I have owned a copy of Poser4 for about a year now, within the last 3 months though, my cd has broke. After a terrbile incident with the 4.3 patch, i needed to reinstall, and couldn't. As a result, i borrowed my friends version... he was no longer using it, so he even uninstalled it from his computer. He's very law conscious, and ddn't want to risk breaking the law by having two versions installed. Over the time whilst i've has his copy of the program, i've made some art which he like and he decides he wants his program back. No problem. I uninstall it and give it him back. Now i'm without it. Last weekend, i went to a carboot sale.. or flee market.. whatever you choose to call it. On a stall there, was Poser4, said to be including purchased Victoria and Michael CD's. I really wanted it, so i payed the guy the money... came home, installed Poser.. Installed Mike and Vic... and found another CD in the pack. Eager to see what it was, i put it in the drive. File simply called PoserUpdate.Exe. I figured it was the pro pack update, and i ran it. Well, next thing i know.. i open poser, and its still not pro pack. However, i do now have a VERY extensive library of items that i shouldn't have. A lot of extra clothes, characters, props and so on. Some i'm sure can be found for sale here. Now, i installed it immediately.. and reinstalled with just poser and the Vic and Mike characters. Here's my question... since i payed for the CD that came with it, should i do what my heart tells me, and play wth all my new items and create some great things for myself? OR; do what my mind tells me, and trash the extras CD? I REALLY want to use these items, but would feel tremendously guilty as i never purchased them from the proper people. SO i know trashing them is really the right thing to do... but damn, i want to play with the toys! What would you guys do? Give in, and plays with them... OR bin them? Thanks for you answers. TED.

I am just wondering..

Why didn't you reinstall Poser using your legitimate serial number?

My Poser CD is hosed. It's scratched. But I paid money for it, and a lot of it, since I got it JUST as soon as Metacreations released it, and there's NO WAY I would buy it again just because I scratched my CD. So I installed a friend's copy and then used my legit serial number for it.

Anyhow, these flea markets are often full of warezed versions of software. If the copy you bought is not a legit looking Poser CD (orange and white cover, if iirc), that's exactly what you got: an illegal copy.

Sounds like the extra content CD that comes with Poser 4. I wouldn't worry about it.

My Poser CD broke too. I told the folks at CL about it, they sent me a new one for $5.00. Well worth it I think, if you have your original serial number you should be OK.

See my problem is/was the exact opposite well kind of the same but with added joy! (insert sarcasm) I bought poser 3 awhile ago, had it installed and everything was fine. Then I had to uninstall it about a year ago or so and then when I went to install it back on I couldn't find my serial number, so I borrowed a friends, felt bad about it but I just wanted to get it up and running and curious labs couldn't send me anything except an upgrade of which I had no money for. But I didn't get to use it anyway, because I found that my CD was scratched from moving to my new house, and wouldn't install properly, so I again contacted curious labs and there was nothing they could do but give me an upgrade. Which again couldn't afford, and I didn't have access to a scanner anyway to show them my CD and manual (which is there requirement if you can't find your serial, which I think is nice by the way, nothing against CL) But to make a long story short, I finally got Poser 3 to work by purchasing one of the free versions, now I just have to figure out if I can get the P5 upgrade with my legit purchased metacreations version, since of course now I have the money. Isn't life grand! I hope they will be able to work something out. Brian

Ted, Listen to your mind/heart. I was just at a Convention this weekend and I ran into a lot of cg/3d users and I can't begin to tell you how many of them have pirated software and just don't care, and worse yet don't have a problem with it. Every excuse in the book is used for the rationalization of using something they didn't pay for. The fact that you are asking the question about what you should do shows that you at least care enuf to ask. Absolutely, do the moral thing. After you varify ( if you haven't already and it sounds like you have) the extra stuff you have and if indeed it is stolen(and that's the word for it if it is)throw the disc away. The people who do the work to make these items available need everyone to "just say no" to warez of any kind and for all of us to do the right thing when we are presented with these dilemas. You earn something when you work for it and buy it, yes it's old fashioned but it's the right thing to do and it's great that you are wrestling with this and you just didn't go ahead and keep your mouth shut and let this unexpected bonus sway you into thinking it's ok to rip off someone elses hard work " oh,this one time who's going to know". Thanks for "posing" the question, I'm proud of you for having the guts to ask and ignoring that little devil on your left shoulder. Putting the soapbox away now...

You are legally allowed to make one back up copy I think. So I make a backup and only use that one. My original cd's are stored in the original boxes with manuals and won't get scratched that way or broken.

take a good look at the disks? are they CD-R's? Are the labels stickers? the original disk labels appear to be painted on If what you have is warez, I would advise you to keep the poser 4 disk & use your original serial #. Scrap the rest, there's plenty of free suff out there, some of it is even better than the purchased stuff. to ease the temptation of keeping the stuff you have, pay a visit to these sites: http://digitalbabes2.com/ http://iso.power.ne.jp/ http://home.att.ne.jp/yellow/RUBI/topenter.htm http://bat.server.ne.jp/ http://www.poserstyle.com/index.php3

On the other hand, if what you have is the original disc, then it sounds to me like you found someone who was getting out of the hobby and included the stuff they bought. If that's the case, you got a great deal. Enjoy it with impunity.

heyas; well, i hate to tell you, but you need to check the license on the michael/victoria cd thing. not sure on the cd's, but i know the individual models from daz have a clause in the license whereby you cannot give away or sell them to anyone else.

Personally, I ave a zipped copy of my entire Poser4 directory parked on a second hard drive (in .zip), as well as a copy of the backup .zip burned (it barely fits) onto CD. If it gets any bigger (prolly will), then I'll have to back up individual pieces of it, like the Props hierarchy, Figures Hierarchy, Geometries (the Beast itself) hiaerarchy... In either case, even if my hard drive and original CD hoses out, I still have backups somewhere (you don't work as a sysadmin for long without getting completely paranoid about having lots of back-ups...) /P

I agree with penguin on that one! While legally you are only supposed to make one back up copy, I don't think anyone is going to go headhunting people who make a few for safty's sake (not to distribute!) June 2000 My house caught on fire and I lost everything, let me tell ya a rack full of melted CDs is not a pretty site (originals & backups on the same rack...sob). Now I have copies of all my favorites stored in 3 places. I've got my working copies & manuals here at the desk, my backup copies in the detached garage, & the originals are stored at my mom's in her fire-proof safe. I'm not going to have that happen again!