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)