Quote - I'm using Poser 6 now, I'm happy with it. Most of the changes from what I hear in Posers 7 & 8 were more content, a few extra shader options, and a few extension additions.

Not sure what your sources are, but the changes in Poser 8 are far more than that. Lighting enhancements, rigging enhancements, Wardrobe Wizard built in, Dependent Parameters editor, revised library/content system, customizable interface, and more.

Quote - I think people who early adopt (habitually) do pay way too much, and they kinda mess it up for the rest of us to - because the available new (free and pay) content that works well - or just plain WORKS - with whatever version you CURRENTLY have quickly shrinks and soon disappears because everybody who has money to flush down the crapper jumps on the trendy bandwagon - leaving the limited income guys using older versions in a clinch and basically screwed. 

I'm a bit confused here. Older content works just fine in the newer versions ... and if it doesn't it's not that hard to change it so that it does work.

As for newer content not working in OLDER versions, I can't think of ANY program that is "forward compatible"  ... how could they be?  Can you open files created in Photoshop CS4 in Photoshop 5.5 which was released 10 years ago?   Or can you open a file created in Word 2007 in Word 97? I don't think so.

The newer content is created to take advantage of the newer features in the software - and from Poser 4 to Poser 7 the main difference was in materials. With Poser 8 there are new rigging features that you might eventually see in newer content.  But because it takes time to provide support for "legacy" versions of Poser, it becomes less and less appealing to support older versions. It's not practical do so if you want to keep the content free or affordable for the users.

Quote - Thank God most Poser 4 content will work fine on 6 will a little codjolling, but there's no gaurantee that Smith Micro (who in my opinion trashed Content Paradise to smithereens) won't go all dork on us and suddenly pull a new version of Poser out of there corporate butts that won't be able to use ANY past Poser content, and the more frequently people snap up new versions fresh off the drawing board because they have less patience than someone who's gotta pee real bad, the closer that nightmare day might creep upon the rest of us who have enough grey matter to know better - SNAPPITTY SNAP SNAP bros and sisses!!!!

So what you're saying is that there should be no advances in the software at all so that it will continue to support the features found in Poser 4, which was released ten years ago?

Poser 4 content will still work in Poser 8 with a little codjoling - but when going the OTHER way and getting newer content to work in Poser 4, you're also talking having to deal with the memory limitations that Poser 4 had.  So it's becoming a bit unreasonable to expect that today's content will still work in Poser 4 ... higher resolution meshes, higher resolution textures, and so on are getting to be too much for Poser 4 to handle.  And truthfully, the quality of content 10 years ago is nowhere near the quality of today's content, a lot of that having to do with the fact that the newer versions have more POWER.

Quote - Wait - and you'll pay less and preserve the available content base

How does waiting for a service release preserve the available content base?

Quote - snap it up quick - and you have more bugs to deal with - and you'll be a party pooper for everybody else. Case closed.

I don't mind dealing with bugs. Pretty much every software program I've purchased has them initially, Poser is no different in that regard.