DAZ has a deserving reputation of releasing good figures (as it is generally true concerning the history of the Victoria line) and supporting them, with merchants on board on site that are willing to do the same.  They are willing to do buyouts put those products under the originals banner, which even if its made by someone esle, shows direct support by the company.  They have a mix of low and high price items to support the figure.  The base figure, itself, is free, so there's no risk to check it out.

Merchants at other sites know DAZ reputation and make items also, knowing that they are going to have a better than average shot at doing well.

It all builds speed from there.  Galleries, Freebies, products from all over.

I don't really think it has to do with piles of freebies over an extended period, but I respect your opinion.  I think it more has to do with offering a free or low-cost version of the base figure, which makes the figure accessible and risk-light to check out - I think that's a primary step.  Then it has to do with offering features, from the start, that are competitive to other figures on the market.  Have the morph packs ready to go, the catsuit, a basic wardrobe and so on (they don't have to be free).  You don't have to have every single miniscule thing in there but enough that it shows what direction you are going in.  Then you have to support your own figure with addons and packs, even if they are buyouts or sourced to developers to take care of.  Water the seed, nuture it, take care of the plant that sprouts forth.

Now, of course, where we are at now with V4 has to do with history.  The landscape was different when V4 was released and several years afterwards.  There were no alternate rigging systems so everything was done in spheres.  Now, we have a large fragmentation between the various figures, how they are composed, what they will work in and to what extent.  Everything was more or less cross-compatible between the systems.

Now it's a scenario where there are significant numbers of users using older versions of Poser (this percentage also varies per site) or sticking with V4 because across all the versions, they likely feel there is more bang for their time spent and unless folks feel there is something compelling and competitive with any new figures that come out, it's probably where it's going to stay.

I don't really feel that tying a new figure directly into a release of Poser is really going to do it because that's more about using the figure as a selling point for the program, that requires an investment, instead of releasing the figure into their marketplace with a free or lite version.  What would be better, IHMO, to have an advanced version as a selling point for Poser with accessories and clothes or whatnot as new content and go that way instead.  Otherwise have the figure accessible to a larger audience, even if it's limited to Poser 9+.

The way I personally feel as a creative artist...  I'm not going to sit around and rig stuff in spherical zones  when I have weight-mapping to play with and I feel is superior on many different levels - more of a huge preference than a rule, BTW.  I'm going to tap into modern features (Poser modern, not what the rest of the planet is involved with) if I can, going back at least one version or so, if possible.  When Poser 11 comes out, we'll have 3 versions to tap into, just concerning weighting, dependent parameters and SSS.  That at least gives a common ground between the versions and you can add higher features for higher versions of the program as options or whatnot.

Hope this thread doesn't spiral out and stays calm. :)

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