Attached Link: Comparative figure support in Marketplace

I agree that Studio isn't ready for primetime for new users. I was having trouble trying to figure out what I could do with the program when I installed it; and I've been playing with Poser for a while. I seem to recall being able to do much more with Poser 1, without looking at the manual, immediately after loading it than I've been able to figure out with Studio. Not adopting the standard Poser Runtime directory structure is going to make Studio a nuisance to use with existing content. I just tried Studio yesterday and have the impression that the only way I can add new content, not built for Studio, is to install it somewhere else and import it. I haven't had a chance to experiment with that aspect of it, but it would be a major mistake to ignore that portion of the user base. Anything that makes Studio harder to use than Poser is just one more reason to not use Studio. Both Poser and Studio have to be backwards compatible with Poser 4 to be successful because that's what the market demands today and for the foreseeable future. I don't know what kind of new features DAZ may have in mind for their characters. I'm sure that intentional ERC controls would be high on the list. Who wouldn't want to see muscles reacting to bent limbs or automatically pull in elbows and knees with extreme bends? Then there's all other kinds of wishlist things, such as hair and clothes that react to gravity. DAZ may not be the only figure maker, but, based on a quick set of searches I did in the Renderosity MarketPlace, their major figures are essentially the Poser figure standards and have nearly twenty times the level of support as any other figures today. When it comes to clothes and accessories, DAZ is a small player. As any member of the Platinum Club can attest, there's not a large volume of DAZ original content at DAZ. Then there's thousands of products here and at other Poser stores. The vast majority of those products may be designed to complement the Millennium figures, but DAZ doesn't make any money off them. You're right that Studio won't take off till it does much of what Poser does and does it better. Nobody is going to switch to something that isn't easier and better than the product that they're using. Even if it's easier and better, it's still hard to convince people to switch from what they're familiar with. DAZ studio can only succeed if two things happen. It has to be easy enough to use that a person, who doesn't have Poser, can quickly churn out images. The more difficult thing is getting Poser users to switch. That's harder. Why should somebody learn something new when they've already got something that works? Studio can't be just as good as Poser. That's not good enough to have to learn a new interface. It has to be better. Considering that it's in DAZ's best interests to make Studio work, I'll wait and see.

My visual indexes of Poser content are at http://www.sharecg.com/pf/rgagnon