics when they rent space, or monitoring the ethics of their tenants, and I will hesitate to shop at any of the stores. 3. If the mall's response to complaints about the businesses that rent space is "We just rent the space, it's not our problem," I will never shop there again, nor anywhere else that the mall company manages. I have nearly a hundred items on my wishlist. I have not made a purchase at R'osity since I learned about this problem. Not because I'm afraid of getting burned, but because I don't want to give "differently ethicked" mall managers $7 when I make a $14 purchase. If I want something badly enough and it is not a R'osity exclusive, I buy it elsewhere. Vendors who sell exclusively, in spite of my admiration for their work, I don't patronize. A TOS that defines code theft and the penalties for being caught doesn't require a law degree (contrary to what the lawyers might vote). We are talking about congruencies on the level of a zTran setting that matches down to 0.0001, and textures with regions of identical color bits. No, the testers can't be expected to catch the thieves in advance. But when they are caught, and reported, the penalty should be as simple and unambiguous as the crime. I'm not a latrine lawyer; I'm tempted to add, since you've decided to personalize things, that the phrase is, for the most part, redundant. I really don't care about the legal issues. If the legal issues were simple black and white, lawyers would be selling pencils. I care that honest people are being hurt and R'osity is more interested in its legal CYA than in stopping the abuse. It's not a legal issue; it's a consumer issue. I was in a shop recently when the owner was abusing one of his employees in front of customers, humiliating her for making a mistake. Does he have the legal right? Ask him. Better yet, ask two lawyers and offer to pay them to argue. Will I ever be back to his store? Do you have to ask?

Illusions. Under UK law, Renderosity here, is the responsible party. why? they are the ones handling the cash, doing the adverstising etc. Now, in the US things may be different, but I assure you, here in the UK and UK court would ignore all your barrack room lawyer tricks.

While I respectfully disagree with Illusions on many points, I do agree on one. We can chose to spend our money elsewhere if our concerns are not addressed to our satisfaction. So, let's do so.
CUSTOMERS: Many of Renderosity's major competitors have satisfaction-guaranteed refund policies, no dancing about who's fault and responsibility an issue is. To the best of my knowledge (i.e. when I last looked), Poser Pros and 3D Commune are both among these and often carry items from the same artists. There are others as well, I'm sure; these are just the two that pop to mind.
VENDORS: If you are exclusive to Renderosity, please consider changing your status to non-exclusive and selling elsewhere. When I looked into it (about a year ago, I guess) 3D Commune gave a better split WITHOUT requiring you to be exclusive.

Jumping in here: First off, Renderosity does take 50%, yet they calim that they are only "providing merchant space". Um, I can set up a store on my website with a PayPal account and sell for myself. It's about time Render started earning that 50% of the cut... Or maybe that's the point: if they start going after every copyright violation, some people may be afraid to sell here, which would lower Render's income. {The piranha-like way they go after a person instead of the topic is incredible.} This is a tactic that's been used here for a long time and in a lot of other threads. Why try to debate a person on the issue when you can verbally belittle him? Other people see that the person is belittled and don't bother answering the questions either. So, there you go... debate over. The debate wasn't resolved and the person who brought up the topic was reduced to a whimpering animal. So, if you ask why the sky is blue, people will tell you that you shouldn't be standing outside and that you're a fool who doesn't know what he's talking about. Oh, and you're stepping in cow manure. But why is the sky blue? Look, we just told you you're standing in cow manure. So stop asking the question already, we don't want to deal with it.

"It's about time Render started earning that 50% of the cut" Renderosity isn't taking the 50% cut from the customer, it's taking it from the merchant for services rendered. Those being the transaction, receipts, harddrive space for product and advertising, site maintenance costs, and the bandwidth. Not to mention supplying a large customer base because of the popularity of the galleries and forums which cost a lot to maintain. Set up a store for yourself on your own website and if you're lucky and get customers watch out for your bandwidth costs. I'd hardly say that Rendo doesn't earn its cut.

Hi Everyone - because I do not know the answers to many of your questions - I have referred this thread to Admins who can best help to answer your queries. Thanks for your comments and concerns. ladynimue