A recent surge (yeah, I'm calling two people a surge) of interest in my freestuff characters has forced me to, once again, check my links and make sure they work. They still do. Not only do they work, they are working at the rate of about 40 kbps. In other words, they down in about 3 seconds on a cable modem. Both items display a thumbnail. This applies not only to my stuff, but most likely everthing in freestuff: If you can see a thumbnail for the item you want, the link most likely works. The thumbs are almost always stored on the same server the items are. The only time a problem truly exists is when you can't see a thumbnail. This means the server is down or the items have been removed from the server for whatever reason. It is at this time the person who posted them should be contacted. By the time you actually contact the artist, it is more likely that the artist has already lost all faith in humanity, having expected to see his/her creations lovingly used in actual renders. Six to twelve months out, this is usually not the case. Thousands of downloads and maybe two renders. Therefore, it is NOT a good idea to send an ill-toned letter to the creator making demands and accusations about files not working. If you see a thumbnail, keep trying and remain patient. If not, keep communication brief and polite and avoid IM's in favor of regular emails. -WTB

I am not sure if I ever downloaded any of your stuff. It doesn't matter. I want to thank you for being kind and generous enough to share your fine work for free. That is an invaluable service that helps many people work with Poser when they perhaps could not afford to buy something. People should communicate with you respectfully. Heck, everyone deserves respect, even if they didn't produce something for Free Stuff. I almost didn't answer your post because I wanted to avoid yet another controversy. Let me state the reality that I've experienced since getting Poser, and since I first got on the Internet. If there is a problem downloading your free stuff, there is a problem with your server. Unfortunately many people can't afford to pay for a web server. That is understandable. The classic problem with web servers is that they don't want a lot of traffic. So if they get a lot of hits, people can't download the free stuff. I've actually seen some web site servers post a message saying to come back in awhile because this site has been taken out of commission for awhile. All too many generous artists lose their free web site hosts, and continue to look for another free server. Then we have generous people who consider paying for a web site host in order to give away free stuff. Let's get back to the real points here. In the past I downloaded all sorts of fine super heros which I showcased on my site. I let everyone know the superheroes were showcased there, but I doubt any artists bothered to go see their creations in action. Sometimes we get something that fits in with a current project or one we have in the near future. Sometimes we don't find an appropriate project for weeks or months. That is just the way it works. 1.) Thank you for your generosity. 2.) I hope to get whatever it is you're offering. 3.) If I use one of your creations, I will be glad to send a polite email. I hope you clearly list your name and contact information in your readme file. Too often fine artists fail to provide that information, or the information is months or years old.

thank you for the advice. I would like to state that I am really appreciative of the free stuff offerings. A lot of time I download things that I plan to use for an image. In this way I have a large library of objects that allow me to make many different images that I could not have done before. I think that the fact that there are a number of downloads is a compliment to the freestuff artist even if the items do not immediately show up. One reason is that as a beginner I downloaded objects that I am only now using after I am more experienced. It took me a while to figure out objaction mover for one, and how to import objects.

WTB - Don't feel bad about it. Don't feel exasperated about my long-winded comment, either, just hate to see you give up freestuff for any other reason than satisfaction with what you've achieved. Personally, I've never been savaged by anyone because of d/l problems. All right, I have the good fortune to have a nice lady like Shadowcat hosting my humble stuff, so I hear of few d/l problems (but I don't think she's heard of too many, either). I have had a few comments about the shortcomings of my stuff (edges on clothes too thick, why no tex's, this'd be far better w/ some morphs, etc.), but almost everyone has been polite and constructive so far. When the tone sharpens I usually chalk it up to disappointment - they spend the bandwidth to d/l some stuff because they expect it to be useful, but it might turn out to be lacking in quality or functionality, or whatever. That doesn't make me feel guilty in any way, ss long as there's no actual errors or bugs in my stuff. I did it for fun, they got it for free, and I'll listen to any suggestion for improvement. If a suggestion sounds like fun, I might do it, if it doesn't, I won't. That's the freedom that comes from not trying to sell one's stuff - you get to create what, when, where and as much or as little as you care to. You offer it to the community, no strings attached, and if someone thinks it stinks, well, duh, as I think you americans say. And if someone actually likes it, well, that's icing on the cake. As to the statistics - went to galleries and freestuff and did some calculator tapping. My renders-to-download ratio indicates that for every 1000 people that d/l an item, one of them uses it in a render that appears in the galleries (at least a "credited render", I can only turn up that kind when searching for my name). So if that ratio indicates that one's stuff is at the bottom of the heap, then welcome to the club ;o) If it's a fairly standard ratio (as I suspect it is), well, listen to the above comments. A lot of d/l's are done just-in-case (don't you do those, too?). I think we all share the problem that there's far too few hours in a day for all the great pics we have in our heads, just tripping over each other to get out. And I still get a warm, comfy feeling of shameless self-satisfaction in my growing paunch whenever I see that my stuff did its bit to help someone releasing one of those images 8o)

Oh, I don't feel bad folks! When I posted Buffy and Marilyn Volumes 2.0, I was already very well aware of Thip's ratio theory. I mention the "bitterness" as an aside, that a lot of freestuff creators go through. The real issue I'm trying to address boils down to this: If you see a thumbnail, then the file is there you just have to be patient and keep trying. If there is no thumbnail, then there's a real problem...be polite and brief and use email, not 'osity IM's. Keeping all this in mind should allieviate some of the pain for both uploader and downloader alike. As for me, I'll be sharing more stuff as soon as Mike 2.0. -WTB, whose links still work just fine at 40 kbps

Another solution is to keep your website and the downloads on different servers to divide the traffic. Before Renderosity permitted web page links, I found a free web provider that hasn't yet disabled remote linking and moved the downloads and thumbnails there. That site has next to no pages and none are linked to from anywhere, so it gets no web traffic. In the long run, I think remote linking is dead in the water for free sites. It rapes the business model those sites use, and all it takes is a two-line Apache server directive to nip that in the bud: deny from all allow from (webhost's domain) I requested that Renderosity do as the other sites have done and host the thumbnails. This would make your testing method useless, unfortunately, but it would also broaden the kinds of places people could host their downloads (e.g. a Yahoo! club, group or briefcase) with a page link but no remote links for thumbnails. My guess is that TPTB here are still evaluating the extra bandwidth that a page of 12 200x200 thumbnails would generate. (I'd say 360K on average or less)

I like freestuff and thank everyone that puts their time and effort in a model or texture, then give it to the community. Renderosity said they had freestuff thumbs on the "to do list" so maybe it will happen sometime :) Right now I use Tripod to host my free stuff w/o thumbs and havent had any problems (that I know of) with files being downloaded. I have never gotten any feedback on my freestuff here. But at the Commune they have a feedback section under the DLs--which would be great here-- and I've got a few there. As far as the DL to pic ratio I know what you mean, I've seen 1 image using my freestuff. Not that I am complainimg. I dont care if I get credit on anything but I would love to get some feedback. How do I know if it works right? or if anyone likes it?

regarding bad links and webspace Many people can't afford the websapace neccasary to keep downloads live and freeservers don't appreciate the massive bandwidth usage of our stuff. There are a few people who donate webspace and IMHO they deserve medals. (Thanks Trent!) My website (with all my DLs) currently takes more than 100 megs - if I had to pay for all my storage, I'd have a lot less up. I've had some server problems and link issues recently, and I really do prefer a polite message to a rude one. Much more likely to get me to actuallyu do something about it - after all, I'm not getting paid for this, you know? As a texture artist it gives me such a kick to see something of mine pop up in the galleries. I do try to keep an eye out for my textures, just to see what's been done with them, and usually try to comment on those pieces. I'm also collecting images made with textures (just to have as a record for myself) For people who use freestuff, if you use a free thing (as a major part of your image) why not ask the orig artist if they'd like a copy of the render? Someone just sent me a whole slew of images with Brendan - I thought it was so cool to see my boy in action. :) And of course Bloodsong had done some lovely things with my Michael textures :) So even if you don't think your render is good enough to post, consider 'tipping' the freestuff artist with it :) (But always ask before you send!) Lyrra "Why make 2 when you can make 20?" Madril