{{{{X2000: Ouch. I thought Russ and Mehndi were trying to swim against the tide of rampant commercialism? All that talk about building a store where the artists get a bigger cut and the site pretty much only keeps enough to cover its costs...}}}} Our goal was to manage to make back for the artists of DAZ the income they were losing when some of their products had to be removed from DAZ's main store, and due to overcrowding other equally fine products had to be rejected just for lack of space issues to be able to still take mainstream "bestsellers". Thus our idea of paying artists the highest percentage possible for the site to still stay afloat. We chose this idea as our initial path we could foresee due to the fact that as realists, we understood that a tiny backwater site with few members would not get alot of eyeballs to draw in large volume sales. Now we were presented an alternate Path to the same end goal by DAZ, and after LONG consideration and weighing of all factors with our staff working with us to weigh out the pros and cons, we chose this path, since it achieves the same end goal MUCH faster. {{{{X2000}}}}} And Daz couldn't just open forums, they had to BUY them?!?!? By buying ready to use forums, as you pointed out later, which I will address, DAZ has aquired a site that is already up and running successfully. This has shortened their path to achieving their end goal, just as their offer to us shortened our path of achieving our end goal. {{{{X2000}}}} So this is going to be the B-class Daz cast-offs? Come on, like Daz couldn't just expand their store if they needed more room. DAZ has chosen to not expand their existing store interface due to the fact that if they did so, soon it would face the same overcrowding problems that Renderosity's Marketplace does. Each artist would stand to lose in this way who brokers through DAZ. By keeping the main store site small, they can give maximum exposure to each artist who was present. It is a business decision that I support as a DAZ broker. However it DID create a need for a new secondary High Quality store as a place that DAZ brokers, and those wishing to broker with DAZ in the future, can turn to. {{{{X2000}}}} I still can't help feeling very disappointed. I hear you X2000. I do believe you feel disappointed, and in time, I hope we manage to regain your faith and trust. We know you put your trust in us, and that right now you feel it may have been misplaced. I am sensitive to that, and am available at any time to talk to you on it privately. You are a friend whom I value and respect and wish to keep as a friend. {{{{ChuckEvans: DAZ "appropriated" PoserPros...they got good and dedicated people with good sense. And a ready-made forum...I don't think Russel and Mehndi "sold out". I think they made a decision that many in their shoes would have made.}}}} You may have struck paydirt Chuck, whether you realize it or not. These people speak of the past, but they fail to tell you the total past. Only a week after we opened our doors to the public, Entropic wished to form a war site against Renderosity, and to persuade Russell and I to let HIM aquire PoserPros. Others here in this thread also have had their fingers deep into many pies. That DAZ in fact has chosen from amongst all the sites it could have chosen out there, PoserPros, must be a bitter glass of wine to drink for some. However, DAZ approached us. We did not "earn" this priveledge by climbing on the back of anyone else, and we built what we made, all of us on PoserPros, from the ground up. It was within our right, all of our right as the staff who built it, to choose to take DAZ's offer and we have. {{{{X2000: Well, here's the thing: Russ and Mehndi touted PoserPros as an alternative to the "evil" money-minded sites. They attracted the best and brightest of the Poser community with their utopian promises, and then when they had had them all within their grasp, they sold out lock, stock, and barrel. Daz "acquired" their site. They sold it straight off to the highest bidder, frankly. So much for non-profit, huh?}}}} We have NEVER touted PoserPros as the alternative to any evil. In fact, other than letting others speak openly and get things off their chests, and not suppressing free speech on our site, we hardly ever say a single word about Renderosity. I attracted the best and the brightest because I personally sent out several hundred emails to people, not even form letters, but personal messages and letters of invitation, one at a time. I took the time to do that. I attracted them because they know that I don't give a rat's ass what I say or who I say it too, or in front of, or the heat it draws on me, and I do not lie. I attracted them because when I said, "come see what I am doing, you will be refreshingly surprised", they believed me based on past experience with me personally. They came, they chose to stay on when they found what they had been looking for in our site. {{{{X2000: Here's the reason: because their new forum wouldn't come already stocked with the most talented Poser creators...They bought the people in it, the people that Russ and Mehndi attracted with promises of a site that never was nor will be. Daz bought Xena and Jim Burton and Jaager and all of the others. And apparently Russ and Mehndi were only too happy to sell them off.}}}} DAZ approached us all. Each of us has made our choice in this matter. Russell and I would have turned DAZ away cold if our staff had not gone with us in this with their full consent given to us. They built it with us. They also own it, and we plan to "split" the money we are paid (not very much btw) for the site with them all. Even those who are choosing to give support and consent for the sale, but ask to be let to go free and go their own way will get his or her share. {{{{RonKnights: Yes, and Dr Legume is now gone. I'd actually checked out Legume's forum, and thought it was very interesting and informative. That may sound strange coming from me, but it's true.}}}} RonKnights, shame on you. What would people think if they saw the LONG hateful messages you sent me about Legume, and PoserPros. You recall don't you Ron? Things about how you would NEVER give support for PoserPros due to the fact that I gave Legume a job as a moderator, and how you will always be our enemy and work to defeat my site and bring it down so long as Doc is there? Well, now dear, you no longer have to fret. Doc, of his own actions, will not make this transition with us. His reasons are his own and concern not one single soul outside the privacy of his relationship with Russell, myself, and his fellow staff. {{{{X2000: Well Ron, it could be a coincidence, but I have my doubts... I'm also wondering if this has anything to do with PJF's disappearance over there...Just a mod one day, and then poof gone the next.}}}} There was no poof about it. Peter made a choice to resign due to personal reasons quite some time ago. I frankly bowed up stubbornly and refused to accept his resignation for over a week. He had to work hard to convince me he was serious and actually did need to be let go out of mercy for him at that time. Peter is like our own personal King Arthur and we await the day he will return to us. We love him, he is one of us. {{{{Entropic: Mehndi and Russ have been selling every member on their non-commercialism, and now they're selling to the most commercial site out there. Not only that, they're currently supporting a few policies that DAZ has that are shady as fuck ( and not quite legal ).}}}} If you will go read the FAQ thread on our site, you will see that myself and my staff were amongst the VERY first to worry on the meaning of the FAQ, and question DAZ. We have the members wellbeing to see to, and will always be the first to mention to DAZ that things need better clarification when they do. We see our role as that of supporting both our community and its members, as well as DAZ. {{{{Poppi: and, giggle...i gotta bring this up....it is hard to trust anyone who would call me "Poopi" on purpose. that thread...yeah, right guys, go ahead and laugh...it was important in its day....shows volumes about honesty, integrety, and, maturity. there were sooo many good ones...the mehndi/neftis...braid copyright hassle...}}}} Poppi, truce is off now? You know, I never actually brought this up, since my method of dealing with any flame war, including that one, was to go silent, but that was a typo dear. That you so panicced over it though was something I did find a bit interesting at the time. And it was a good time for me since I needed strong motivation to get the Wood Elf done. You helped give me that. Your personality, your strength of character and tenanciousness is in his face :) Thank you for all of the inspiration you provided me. {{{{X2000: The short version is that Russ and Mehndi split off from this site, and it was a messy separation. They promised great things and constantly tore at R'osity for not providing them already.}}}} Naw, we did not get into messy seperations, we just left one day and took half the known universe of people who matter to us with us. Messy is not our style. It does happen to be the style of some of you folks in this thread for the most part, who then took it upon yourselves to even back then make things messy. {{{{Entropic: So, umm... if their freedoms aren't be restricted or clipped.. um... Where did Legume go? I guess the mormon church must have abducted him...The fact that Mehndi has already sold out Legume tells me that I was completely right in my pronouncements.}}}} Legume is my personal friend. Moreso than many of you are aware of. We are VERY close, and I consider him like the brother-soulmate my own brothers never were to me. We can talk about anything, and I always feel good, comfortable, and accepted in his presence. I thank Allah for bringing Legume into my life. Where he went, and why he chose to both give his consent and support to the sale, but will not make the transition with us, is his own business. Now, I invite all of you to stop clogging up Renderosity's forums with your worries, and stop breaking their TOS by posting your anxieties and anger and attacks, and to instead come over to PoserPros and make your posts to our faces as the old saying goes, where you know we always welcome open dialogue and it is not against our TOS to say what you will to our faces, nor will any of you risk being banned for doing so, as you do here.