I thought I'd pop back in and add some more thoughts to the original question of why merchants continue to use MAT poses...

First, there's "interia": many merchants have been using MAT poses for years, they don't receive any complaints from customers, and they think their sales are decent. They tend to think things like "This is this the way I've been doing it for years, so why do I need to change?" or "I don't want to change the files in case this upsets customers and I lose sales." (Yes, there's little difference between a MAT pose and material collection file, but some merchants may be nervous like this.)

Second, how many top sellers will see this thread and change their ways? "Well, if a few people are complaining in the forum, then they must know better than someone who's been Vendor of the Month and Vendor of the Year for the past 5 years". Sorry for the sarcasm.
Seriously, though, I bet you could look at any of the top 25 best selling products and all of them would have MAT poses. So why haven't the top merchants switched to material collection files?
I'm sure this is because of point #1: they've been using MAT poses, and no one has complained, their products sell great, so why should they change their workflow?

In turn, if other merchants see that top sellers don't use material collection files, and their products are the best-selling on the site, why should they use material collection files? Sure, this is faulty logic since it takes more than MAT poses/ material collection files to make a great product, but still.

mc6 files can be created with one click and saved to the material library. The same thumbnail can be used from the mat pose and copied into the material library. Creating mc6 files takes a fraction of the time and clicks that creating mat pose files takes and there's no manual editing involved other than creating fancy thumbs for them.

The plus side to that is that it's easy for the end user to convert their mat poses to mc6 files without the need to use a 3rd party script or do any manual coding.

Thanks for the tip on the Camera file mats. Learn something new every day. 

As for polls, the best way to get the most people to answer a poll is to give them an incentive to do so. In Poser's case, that would likely be a free gift at the end of the poll/survey, or percentage points off in the marketplace(s) that hosted the polls. There are far more people that shop here than post here, and there are a lot of people who read these forums and never post a word. I receive PMs all the time from people who never post. 

The results from all participating sites would need to be combined and then factored in based on the total number of users on each site, but the poll would need to be hosted on one site and linked to from all participating sites in order to prevent duplicate results from the same users. 

Whenever polls are taken for voting demographics, for example, they don't call everyone in the region, they only call a handful of them - 1 - 10% or so, if that - and the estimates are based on those results (combined with other factors of course). 

But even if several thousand users answered a poll, I doubt it would make any difference on how most vendors package or market their content. They're going to continue doing the same thing they've always done until they decide for themselves that they should change, based on sales or what their own customers tell them, or what new trends they see developing, if they even bother to pay attention to those trends. 

That's my take on it anyway.

~Shane

I don't like having MAT poses in the Pose folder, but then I don't like 'read me' files under any name in the runtime.  I don't use Daz so I don't like Daz materials in my runtimes either.  That is my choice so I manually unzip the downloads and every few weeks I work through my runtimes making sure nothing slips through the net. 

As it is my choice I don't complain if some files are not in the place I want them.  Come to think of it I don't really complain if I don't like a product I just don't buy from that vendor again.  The only feedback I give is to credit the use of the product if I use it in a gallery render.

IIRC the difference between a .pz2 that changes material settings and an .mc6 that changes material settings is 2 lines at the top of the file. In all other respects they are identical. In fact you can switch them back and forth by changing those two lines and the extension. 

As for why they are in Poses? Tradition. Poser only had one place to put them originally, Poses, and that is still where most people look for them.

Quote - As it is my choice I don't complain if some files are not in the place I want them.  Come to think of it I don't really complain if I don't like a product I just don't buy from that vendor again.  The only feedback I give is to credit the use of the product if I use it in a gallery render.

The only problem with that approach is that unless you let the vendor know why you won't purchase from them again, they'll not consider that maybe they should change.

Would you change a part of your personality that people didn't like, if no one told you they didn't like it?

As far as MAT .pz2 files, I seem to recall it being mentions (by bagginsbill I think) that .pz2 files also contain information for stuff relevant to poses; like animation info, rotation, and translation data. Data that is completely unnecessary for a MAT file.

Yep, I see your point that if I don't complain the vender will not change but in many cases there is little point.  If there is a little problem that is easily sorted then it does not seem to be worth the bother, particularly if it is one of those negatives that others might see as a plus.  To the other extreme the product just does not work or is so far off being ready for the market that you wonder how it made it through for sale in the first place.  These days that is rearly the case but when I first started buying it was not uncommon. 

On the rare occasion I have tried to give critical feedback it has been a waste of my time.  For example, the product that I put off buying for a long while because it looked low quality in the promos.   In a moment of madness I purchased it and it was quite brilliant.  I did email the vendor saying I liked the product but felt that they might be loosing sales due to the promos not reflecting the quality of the product.  Result - nothing, renders remained the same and no reply.  I could even have accepted if there was not reply but the promos changed. 

Still I am taking this thread off track so I will leave it at that and bury my head back behind the monitor.