Quote - Never been a lot of $$$ in a hobbyist anykind of business.
There's millions in movies.
There's MILLIONS in games.

While doing some research for an economics paper two years ago I found the following numbers, ...the movie industry made 8.5 billion dollars US (and yes that's BILLION!), the gaming industry made 8.3 billion, and coming in right in the middle was 'adult entertainment' at 8.4 billion dollars.     The economy may stink but it's obvious from the steady growth in these industries that folks are turning to other forms of entertainment.  The 3D hobbiest is no longer a burgeoning industry; rather it's a steadily growing pastime with Poser leading the way (arguably).  In the Poser NNTP usenet group (yes, folks are still in the newsgroups) we frequently post 'Poser sightings' when someone notices a Poser made animation on TV or the net.  This demonstrates that folks are starting to use it commercially.  I've even started making short animations to use at work for our aircrew training packages.    This is BIG...and Poser is at the forefront.  Someone here posted recently that there's a million folks registered with the forum...doesn't sound like it's shrinking at all.