if i had 189. USA greenbacks laying around i would buy the Ds4 pro upgrade.  it has it's perks

but, i don't, so i can't; i'm at the bottom of the food chain, no income from making stuff.

the DS4A, without the content tools, i dunno; seems to be, basically, the DS4 basic with autofit included.  I''m not sure on the difference between Morph Target with the pro version, compared to morph targets in the DS4A.

@ Alex: EPIC RESPONCE, Might be Troy, but hell lets throw in some Spartans, just so we can say "This IS SPARTA." and get another Sparta Techno remix going, LOL...

@ Misty, know what ya mean. well for the sales, and with the anticipation for Poser Pro 12, I myself am plankton on the food chain, LOL. but this plankton is learning the dark arts, soon I will be a lab rat trying to take over the world..... doh, spoiled again, I announced my evil plans, gotta stop doing that...

i wonder how many they've banned lately from the forums over there.     even complaint thread lost oomph.

Quote - @ Misty, know what ya mean. well for the sales, and with the anticipation for Poser Pro 12, I myself am plankton on the food chain, LOL. but this plankton is learning the dark arts, soon I will be a lab rat trying to take over the world..... doh, spoiled again, I announced my evil plans, gotta stop doing that...

 

Make ebil Dark Art button 

Quote - i wonder how many they've banned lately from the forums over there.     even complaint thread lost oomph.

I know of atleast 18....

What are they banned for?  I'm an infrequent poster there but it may be useful to know what lines to not cross.

Well alot of us people who actually think for oursleves instead of them for us, have been, or at least the ones verbal about it. I saw that they had to defend their new "Strategies" of forcefeeding genesis and their new way they roll campeign, in the forum, they at least acknowledged that people are displeased with the current format of the site or the as i would say the lack of intellect running it, then again I don't work for Pixar or Lucus films, so what do I know. But ever since the release of DS4 the forums were getting lit up with Daz Hate, and complaints, and the civility of some of it was quite funny actually, when Daz tried to defend their claims of DS4 being the nectar of the gods if you will, this coming with a track record mind ya, of overpromising and underdelivering, and over night they are all of a sudden trying to be Poser clones, in the regards of for a lack of better words presteige.

The whole thing with buying genesis stuff and receiving it for v4 for free, a ploy to get sales up on genesis models, point blank for the numbers game so they have some bragging rights, they defended with the comment, we are giving it away free what is wrong with that, but to someone that looks at the gen 4 morphs for genesis, that cost in the store how is that any different from the claim they make if we already own the models, whether purchased at zero cost, or when the models wasn't free, the defending logic is nullified but then again what do i know,

DS4 was rushed out, or at least it seems so to compete with Poser's weight paint rigging in Pro 2012, just a thought that maybe the whole genesis push was to get people griping to SM to support Genesis, does Daz support miki3... Maybe in 4 but I dont know i refuse to use DS4, you know come to think of it, it is like a fart, it gets emmited, it stinks, it lingers, lingers some more... gag reflexes take over, women and children first to evacuate, while some people are their griping about it... lingers some more, the person who cuts it is either embarrassed or proud of their stench, flies drop dead, varnish from foot lockers peels off, WTF Booooooooom plays in everyones minds, then it disapaints... birds come out from their hiding places, and sing, flowers grow from their previous wilt, and all is happy once again, until the next person comes along and repeats the cycle again... Yeah ok...

Yes i ramble, but I am insane so it is ok... Please, no don't run away...screaming, no come back... XD ...And that's all i got to say about that... 

Quote - What are they banned for?  I'm an infrequent poster there but it may be useful to know what lines to not cross.

Based on the remarks made by ostensible supporters of the format and company, it would be anything negative about their products or philosophy or sales ethics. Bringing up history also appears to be frowned upon. Questioning marketing decisions is right out.

So, that leaves adulation.

Quote - "Based on the remarks made by ostensible supporters of the format and company, it would be anything negative about their products or philosophy or sales ethics. Bringing up history also appears to be frowned upon. Questioning marketing decisions is right out.

So, that leaves adulation. "

I saw the post about "negative comments" which implied that reasoned, informed criticism is allowed.

Oh well.  I don't post there very often and when I do, it's limited to discussions about my freestuff, or other, related freestuff.

Guess I'm safe from the headsman.  :) 

As far as Daz, that's what happens when the company has full control of the discussion, and, to be fair, most of the folks over there seem ok with it.
You can't really even blame them for trying to take over the Poser market either, that's just business. I believe their main reason for buying Carrara was to make the app a Poser killer, didn't work.

I don't believe Genesis/DS4 will work either, but then again, back in the '90's, I didn't think IE had a chance in hell of taking over Netscape's market share, so what do I know.

Personally, I use Poser, Carrara, ZBrush, and Hexagon (2.1 and 1.2). I have no interest in Studio, in fact it won't even work with the tablet mouse on my workstation and I'm just not going to jump through hoops changing back and forth in order to use it. And I'm really too old to worry about what the kewl kids say I should be using. :biggrin:

Like I've said before, as a software company, I believe Daz does a fine job of making and distributing content.

Hello,

looking at the price of the newest DS4 bundles, my impression ist that DAZ tries to change a "cheap beginners 3D app"  and sell it as a "Pro" app.

I tried DS3A some time ago and found that despite they call it "professional", it does not even support all my CPU cores for rendering.

DAZ  has a good "pro" app, named Carrara, but they treat it not well. The latest version does not even come with a manual any more, and bugs stay untouched for years. Hell, if they would add proper displacement handling and Python scripting to Carrara, they might become a true competitor for Poser. But DS 3 or 4 ? No way.

Best regards,

    Michael

Daz Studio 4 Pro doesn't include documentation for the really interesting features at this point. Maybe by the time I recieve my copy of Poser Pro 2012 there will be a comprehensive pdf manual for Daz Studio Pro.

Daz Studio 3 Pro was invaluable for me because of morph loader pro and the property editor. The GoZ feature in Daz Studio 4 seems pretty convenient. I'd love a detailed explanation on how to create an original, weight-mapped figure in Daz Studio, but I guess I'll have to wait.

I'm hoping some features of Daz Studio 4 Pro will be useful for creating content for the next version of Poser -- not that I'm optimistic about recouping the price of both products in content sales…

Most Poser users cannot use magnets, create material or create dynamic simulation. I think that most of DS users are similar. For them only difference in Poser and DS is interface.

Few users find tools in both application which they need. For example somebody need clothing room, somebody need weight mapping. You cannot convice them that one application is better and second is worse. Just like cars. You can say that B Veyron is the best car, but if you must transport few tonnes of coal, each Scania is better.

ATM you do not choose software, but you choose features.

Quote - Hello,

I tried DS3A some time ago and found that despite they call it "professional", it does not even support all my CPU cores for rendering.

DS, all versions, uses all cores on single CPU machine and I'm near certain it uses all cores on dual CPU machines. Some processes, such as Shadow Map rendering, were not multi-core but as far as I recall that was already fixed by the time DS3A was released. If you sent a scene to an external version of 3Delight you would have been limited by that, but teh limitations on the internal version are in the form or unsupported features compared to the full version.

Quote - > Quote - What are they banned for?  I'm an infrequent poster there but it may be useful to know what lines to not cross.

Based on the remarks made by ostensible supporters of the format and company, it would be anything negative about their products or philosophy or sales ethics. Bringing up history also appears to be frowned upon. Questioning marketing decisions is right out.

So, that leaves adulation.

It seems that posting anything not supporting them on independent, private websites/forums not belonging to them is also a reason for them banning you which is what actually happened to several there.

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - What are they banned for?  I'm an infrequent poster there but it may be useful to know what lines to not cross.

Based on the remarks made by ostensible supporters of the format and company, it would be anything negative about their products or philosophy or sales ethics. Bringing up history also appears to be frowned upon. Questioning marketing decisions is right out.

So, that leaves adulation.

It seems that posting anything not supporting them on independent, private websites/forums not belonging to them is also a reason for them banning you which is what actually happened to several there.

Whut?  :huh:

Yep, and the reasons supplied for being banned were all things said on a very small, independent forum and nothing to do with what was said in their own forum.

However, according to their TOS, they can ban anyone they want for whatever reason they want.  I guess some people just don't fit in for whatever reason. shrug

About genesis and Poser, it is an absurd thought tell SM make Poser compatible with a "poser" content. The logical way is to ask Daz make their content compatible with Poser, if they want.

The content creators are the people that have to worry that their content are compatible with the programs, not vice versa, and in the casa of Genesis, DAZ is a content creator, or at least  should be.

Just a note. 

Quote - > Quote - > Quote - > Quote - What are they banned for?  I'm an infrequent poster there but it may be useful to know what lines to not cross.

Based on the remarks made by ostensible supporters of the format and company, it would be anything negative about their products or philosophy or sales ethics. Bringing up history also appears to be frowned upon. Questioning marketing decisions is right out.

So, that leaves adulation.

It seems that posting anything not supporting them on independent, private websites/forums not belonging to them is also a reason for them banning you which is what actually happened to several there.

Whut?  :huh:

If I understand Janl correctly, making remarks that are non-supportive of Daz on another (not-Daz) site can get you banned on the Daz forum if Daz get wind of it. Is that what you meant, Janl?

"If I understand Janl correctly, making remarks that are non-supportive of Daz on another (not-Daz) site can get you banned on the Daz forum if Daz get wind of it. Is that what you meant, Janl? "

that is exactly correct. watch what you say ppl.

I can understand that.  I wouldn't want someone as a guest in my house if they'd been slagging me off.  And, just to pre-empt what I suspect will be the comeback to that, I'd have no problem selling to them, though.  

Business is business but I don't have to be sociable about it.

Quote - that is exactly correct. watch what you say ppl.

See also, "FUD" .

Seriously - the wild, baseless, and fevered accusations get crazier every month (oh, wait, wait... I already know what's coming in rebuttal: "but I didn't accuse them of anything!" )

So, does anyone have any actual objective evidence for any of this, or is it just a new version of the quickly dismissed (and just as quickly run away from) spiel of 'OAMG I heard that DAZ was having teh financial problemz!!!!11!!'? 

Here, now - let's not beat around the bush. Allow me to help you out. Let us, together, as a team, get all the other potential juvenile whispers out of the way and in the open, mm'kay? Here goes...

The betting pool is officially open as to the exact date that some disgruntled hack in this joint will quietly and indirectly accuse some employee of DAZ of one of the following:

Supporting Al Qaeda, commiting genocide, pedophilic acts whilst wearing chiffon dresses, nuclear terrorism, performing secret Mormon gay weddings, political bribery, The Spanish Inquisition*, antisemitism, urinating on the Ground Zero Memorial, child abuse, bestiality, and/or the heartbreak of psoriasis.

Did I miss any? Please be sure to inform us if I did. I fix the date on September 26th, give or take two days in either direction.

So - got any other silly rumors? Let's hear 'em.

• Why the Spanish Inquisition? Because, as we all know, no one expects ithe Spanish Inquisition.

Quote - I can understand that.  I wouldn't want someone as a guest in my house if they'd been slagging me off.  And, just to pre-empt what I suspect will be the comeback to that, I'd have no problem selling to them, though.  

Business is business but I don't have to be sociable about it.

Agreed. 

I'm just curious if there's any substance to it. 

As for business? Doubly Agreed. I mean, lots of people go nuts in this site decrying of all things R'otica (a.k.a The Site Which Shall Not Be Linked), but the purchase records told (and likely still tell) quite a different story. As for me and my wee scattering of products there, I don't mind that fact one bit. ;)

(and no worries, folks - I shan't name names. It's not in my character to do so).

Quote - > Quote - that is exactly correct. watch what you say ppl.

See also, "FUD" .

Seriously - the wild, baseless, and fevered accusations get crazier every month (oh, wait, wait... I already know what's coming in rebuttal: "but I didn't accuse them of anything!" )

So, does anyone have any actual objective evidence for any of this, or is it just a new version of the quickly dismissed (and just as quickly run away from) spiel of 'OAMG I heard that DAZ was having teh financial problemz!!!!11!!'? 

Here, now - let's not beat around the bush. Allow me to help you out. Let us, together, as a team, get all the other potential juvenile whispers out of the way and in the open, mm'kay? Here goes...

The betting pool is officially open as to the exact date that some disgruntled hack in this joint will quietly and indirectly accuse some employee of DAZ of one of the following:

Supporting Al Qaeda, commiting genocide, pedophilic acts whilst wearing chiffon dresses, nuclear terrorism, performing secret Mormon gay weddings, political bribery, The Spanish Inquisition*, antisemitism, urinating on the Ground Zero Memorial, child abuse, bestiality, and/or the heartbreak of psoriasis.

 

Did I miss any? Please be sure to inform us if I did. I fix the date on September 26th, give or take two days in either direction.

 

So - got any other silly rumors? Let's hear 'em.

 

• Why the Spanish Inquisition? Because, as we all know, no one expects ithe Spanish Inquisition.

I consider myself a level headed guy, I support the Spanish Inquistion and pragmatic Antisemitism as much as the next guy, but why on earth did you have to bring the secret  Mormon gay weddings in to the discussion? Because I  very much object to unsupervised  people having secret Mormon Gay weddings and honestly anyone who takes part in these vile seremons should be horribly mutilated by a flock of anarchist sparrows. 

A big thank you to everybody.

Earlier this year I had decided to buy in September a new TV set. After going thru the last entries of this thread I came to the conclusion that I need not spend several hundred euros to entertain myself: it is sufficient to come here.

So again, thank you to everybody and... watch this.

Quote - If I understand Janl correctly, making remarks that are non-supportive of Daz on another (not-Daz) site can get you banned on the Daz forum if Daz get wind of it. Is that what you meant, Janl?

Unbelievable I know and I would not have believed it myself just a few months ago. I am an old time member of this community and take most things in my stride but this seems wrong to me.

It appears that they themselves have confirmed that they have spies reporting back what is said on a very small unimportant independent site and they have banned people for, in my opinion, the most flimsy of reasons. The evidence is there and I have seen it. Whether you believe it is up to you and where it will stop is anyone's guess. :(

Quote - ... have confirmed that they have spies...

OMFG.

Just when I thought it couldn't get more over-the-top... it frickin' does.

** The scene:** Prague, 1962.

It is a dark and foggy night. Steve Branson is waiting in a back alley near the train station, impatient to  meet someone. He draws his coat and hat down against the increasing chill... damned Euorpan winters. Never ouright cold, but instead it sneaks up on you. He hated these assignments sometimes. And for the thousandth time, he wondered why he couldn't have just taken that desk job back in Washington...

"Psst! You got a light?" came a whisprered question out of the gloom in flawless Russian. It still startled the man, even though he was expecting that very same question, and expecting that very same voice. 

"Boris old man! Good to see you!" he whispered back, in his own English tongue. The two men embraced heartily, both having a very hard time holding back sudden tears of joy.

Usually pleasantries were never observed, but it's been a year since the infamous Morphed Foot incident, and the two men were each amazed that they had managed to survive. They allowed themselves the time. 

"Stefanovich - it is good to see you too! But... it seems we have a job to do again, Da?"  Boris had that look in his eye that said it was time to get to business, and a grimness that said it wouldn't be easy. 

"So I heard. It seems our old mutual nemesis is back at it again. What do you know about it?"

The old Russian replied: "Far too many Bothans died to bring me this information, but it is accurate. It seems that the evil D.A.Z. has built a new base on a remote island, has rebuilt the Vicki Army, and has built a new secret weapon that is unimaginable!"

"You don't say... and where is this remote island? The Pacific? The Mediterranean? The Indian Ocean?"

"Nyet. They have built it in a place even more remote than you can imagine! They built it in a mysterious island near the coast of Edmonton, Canada!"

A deep chill, far colder than the fog, ran down the American's back. He knew full well just how remote Canada was. You may as well try to get the boys at NACA to build a spaceship to take you there for all the distance and remoteness this is going to entail. D.A.Z. was one dastardly bunch of evil men, and now they would be nearly out of reach. 

But, Steve had a job to do, and he had to do it well - most of humanity and all of CG depended on it! His resolve began to solidify, but he needed more information.

"Okay, then we do this, but it won't be easy. Boris, what is this weapon they speak of, then?"

A look of fear cross the Russian's eyes, but he managed to contain it. He calmly lit a cigarette and drew a heavy breath. It seemed to calm him a bit. After a couple of puffs, the explanation came forth: "Stefanovich, I know this will sound crazy, but this weapon is even worse than any nuclear device you can think of. You see, it has the power to remotely prevent speech... as a side effect, it causes the human target's form to change, making your butt look funny whenever you bend your legs."

"That's impossible!" Steve spat back in sheer disbelief. "Nobody would be that cruel! Nobody!" But Steve already knew that yes, there are men who can be that cruel. The men of the organization known as Dominate All Z-Axis. It was led by a twisted figure, a man whom they say is impossible to look upon without losing your sanity. 

He gave a brief thought to writing a small dispatch to his family, to tell them one last time how much he loved them. The very acronym D.A.Z. made it hard for him to retain his bowels every time it was spoken, for he knew just how evil they were. But he had a job to do, damnit! He steeled his resolve as best he could. After all, Humanity itself depended on this!

==

...and, that's about as much credence as one can grant to such tales.

Penguinisto, I am not sure why you are taking that attitude when you have nothing to base your assumptions on whereas I have actually evidence of what I am saying. I do not appreciate being made out to be some sort of sensationalist. This is the last I will be saying. Believe whatever you wish.

Quote -  

** The scene:** Prague, 1962.

It is a dark and foggy night. Steve Branson...

Now this is a good story! It also gives exact names and places, so it is probably true, right? At least to me it sounds much more convincing than what might have happened at some unnamed "small independent unimportant website" :-)

If you have this evidence, then by all means, let's see it!

Oh, and please make sure this evidence is verifiable and objective, and not the fevered blog/assertion of some digruntled soul. 

As for my "assumptions"? Well, they are based in a little something called "reality". You see, a business has to do many things - pay the light bill, create products, sell and market those products, look forward to market trends... things like that.

The last thing they have time and resources for is to have a cadre of "spies" (your term) to waste money and other resources on. 

I think I can help you out a little, though. You see, the owners of DAZ, Renderotica, Smith Micro, Renderosity, RDNA, etc? They all talk to each other online and on the phone. Sometimes nearly every day. They all work together quite well in most respects. Thing is, they have to, if they expect to even maintain a market for hobbyist CG art.

Why? Because this little market isn't going to support itself solely from the incomes of the menopausal, the perverted, and the amateur. Compared to the pro world, we're extremely cheap bastards. If these guys didn't band together, they would have died off a very long time ago, beucase population and money-wise, this market is too damned small. 

Each is highly dependent on the other to survive. They have to be. Allow me to crack some eggs here. Check your egoes at the door, dear reader, because this is gonna be ugly, but I promise it shall be, for the sake of brevity, to the point:

• Poser needs DAZ content because the Poser default figures and content quite frankly suck, are largely unsupported, and in general can't morph worth a damn. They also need Renderosity because their own store is about as popular as Spatula City (that is, not very). Yes, Poser has neat-o features like dynamics, IBL/AOL and the like... which only 5% of the userbase even bothers with. As long as that other 95% can get rendered their faeries, bouncy bare boobs, and other cutesie little suburban fantasies,  then that's sufficient for them. Dare to say I'm wrong? I point you to Renderosity's own galleries as evidence that I am right.

• DAZ needs Poser because there are too many established users of it to ignore fiscally, and unlike DAZ|Studio, Poser has the long-time brand recognition.

• Renderosity needs Poser, DAZ, and D|S to remain afloat because they damned well cannot hope to survive on just one. They need DAZ for the content and Poser for the userbase (because D|S users pretty much have their own forum, and a much more populated one to boot). Yes, I know Renderosity has support and open arms for damned near everything else out there CG-wise, but honestly? Who are we kidding here? Poser/DAZ is 95% of their business, if not more.

• RDNA is too small and specialized to survive without any of them.

• The others aren't even worth mentioning (including Content Paradise), at all. These entities would evaporate like a bowl of ice cream at ground zero of a thermonuclear blast if DAZ, Poser, and/or Renderosity were to suddenly die off. 

So you have these interdependent entities, and they all chafe like hell at it, but here's what each are doing:

DAZ, originally a spinoff of the CG modeling company Zygote, has been actively working to ensure their continued survival even if everyone else died off - that survival wouldn't be pretty, but they could (barely, if they were lucky) survive. Of all of them, this is where the greatest odds lay for Poserdom. Only time will tell if they manage it or not.

Poser has always been the ward of a larger company, and has been passed around from one to the next with only one exception (the Curious Labs phase). Metacreations, a brief stint as abandonware, a brief stint as its own deal (Curious Labs), EGISys, eFrontier, Smith Micro. It has cast its fate to corporate world, and as such, has the top priority of showing value to their owners and their owners' stockbrokers. 

Renderosity was originally a community website, but quickly became a corporate entity. Its entire survival rests on the survival and growth of DAZ and whatever company owns Poser at the moment. 

Content Paradise was originally eFrontier's idea of not being so dependent on Renderosity or DAZ for content. It's about as busy as a maternity ward in The Vatican.

Renderotica (let's be fair, after all)? We got one big fat factor, which need not be elaborated on due to its obviousness. It's certainly enough to keep the light bill paid, but if DAZ or Poser crapped out, the place would hurt pretty quickly, with not too much hope for survival long-term.

RDNA and everyone else? Couldn't stand on their own if they tried.  

==

So - with interdependence of all these entities proven beyond belief, where does it leave all that angsty, menopausal, catty, snide and otherwise overly dramatic bullcrap generated by a bunch of bored housewives with no lives?

Not in much of a position to be believed (let alone acted upon) outside of the usual cliques, I'm afraid. 

Sure, there are times when incredibly stupid things happen. Hell, Renderosity has a tradition of doing it every year, at around this time of year come to think of it.  DAZ does it nearly every time they release a new product or flagship figure, but it turns out that they tend to clean up the messes quickly enough when/if it effects the bottom line. Poser's owning company(whoever it is at the time) manages to do it whenever they release a new product (though to be fair, none since have been as bad or as ugly as the Poser 5 debacle). OTOH, even in these cases, the incidents are more easily attributable to incompetence than to malice.

It's a basic tenet of human organizations, and to those unused to the idea, it is a hell of a lot more common than you really want to know.

So... about that evidence of cloak-and-dagger? It'll be entertaining if you actually have it. Otherwise? Please realize that nobody really gives a damn outside the kaffee klatch in this thread (myself included) thinks about the oh-so-eeeeevil DAZ. Or Poser. Or Renderosity.

(edited to add links)

Yeah but that is the point to the whole matter, when someone disagrees with what is common place, you get the die hards with their inquisitions, the people that just voice their opinions, and could really care less what anyone has to say, and they martyrs, but based on experiance and thousands of years of this crap, where is evolution at, the paradox lies within, as well as on the outside, what one is embraced as savior becomes Satan in the end, as more and more cry for evil to conquer evil on the act of concious conclusions, where those say that those ideas are baseless and absurd, stare long and hard, now if the role was reversed, and you be the ones griping, this and that, then maybe you would see your advasary qualities straight on, instead of in fractals, opinions are opinions, if one has to hide what one says then the facts may be quite acurate, but then again one would have to think for themselves to see past glamours.

As for the whole forum issues, I have had posts removed for putting up a price in a commercial sale, while one of the diehards, did the same thing and it remained up without any removal, but then again that has no base since I am on the bottom of the food chain, so to say. But then again I must ask, you ask where the base is from... how can it be proven if it is hidden from sight, LIKE deleted from forums, you might say it is ignorant to say this or that but it is a view, a view is base enough for one, and an opinion is a reflection of what one thinks of the whatever said opinion is of, base enough, Based on the onslaught of opinions of those against anyone saying anything about the product in question, there is factual base proof, that they don't see or know of the base of the facts in which the "baseless" ones are speaking of, so when they say baseless, the mirror often reflects back, now whether you are pretty or hideous, that is all on you... I prefer, my cybergoth/black metal look.

Peng, you owe me a new keyboard.  Great - and funny - post.

but then again reality bends around the person weilding it.

Just one tiny correction to your superb diatribe, Mr Penguinisto.

95% of users may well get 'bare boobed furry faeries' but only the 5% of users who use dynamics will get 'bouncy' ones.

I'm not menopausal or amateur so that leaves... :huh:

Hey! I resemble that remark! 

So are there spies at gay mormon weddings?

Quote - ...what one is embraced as savior becomes Satan in the end, as more and more cry for evil to conquer evil on the act of concious conclusions, where those say that those ideas are baseless and absurd, stare long and hard, now if the role was reversed, and you be the ones griping, this and that, then maybe you would see your advasary qualities straight on....

We interrupt this existential journey for a commercial break, sponsored by Dramamine(tm)... 

Okay, I get the whole idea that all the corporate players are evil. To that, a simple answer can suffice: "we knew that." :) 

Quote - As for the whole forum issues, I have had posts removed for putting up a price in a commercial sale, while one of the diehards, did the same thing and it remained up without any removal, but then again that has no base since I am on the bottom of the food chain, so to say.

Oh, I wouldn't say that the old-timers get any breaks. I can put up a post that gets deleted in this joint so quickly, that you could almost hear server hard drive platters head-crashing from the shock wave. OTOH, it is part and parcel of how they do things here, and even the PTB here at Renderosity will admit to as much (sometimes if pressed). 'tis not rumor, and anyone who posts here with any regularity knows it.

'course, that's not really the issue at hand. Now the whole business of spies, mass-bannings, and the like? That makes for juicy reading, and even juicier rumors.

Quote - But then again I must ask, you ask where the base is from... how can it be proven if it is hidden from sight, LIKE deleted from forums...

Ah, but this is the Internet! This is where technology is just as much friend as enemy. Screenshots, collateral evidence (emails, sitemails, posts on other sites, etc), archive.org and Google Caches (if it hangs around enough)... it's not that hard or technically challenging to do, yanno?

So - we now return you to your regularly scheduled existential forays...

--

In Xanadu did Polly Gone, a pleasure dome, erect...

Quote -

So - with interdependence of all these entities proven beyond belief, where does it leave all that angsty, menopausal, catty, snide and otherwise overly dramatic bullcrap generated by a bunch of bored housewives with no lives?

So are you suggesting that Janl is a menopausal yet bored housewife with no life?

Do you have any real evidence of it?

Nobody thinks that DAZ has an espionage department: they don't even remotely have the resources to create it; for them is sufficient that some volonteers (aka delators) report on other users (I imagine 30$ coupons on some people's accounts).

Unfortunately the discussion is turning sour so I try to lighten it a bit with...

...something completely different...

...the dead parrot!

Check this thread on DAZ (no bashing, it is the announcement of a product ) and the raptured reaction (the real one, not the May reharsal) of Carrara users.

Do you feel cheated? no dead parrot? ...sorry, you'll have to live with a dead... program (name withheld but I give you a tiny help, it is the same of a Utah national park... that's right! MonumentValley.exe!)

Bye.

P.S.: who volonteers for the Holy Hand Grenade?

Quote - Nobody thinks that DAZ has an espionage department: they don't even remotely have the resources to create it; for them is sufficient that some volonteers (aka delators) report on other users

Yep, members, maybe with personal vendettas, spying on other members and then reporting back with, what appears to me to be, the sole intention to cause trouble. :(

While I agree with the substance of Peng's posts, your point there is something I wouldn't be surprised at.  There are some awfully petty and small minded people who seem to get very worked up over what are pieces of software for making pictures.  

A bit silly, if you ask me.  

Quote - While I agree with the substance of Peng's posts, your point there is something I wouldn't be surprised at.  There are some awfully petty and small minded people who seem to get very worked up over what are pieces of software for making pictures.  

A bit silly, if you ask me.  

I can agree to that in theory, and  definitely agree with your theory as to the motivation behind it. It's amazing just how abundant such evidence is for the latter theory, too.

OTOH, carrying the first theory through, and it stops making sense. Intellectual exercise time:  

As a business (any business), what use would one have for such information? The vast majority of it would be worthless, misconstrued (that is, heard wrong), made-up for some reason or other, unrelated, petty, or is otherwise unreliable stuff. Call it a rough estimate of 98% of the total.  The tiny fraction that actually has any use? The majority of that is readily available online (call it 1.5% of total), and the final tiny fraction that is actually useful information would be mostly tactical, with the juicy (and accurate!) strategic stuff making up maybe 0.1% of the inbound volume.

So basically, having some network o' spies, even volunteer ones, would still mean spending time and resources sorting through the chaff to get at those one or two juicy kernels of wheat.  Let's consider it a parallel to finding something on the order of Boris Vallejo, in the Rendo galleries, with a crappy search func- err, yeah, that.

Oh, and then you have to spend time verifying the information, then deciding on whether or not to base one's business decisions on it. Note that the petty BS like who posts what in which forum would have been filtered out long, long, long ago.

In all, in general it is too much work for too little reward, for any business that wants to remain financially profitable.

Penguinisto Clancy - you need to get some stuff published if you haven't already.

Also I want to know how the story ends.

Love esther

The cross-eyed busty maid did it in the temple, while wearing nothing but a sword. You can see it in the Gallery, err, somewhere...

nobody does it better, sometimes I really wish they would....

All good points, Peng.  I wouldn't be at all surprised if there aren't some vindictive souls contacting DAZ (and Rendo,RDNA, Rotica et al) with "dirt" on other forum posters, though.

I do, however, harbour doubts as to whether such things are acted on.  Most of the time.

I can speak from experience that I was banned from one site because I was a moderator here.  I was told as much by the site's owner.  None of the above mentioned, btw; not mentioning any names but it has the words "Forever" and "Posette" in there but not necessarily in that order.  :)  Admitted, there's no real comparison, since the other sites we're discussing are primarily sales oriented; I just presented it as an example of how silly some people are.

I like this idea that banning people from a forum is some great outrageous moral crime against humanity.  It's cute.

Quote - All good points, Peng.  I wouldn't be at all surprised if there aren't some vindictive souls contacting DAZ (and Rendo,RDNA, Rotica et al) with "dirt" on other forum posters, though.

I do, however, harbour doubts as to whether such things are acted on.  Most of the time.

Ditto on that one. I for one would damned sure not want to have to open the email inboxes of folks like Tim, Dan, Steve... none of those mofos. It would get old in a hurry.

==

Quote - I like this idea that banning people from a forum is some great outrageous moral crime against humanity.  It's cute.

...and where the hell is Stan Kalisch when you really need him, anyway? 

Is this the very small independent site?

FGPlus • View topic - FG Main Thread - Where the fun and info is

Have not read through much of the thread but I see banned 18 in sigs.

Saw the same thing earlier today... no real (or full) explanation, no nothing, anywhere.  If this was public, it should have been locatable somewhere on the site, or with screenshots, or...? 

Still reading through it for clues.

Edit - nope. Nothing by hysterical whining and ranting. :/