How interesting.  Apparently DAZ is playing with what I've been talking about. See 'DAZ Studio Online.'

http://devcenter.gizmoz.com/newsite/digimiCreator/digimiCreator.html?mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9wsRonuazNZKXonjHpfsX66%2BsuUKWg38431UFwdcjKPmjr1YIFRMB0dvycMRAVFZl5nRlWE/SML4Q%3D 

Now it's obviously just a bare beginning, I assume that's why it's in 'devcenter' - the rendering doesn't seem to work and the content is minimal, I don't even know where if if the plan to do a full service - but it's interesting indeed.

Add the entire DAZ content library, account management, storage, render farm infrastructure etc. and you have something that might be pretty compelling for some people. If you tie it in with the application on your local machine it might be possible to start a scene at home, upload just the description of the content, lighting, poses etc. and then continue working on it from anywhere or vice versa. You would only need to buy DAZ content if you wanted to have a local copy.

One problem I see is non DAZ content. Maybe vendors would allow DAZ to host their content if they got a workable per use fee. Otherwise, maybe some arrangement could be made to upload it in with a key so that only the purchaser could use it. With data deduplication, there would still only need to be one copy of any one item. Many potential issues to work out

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