"Even if photorealistic rendering ever did become as easy as pressing a button, some people would still want to take it past that normalcy and do things others aren't doing." I agree entirely. I'm comparing the relative niche status of 3D development, not using the content. Think in terms of the evolution from early motion pictures to home 8mm to today's desktop video. Ditto for the printing press to the typewriter to now ubiqutous software for newsletters, greeting cards, etc. I've said many times that I think 3D creation is poised on the cusp of that type of widespread use. Poser was a tremendous step forward but it's still not quite there. Indeed, one could argue that it's moving in the opposite direction by becoming more like the high-end, high learning curve applications. OTOH, products like the RealSkin shader are (probably--haven't used them) an example of packaging complecity to make it more accessible to those who want more realism but don't want to spend hours tweaking shader nodes. There will always be a range of skills and desires, from the 'make every polygon yourself' 3DCG elite to the 'make art button' crowd. Poser is kind of like a manual 35mm SLR. You can get decent snapshots easily or reallly nice results if you fiddle with all the knob and dials. It's not a modern auto focus, auto everything camera that can produce the results of the previous generation without the 'hassle.' The latter is a large part of the (potential)user base IMO. As I've often said, give me a white stucco wall, a wool dress, a 70W Sylvania bulb, etc. These aren't mysteries, the properties are known. God bless those who want to tweak the nodes to get the nap of wool from a particular strain of Merino sheep, I'll settle for generic :-)

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - H. L. Mencken