Since I have not seen anyone comment on it, I thought I would.

If you do not have V4, it is no longer free.  http://www.daz3d.com/i/shop/itemdetails/?item=4783

Bill

Which shows that DAZ is saying switch to D|S4/Genesis or leave, to the free(down)loaders isn't it ?

Well now, let's see how well that works for them.

If I remember correctly they were starting to take the figures off freestuff. Saw it coming.

Also, lets keep this thread nice. Just a early warning.

Ah yes, the beginning of the end. It's been a nice ride :).

Laurie

Isn't this par for the course?  When V4, M4 etc. came out, V3, M3, etc. stopped being free.

BTW, I heard somewhere that M5 textures work on M4.  Is that true?  Would make it easier for merchants who want to support both.

V3, M3, etc. stopped being free.

*thats not exactly true ....

Quote - Isn't this par for the course?  When V4, M4 etc. came out, V3, M3, etc. stopped being free.

BTW, I heard somewhere that M5 textures work on M4.  Is that true?  Would make it easier for merchants who want to support both.

Nope, wrong. All the base figures became free at some point...had nothing to do with the release of any figure. They were using the base figures as loss leaders.

I guess they figure they no longer need them.

Laurie

*Kimberly dear, nice try.. :-)

Perhaps all this will end now.

DAZ figures in DS, and Poser figures in Poser.

Finally things begin to make sense. :-)

1+1 will be 2 again.

Aaaah, what a relief, I can go to sleep now. Safe and sound.*

Happy Posering to ya all my dearest friends.

Or??
"Male5" does not like the free competition.

He is kicking them out. LOL....

Didn't know about it.  Doesn't affect me.

Quote - *Kimberly dear, nice try.. :-)

Perhaps all this will end now.

DAZ figures in DS, and Poser figures in Poser.

Finally things begin to make sense. :-)

1+1 will be 2 again.

Aaaah, what a relief, I can go to sleep now. Safe and sound.*

Happy Posering to ya all my dearest friends.

Ok... you have me confused. What is the point of this post? This thread is regarding Poser. V4.2 is a Poser figure too.

It's 12 minutes past  8pm here.  I give this thread until 9:30.  Really.

I'm really not understanding why it seems you guys want this thread to go south. If you want it to go downhill, it will.

We are adults and all pretty smart, you call know what is good and bad to post.THINK before you post. Anyone that tries to turn this thread bad will be given a warning(in private).

erm.. no, I don't want it to go south at all. my reply was not even close to causing that.

it wasn't until 1 certain person decided to play bait the Mod that it started going south.

I wasn't talking about you Khai.  And your wrong.. its not gone south. :)

Quote - I'm really not understanding why it seems you guys want this thread to go south. If you want it to go downhill, it will.

We are adults and all pretty smart, you call know what is good and bad to post.THINK before you post. Anyone that tries to turn this thread bad will be given a warning(in private).

I don't want it to go south, either.  I'm making a prediction based on just about every other DAZ related thread in here lately.  

I may be outspoken at times but I don't think I'm irresponsible. 

Hello good evening from Belgium.

I was just trying to be nice and logical.
Not fishing, not trying to do anything.

To compare;

A Mercedes engine belongs in a Mercedes car.
A BMW engine belongs in a BMW car.

Both have good engines and both have good cars. But do not mix them.

So perhaps, in a long and distant future; DAZ models in DS, and Poser figures in Poser.

Ah, life could be so easy.

Greetings to you all,
Tony

Not going North or South, East or west.
But going to bed after a long day.
Sleep tight.

As it is about V4 it is also very much related to Poser and I don't want to see this go south any more than any other thread but if it does start slipping I would like it to be moved, locked or deleted before it gets personal rather than after.

Having said all that, and based on recent history, a very early reminder to 'play nice' does not go amiss. 

Quote - Hello good evening from Belgium.

I was just trying to be nice and logical.
Not fishing, not trying to do anything.

To compare;

A Mercedes engine belongs in a Mercedes car.
A BMW engine belongs in a BMW car.

Both have good engines and both have good cars. But do not mix them.

So perhaps, in a long and distant future; DAZ models in DS, and Poser figures in Poser.

Ah, life could be so easy.

Greetings to you all,
Tony

Not going North or South, East or west.
But going to bed after a long day.
Sleep tight.

Whut?  Zygote - the former owners of DAZ - made the native Poser figures.  

Anyhow, I don't see anything wrong with making figures cross compatible; it seems silly to cut out half your market when people have little enough money to start with.

I'm assuming that's what you're getting at.

Still, what DAZ does is nobody's business but their own.  Pun intended. 

Actually this makes sense to me. If you are no longer going to be able to sell to a market (Poser users not being able to use Genesis) then you charge for any products you have that ARE usable to that market (V4/M4). Economics 101. 

"If you do not have V4, it is no longer free"

Well, looking at solely the Poser side of things, that should provide some extra incentive for competing figures, especially considering a $30 regular price.  Outstanding!  Savvy designers should be able to benefit from this.

Quote - Actually this makes sense to me. If you are no longer going to be able to sell to a market (Poser users not being able to use Genesis) then you charge for any products you have that ARE usable to that market (V4/M4). Economics 101. 

I don't see it.  Maybe a Poser compatible V5/M5 package but not a model which has been free for most of its release.  Considering most people who want it will already have it, I doubt there will be many sales, particularly since the model and mesh has been roundly slated ever since it first appeared.

Still, if they make a few bucks off it now and again it may justify the server space. :) 

Existing poser users have had enough time to get their "free" copy of V4 and many new users will get the V4 Installer files from  the warez/file sharing communities and will justify it buy saying
they refuse to pay for something that used to be given away free of charge.

The same will happen if DAZ studio pro4 ever becomes a "paid"app again

You can NOT stuff your free toothpaste back into the tube and expect people to happily start paying for it.

Cheers

Quote - You can NOT stuff your free toothpaste back into the tube and expect people to happily start paying for it.

Cheers

Something tells me they know that ;). Maybe they're looking to retire her. Who knows.

Laurie

I didn't say it woukld work. I simply am guessing that is their mindset.

It will add value to the DAZ book for sure :)

Bill

"Maybe they're looking to retire her. Who knows."

Seems rather simple to me.
The new price is a "Surcharge" for them providing continued tech support for a product line they consider vestigial.

As a free "loss leader" they got their returns on the sales of V4 specific by products
(Character sets, slutwear etc.)

There will be no more "Daz originals" for the Gen4 figures  and
any new content will have to come from Risk taking third parties.

IMHO this pretty much kills the V4/M4 "weightmapping" movement unless  poser merchants take up the mantle of providing all new content for the older models.

Cheers

I feel that by pricing it now, after having it free for a long time, is simply a deterrent.  Is it a trying to move folks towards Genesis?  Yep.  I'm not attacking Genesis either.  It's their properties and they can do as they like.  They can price V4 at $100 if they want.  Doesn't bother me.  Is it interesting to watch?  Yep! :)

I don't think its a servicing charge at all.  They made their money on it many times over, both in original accessories and their brokered content share.

They've done this with the other figure lines and those, IMHO, were deterrents too.  So it wasn't a matter of "if", it was a matter of "when". 

One would think that the more ppl buying at your store the better, but I guess not...lol.

Laurie

Some of you worry too much :) Give it a few months and it'll be free again, then all the folks that bought it will complain about paying for it. Bit later, it'll go back on sale again and the cycle repeats. Look at V3 and V4 for that. Thats the model and if works fair play to daz. Indeed watch out for M5 as a freebie in a few months time. Unless someones desperate to "must have" the lastest toy. It seems the trick is to be patient, wait wait until it's a freebie and then getting it.

I could have sworn v3 was for pay when I first started poser. I might be wrong with that. I know the v2 one was. They seem to bounce back and forth. Who knows what their buisness model is. It's likely this stuff is all dictated on how they need the books to look.

Chances are they are still trying to encourage people to switch to genesis. They spent all this money to create it. They want people to use it.

Yes. I paid for the V3 base for sure.  Back then, making something like that free afterwards didn't sting so much because Daz regularly had some wicked sales. Of course, as a newbie to the Platinum Club back then, I also felt happily overwhelmed with tons of very cheap content.  I'm not sure how such a move of switching back and forth from paid to free would fly these days.

It's probably a smart move by Daz.  If you want to stimulate adoption of your newest version, ending support for the old ones seems standard these days, and as Red Phantom says, there may well be solid accounting reasons.  One way to get Genesis to take up an increased % of sales is to reduce the % of Gen 4 bases.

Of course, a free V4 did make her extremely popular.  My brow furrows slightly at the thought that she will no longer be quite the target for content creators as she was when free -- and one wonders whether Daz might do something drastic and vault their old bases on the grounds that the shapes are now available for Genesis.  That might put a halt on Gen 4 content production...

I don't think it matters that long time users already have a copy of the bases.  New users are surely the ones driving the market for repeated iterations of the same tiny bikini, for instance, because it can't be the people who already have ten tiny bikinis buying their eleventh that make such content so profitable, can it?

I recall V3 being 99 or summat like that, then 50, price varied and then free. Which was a smart move. Though with genesis it's academic for me personally as I only use poser. Yes I hear genesis can work in that, but it requires some tweaking. Some days I've got barely time enough to fart, let alone waste time tinkering. So I won't buy that stuff, instead I'll buy something that I knows works with no hassle.

"It's probably a smart move by Daz.  If you want to stimulate adoption of your newest version, ending support for the old ones seems standard these days, and as Red Phantom says, there may well be solid accounting reasons.  One way to get Genesis to take up an increased % of sales is to reduce the % of Gen 4 bases."

I agree.

Cheers

"It's probably a smart move by Daz.  If you want to stimulate adoption of your newest version, ending support for the old ones seems standard these days, and as Red Phantom says, there may well be solid accounting reasons.  One way to get Genesis to take up an increased % of sales is to reduce the % of Gen 4 bases."

I agree.

Cheers

Now SM REALLY needs to step up to the plate and make TRULY comparable figures. Not the kind of crap (sorry guys) that's come with Poser since version 7 (Jesse and James weren't that bad). And while I love Miki 1020, she had a ton of problems. And Miki 2 and 3, while nice, are still Asian figures only. We need a figure that will go from one to another and with the morphs to do so. SM just may have to go into the content business full bore...lol.

A word on Anastasia. I like her a lot. Perhaps SM should think about making a figure that looks close to that out of the box, rather than horse-faced and butt-ugly Alyson and Ryan with nice morphs ;).

Oops...swore I was gonna be nice..lol.

Laurie

Well there is some super secret figure project underway that has bagginsbill under NDA
from the thread it seems they are going to give ryan the "Anastasia" treatment or intro a new weightmapped Male figure all together that will shake the industry and be a game changer.

Cheers

Quote -

IMHO this pretty much kills the V4/M4 "weightmapping" movement unless  poser merchants take up the mantle of providing all new content for the older models.

Cheers

I dont think that follows at all.  v4/M4 Weightmapping projects are efforts aimed at giving poser 9/pp2012 users a weightmapped figure that can leverage their existing libraries.  A price on v4/m4 base changes that purpose in no way.  

Quote - Now SM REALLY needs to step up to the plate and make TRULY comparable figures. Not the kind of crap (sorry guys) that's come with Poser since version 7 (Jesse and James weren't that bad). And while I love Miki 1020, she had a ton of problems. And Miki 2 and 3, while nice, are still Asian figures only. We need a figure that will go from one to another and with the morphs to do so. SM just may have to go into the content business full bore...lol.

A word on Anastasia. I like her a lot. Perhaps SM should think about making a figure that looks close to that out of the box, rather than horse-faced and butt-ugly Alyson and Ryan with nice morphs ;).

Oops...swore I was gonna be nice..lol.

Laurie

Agree. Alyson and Ryan do not even look human to me. I'm astounded that Anastasia shares any DNA with either one of them.

Quote - > Quote -

IMHO this pretty much kills the V4/M4 "weightmapping" movement unless  poser merchants take up the mantle of providing all new content for the older models.

Cheers

 

I dont think that follows at all.  v4/M4 Weightmapping projects are efforts aimed at giving poser 9/pp2012 users a weightmapped figure that can leverage their existing libraries.  A price on v4/m4 base changes that purpose in no way.  

Actually it does. Because it throws a barrier to entry for any one new to 3D.  Previously in order to get the tools to weightmap V4, you just went to DAZ, got a free download of V4 then used the tool. With the $30+ that new users have to pay for V4 and morphs ++, new users now have to weigh paying that amount to get to that functionality. I would have never gotten into 3D if I didn't see that advertisement for downloading M4 for free... and the economy was in much better shape. In this economy, people will weigh paying $30+ to try out a figure that they may not use. And if you don't get enough users and vendors to support your product, it will die off. Also, if no one buys that $30 V4, then it can be said by DAZ no one is using it, and throw the figure right into the vault.

Now the "get your free V4" no longer works to push the WM Gen 4 figures; now new users have to pay for the priviledge to try a communty project.

When I beta tested 2012, I was disappointed because there was nothing really to showcase Poser's new weightmapping features. Ryan and Alyson were really horrible choices to showcase the technology, and they are horrible to morph...at least James and Jessi should have been the ones to weightmapped.

Yeah, am still to this day not sure why they abandoned James and Jesse for Alyson and Ryan. Must be a licensing thing I guess. James was probably the last half decent figure to come out of Poser for awhile, besides the extra purchases like Miki, etc.

Laurie

I must be misremembering. I thought they announced some months ago that the free base figures were being returned to paid - so this isn't exactly 'news.' Some folks will buy them, some won't. Dogs bark and the caravan moves on as they say :-)

the weightmap projects have nothing to do with trying to gain or keep market share for those figures.  They are entirely about giving something to the community of existing users.  A stop gap and bridge until other, better figures can be put in place.  Their purpose is served regardless if any person buys the gen 4 figures ever again.

The gen 4 figures were chosen for weightmap support not because they are great figures that the crew wanted to see endure, but because they are so pervasively entrenched in peoples runtimes.  In fact the eroding of the 'new user' base for these figures only strengthens the incentive for vendors to support and companies to better support other figures that are designed for poser.  This moves, in my eyes, just marks Dazs exit from the poser figure market and I'm perfectly OK with that

Quote - Yeah, am still to this day not sure why they abandoned James and Jesse for Alyson and Ryan. Must be a licensing thing I guess. James was probably the last half decent figure to come out of Poser for awhile, besides the extra purchases like Miki, etc.

Laurie

I'm not sure that James and Jessi were abandoned exactly.  I recall reading one of the SM guys saying that p9 was a features update and they didn't alot very much resources to content.  I think I remember in the same post him saying that he would have liked to have put more time into Ryan and Alyson as well.

I guess I'm being optimistic but I see it as an opportunity.  It throws a barrier but only slightly.  This is certainly an attempt (IMHO) to pave the road to DS and Genesis but it could have the opposite effect of folks exploring the content in their runtimes and seeing what is out there in the way of alternatives.  There are several figures that are free, cheap or come with a price but are loaded with goodies.

There are a ton of free figures in Poser, especially if you explore everything that is there: Sydney, James, Jessi, etc.  This is a great opportunity to touch up those figures or weight map them or whatever.

It might even spur more folks on to exploring the idea of content creation.  It can be a winning scenario. 

Back in 2001 Vicky 1 and Mike 1 were $59.95 each.

Textures were sold separately at $24.95 each.

Clothing set you back another $34.95 for each.

There was no "DAZ Studio" around and Poser was the only game in town.

Vicky and Mike had so few clothes that DAZ had to create additional Mike-P4 and Vicky-P4 figures that could wear Dork and Posette clothing.

Posette and Dork OTOH were free with each copy of Poser.

They had a large default wardrobe, "casual" versions and a lot of freebie textures and clothing. Morphs and cr2s could be freely shared as everybody had them.

Still people rather gave DAZ their last cent than be caught with one of Poser's native figures.

And the same has been true for all consecutive generations of figures.

Yes, laugh all you can about DAZ' marketing. Yes, I had my share of laughs about them in the past, too.

But right now, I don't feel like laughing anymore.

Not at all.

Download.com still carries the free content for Daz Studio, and that might still contain the free V3 and M3 figures.  

From a business perspective, the price of the V4 and M4 figures should make them more expensive compared to the new V5 and M5 Genesis figures, so new customers will choose cheaper newer versions - I am guessing !

I have had it with the catch-up game.  Not going to be dragged along to use newer figures from Daz.  Quite happy to use older DAZ figures, as well as those which come with Poser.  May have to manually tweak some things, but I'm comfortable, and just want to have fun with my digital art.

Even for non-controversial items like animals, scenes and plants I have found Daz expensive lately. I look around carefully now before buying, and also decide whether I could have made the item myself. I buy less and less from Daz.

I am a hobbyist, but only partly. I got into 3d for business reasons, to produce graphics for training materials. When I original bought Poser Pro (I think it was in 2007 or 2008), it never occurred to me that I should use figures from Daz.  I happily snapped up every G2 figure, and bought lots of characters and clothes for them. OK, I was ignorant about the industry. What made me eventually start using Daz figures was buying a Poserworld membership. When the Daz base figures became free, I happily bought morph sets and textures for them to take advantage of the clothes at Poserworld and the freebies here and at ShareCG. Over the years I have collected over 360 characters for V3, and about the same number for V4. I still use the G2 figures a lot in spite of that. They suit my purpose, especially with the career wear available for them.

I now have a lot of utilities for Poser to help me create my own content (thank you PhilC). That strengthens my commitment to Poser.

Daz just doesn't represent good value any more. I still sometimes look at their store when I need an item. I often find a better deal somewhere else, so I don't end up buying there so much any more. They need to look at their value proposition holistically.

The majority of things released in other stores as DAZ is still for V4 and is a LOT cheaper as items for genesis. For newcomers the additional cost for V4 pales to what they have to spend on clothing and hair if they want to have a decent wardrobe. That has never changed. But even so, the route with a paid version of V4 and non-DAZ stores is probably a lot cheaper as the genesis route at the DAZ store.

Wheter it is a sign of good marketing to alienate a good portion of your customers to lure in new customers is something only time will tell, but it does not help your reputation. The ones who are really feeling the pain in the short run are the smaller vendors because of the split market.

Quote - I am a hobbyist, but only partly. I got into 3d for business reasons, to produce graphics for training materials. When I original bought Poser Pro (I think it was in 2007 or 2008), it never occurred to me that I should use figures from Daz.  I happily snapped up every G2 figure, and bought lots of characters and clothes for them. OK, I was ignorant about the industry. What made me eventually start using Daz figures was buying a Poserworld membership. When the Daz base figures became free, I happily bought morph sets and textures for them to take advantage of the clothes at Poserworld and the freebies here and at ShareCG. Over the years I have collected over 360 characters for V3, and about the same number for V4. I still use the G2 figures a lot in spite of that. They suit my purpose, especially with the career wear available for them.

I now have a lot of utilities for Poser to help me create my own content (thank you PhilC). That strengthens my commitment to Poser.

Daz just doesn't represent good value any more. I still sometimes look at their store when I need an item. I often find a better deal somewhere else, so I don't end up buying there so much any more. They need to look at their value proposition holistically.

Actually I think they have. Think about what you posted. You're a hobbyist and probably don't have a lot of money to spend on content. If you want your content business to thrive, who do you need? 

People with money to spend and not trained to expect stuff for free or heavily discounted. How do you do that? Bring in new users to replace the ones not paying then have set prices for item so they see things they want have a set price to them. So then those new customers not only buy new stuff, but then start going through the old stuff to and buy it... even at full price. I know that been happening at my store.

What I've seen a lot in the past are very vocal people that want things, yet have no money to actually pay for those things. It OK to want things from a company as a consumer.... but being a consumer means once those things are available, you pay for them then; not wishlist them for later... that defeats the purpose of demanding a supply of a product. Because if you don't the company will start listening to those who are actually paying and weed out the ones that aren't. If you're doing your shopping at other places instead of theirs, they'll charge for those things that used to be free that people just only ran into the store to get and run out... and start catering to those actually in the store shopping and buying. That's pretty much simple business there.