Forum: Poser - OFFICIAL


Subject: Daz Issue !

pokeydots opened this issue on Jun 30, 2002 ยท 38 posts


thip posted Mon, 01 July 2002 at 12:04 PM

Thanks for pointing out the earlier "Amy's hand" case, Poppi. Perfect example, IMHO, of the general problem I've been desperately trying to point out. Forgive me for re-re-re-iterating it, but I honestly think it is of extreme importance both to DAZ and all 3rd party creators. Tailor-ing and any kind of shrink-wrapping are two sides of the same coin, DAZ-wise. Both essentially use DAZ meshes (morphs are simply mesh info w/out the actual mesh) as "guidance data" in modeling. Tailoring uses DAZ morphs as input to push a certain shape into a mesh. Shrink-wrapping uses DAZ meshes as targets to pull a mesh into a certain shape. Thus, both methods produce what DAZ calls derivatives. DAZ clearly acknowledges that their core concern is that it may be extremely hard to tell a DAZ derivative from an original mesh. Quoting Dan Farr from the "Amy's Hand" thread : "differing polygon count and layout does not necessarily mean a model hasnt been derived from another model." Therefore, it seems, DAZ will consider ANY mesh that fits a DAZ mesh a derivative - and thus a potential copyright violation, especially if it competes with a DAZ product. Intentionally mis-quoting Dan Farr, I would like to point out the obvious : "Differing polygon count and layout does not necessarily mean a model HAS been derived from another model." Rather, it would indicate that the model HAS been scratch-built. But ANY model that is supposed to fit a DAZ model, such as clothing for a figure, will have to ... well, fit, for obvious reasons. So, unless DAZ clarifies the EULA, silly, semi-honest 3rd party guys like my humble self will have to assume that they are guilty unless proven innocent. And since it is just as impossible to prove that my meshes are NOT rip-offs, however different the poly count and layout, as it would be to to prove that they ARE - well, I don't stand a chance. The strictly legal pros and cons do not interest me - it is the spirit of informed consent and cooperation I don't want destroyed. So either I retire as a clothing developer, or I ignore the EULA and take my chances. And since I will not take chances on behalf of all the good people who have accepted my freestuff, or bought my commercial items - well, then I just have to consider myself headed for retirement until this matter is cleared up. I have taken the liberty of e-mailing DAZ a link to my original thread about this problem, and I still hope fervently that it will be cleared up by saying that my interpretation of the EULA is ridiculously wrong. But I will only dare to believe it if DAZ says so themselves - it is their EULA, anything else that has been said in all our verbose threads is essentially guesswork. So - DAZ says?