I see stuff in the store I would expect to see in free stuff, Why has the stuff in the store taken a sudden downward spin in quality, Those who produce the good quality items know who they are. Stupi part of this is people have to search loads of junk to find anything good now. Sure I know people want to make a buck, But do yo have to be tacky to do it?

While I agree with you that the store is filling up with stuff I'd never buy even if I had unlimited money, we should remember that one mans junk is another man's treasure. Also don't discount the fact that bandwidth is no longer 'free' so even giving away something cost money. What used to be freestuff quality is now more like low-cost quality. My only issue with some merchants is the folks who so overprice their low quality items. Some people should honestly research the market they are selling to.

How about a quality rating system, Like low quality items, quality items and premium items?

maybe you need a 'sale' rack..;)

I wish I'd said that.. The Staircase Wit

anahl nathrak uth vas betude doth yel dyenvey..;)

searching pages and pages and pages, of flea market items is no fun when your looking for something worth buying. I don't wantto stomp all over the little guy but come on, cheap is cheap, Don't we all complaint and rant when we go into a store and see cheap stuff staring at us off the shelf? This is a community of artist yes and one mans junk is another mans treasure at times, yes. But I saw stuff in there people did just for the sake of having something to sell like a cheap light set, Or cheap textures, Or a 3 minute mesh model. cheap is cheap, Im sure Im not the first to mention this. how about a price search system, If I put in a search of 20.00 I would be able to ovoid all the crap.

Don't count on the $20 to get rid of the crap, and you'll lose some great itmes that way. On your list a good half of the items are under $20. And some people put a $20 or even $30 price for something I wouldn't give away. A rating scale sounds nice, but a lot of people very happy with a product wouldn't remember or bother to add a good rating, but one customer with a bone to pick about something very minor would, so the rating would be "poor" when the product is actually excellent. All part of the way the 'sity works. It's a wide open venue, unlike Daz or rDNA who have only a few content creators on staff. Here anyone can sell anything so long as it passes the 'sity's product testing. And, as has been said before, one man's trash is another man's treasure. I've paid good money for things that probably no one else wanted, but I had a real need for. They were crap products, but it was just what I needed to finish a scene. When I was flush, I'd buy a big package for an incidental prop included. This actually is a good part of the reason I've not had the courage to actually try to sell something. I do pretty good clothing, but the textures are crap (not my strong point). I'd rather give it away than have to deal with it all, even though I'm so broke I'm drinking dry milk (which is actually pretty good in coffee).

A few suggestions: 1) If you don't like the quality of a product, make a better one of your own. 2) If you don't like the product, don't buy it. If no one else buys it, it will be moved to the Warehouse and eventually deleted. Or, at the very worst, e-mail the artist and tactfully tell him how you think the product needs improving. I'm sure he will listen, especially if you suggest that the improvements will help the product to sell.

It's one thing to sell something you spent hours making that turns out impressive, Like Billy t's Bikes, Or fantasy Vicky for example. But if your making a cheap lightset or cheap models,Anyone can make in ten minutes. Then your just taking advantage of the store because you see doller signs. Your out to just make a buck on anything you can rather then to deliver quality merchandise to the poser community. And that means your trying to suck what you can out of the poser community by deliveriung cheap merchandise and taking advantage of the store system because you see it as a fast chance to make a buck off someone. But some of us notice you guys because of all the junk we need to sort through at the store.

That is constructive, But I think alot of these guys don;t care if thier stuff is cheap as long as they can get some sucker to buy it.

Jeez, i hope you dont lump me in that group of bad products when mine hits. I'm more scared now than i was.

that rise an important question i often asked myself: what is the point/edge between items worth selling and item that only worth being freebies ? I mean 1st of course art is subjective in a way, but what do people expect to find in commercial packages/items and what are they indulgent of for freebies ? Sometimes i see freestuff (mostly on japanese websites) that can easily match many sold items here. Also i see peopel with marvelous freebies, so do they have to even make better that good items to allow themselves sellign them ? also someone told about the bandwidth usage and such. I was dumped thrice in a month by "free" webhosts, and believe me, finding a 100mb (least) capacity, withotu add (or at least popup), and unlimited file size (freebies can go above the 1 or 2mb limit most hosts allow for free) and month bandwidth. Well finding such a gem was an heroic task ! After that point the least expensive hosting solutions with unlimited bp and file size limit are somehow above 15$ a month... personnaly i only make freebies cause i ma a beginner and i do not see myself worthy enough yet when i saw many wuality freebies and products here, so i have to learn and i do not rush.. But of course would i be forced to PAY to offer people freebies, i sure would give up at once ! I think it is a legitimate attitude: offerin free stuff for free, but offerign freestuff at oneself's expense, i dont think it is fair

"how about a price search system, If I put in a search of 20.00 I would be able to ovoid all the crap. " lol, not really. ive seen some horrible quality items that i wouldnt pay $5 for (hell, i probably wouldnt waste bandwidth downloading them if they were free) at 'hopeful' prices of $20 or more. i think the worst are clothing add-on textures that cost twice as much as the actual clothing pack itself (and sometimes the add-on textures are far lower quality than the original ones that came with the clothing). or poses for $15+. ive been working on a pose pack for months, and they will be released along with hi-res props some are tailored for, but i wouldnt dream of asking more than $6-9 even though i know they are far higher quality than most of the pose packs out there. i feel that new merchants should whet their teeth on freestuff FIRST, then hit the store with a lower priced item around $5-8 to let customers sample their merchandise. just seems to me like some people make an item, then sit there and think 'should i put this in freestuff? naw.. wait - i will put it in the marketplace at $20 and see if it sells'. the whole 'see if it sells' attitude irks the hell out of me. if you submit something to this already flooded marketplace then youd better be damned sure in advance that it will sell. this isnt a testing ground, or a flea market. if as a merchant someone is 'offended' by this post then all i can say is they dont belong in sales. its a competitive market, and people that approach it with a 'lets see if this will sell' attitude are not going to get very far. cheers, -gabriel (Blackhearted)

Don't be intimidated by MM's negative attitudes, lobo75. There are plenty of us who are rooting for the newbies, and would love to see what you have to offer. I'd also like to enter the fray when I feel ready, and there's no way I'm going to be intimidated by either those whose talent vastly exceeds mine, or those who don't "get" the very fine suggestions that JohnRender made, above. I'm sure we've all seen some "junk" in the marketplace, but as other have said, that's a subjective evaluation, and not one that gets expressed very frequently. Caveat emptor: It's up to the buyer to do their best to consider whether or not the product they're looking for is worth spending money on. If they decide that it is, that doesn't mean that the merchant is taking a sucker for a ride. Everyone has to start somewhere. No content provider is born with top-notch talent. This would be a good time to praise Renderosity's brokerage system; it gives us beginners a chance to step into the pool, generate feedback, develop a reputation (and hopefully, skills,) and to make a little extra cash. I do think that the marketplace's search engine is far too crude for such a huge store, though. Improvements and better options for refined searches might help to alleviate the pain that the impatient and judgemental persons are suffering. :-) As a democratic capitalist, I like the diversity of the Rosity MP. I see plenty of things that I feel are silly, crass, needless, or undesirable in there, but such is the way of free enterprise. And as we all know, with a little patience, you can find plenty of great deals and treasures.

There aren't many textures in your list. Does that mean you lump textures in with the "crap"? Just checking - I'm a texture artist and I think MY stuff is nice ;o). Laurie

Oh, and I spend 15 bucks a month to give folks freebies too. It's worth it to me, especially if I see folks are getting use from them. The stuff I sell by no means is making me any money. It just helps to offset the exorbitant cost of my Poser addiction...LOL. Laurie

But then you never know about textures... The textures in my Ichiro package are awful. I hate them. The cloths are good though. I know of someone who's doing a for-sale set of clothing for the Fantasy package, and it's great! So, the clothing is free, the really good textures are going to cost a bit (but not much), with part going to charity. Well worth the price if you like my cloths, but hate my textures (like me). It still will come down to Cavient Emptor (sp?, my latin is VERY rusty). You don't really know quality until you buy it. Of course, some items have been overdone. How many light sets and camera poses are available? Now, how many are really different? I've gotten so many as freebies from different sites, or as part of another package I'd never buy a set of lights and cameras. Unless. A big unless. It had something so different and innovative that I had to try it. It's like P5 materials. I bought a couple of really good P5 material sets (The3DWizard's is the best). But I doubt if I'd ever buy another. I got what I wanted from the first two sets, and used how them as a basis for hundreds of my own. It's the same with lights. Get one good set, and there are tons of free ones out there, and learn enough so you never have to buy another. Poses are the same way. I get a few good poses in a set, and can use those as a basis for my own. A pose set has to be really different to get me to even look.

LaurieA, I know you're smart enough not to take the opinion of one person as an actual indictment. Your textures ROCK! And your freebies are appreciated. I agree that MM's list includes many outstanding products, I've bought several myself, but you make a point...things like textures can be so crucial. I recently purchased Karanta's beautiful and unusual reflection maps, which can be used to amazing effect. I value them and use them more than several meshes and character sets I have.

let me clarify my above post before someone says im trying to keep newbies from having a chance - which is wrong. the attitude that annoys me most is the 'see if it will sell' attitude that a lot of people seem to harbor, and i think that as a merchant you should know in advance if that item will sell. how does a merchant know, you ask? look at your product. look at whats included in your package. look at other competitive products in the marketplace. look at the price of your product, and other products like it in the marketplace (also note how many products like it are in there).. now ask yourself - am i offering something of value? something competitive? would I buy this? thats how you know. cheers, -gabriel (Blackhearted)

Yep, there are a few texturers who's stuff I GOTTA have... LaurieS LisaB Elusion Silverleif Studios ByteMeOK Catharina Harders Morris Ecstasy Handspan Studios I guess I too have a tendency to buy from artists that I KNOW are really, really good. Texture, mesh or otherwise. I buy from the same one's over and over. But I don't really mind wading thru the stuff I don't want. Sometimes it even can give an inspiration or two. ;o) Laurie

Gabriel, you've got a new handle! Laurie

naw just a nick for my photography gallery - didnt want my poser/3d gallery getting flooded by my photos.

Intertesting thread this one. I recently put something into the marketplace, 17 2560x1920 photos of forests/woodland that I was visiting last weekend. They're over 22mb due to the hi-quality size of the files and I got, what I thought, were very nice and usuable background shots. I considered giving them away, but I don't have the kind of hosting plan to offer those sizes of files. So I've put them in the store for $6.50 for 17 of the best (I took over 50). If somebody wants them and can use them, great, if not, doesn't matter to me, doesn't cost me anything to have it in the store but I might recoup a small cost of my camera. That's the attitude I took with it, if I hadn't put them in the store, nobody would've got them, now if somebody really wants that sort of thing, it is available for them. Best wishes Jody

Gabriel, you make a lot of smart real-world points. I'll keep 'em in mind when I'm ready to market something.

As much as we probably don't want to admit it, Mesh has a point. I can still remember an especially terrible Mike texture where the seams were obvious all over the place (including a closeup that almost brandished the seam between the head and neck), and I wondered, hey, anyone minding the store here? Textures? Hey, if it's just taking it into Photoshop and playing with the Hue/Saturation/Lightness levels just so you can get 25 different looks from one piece of work, then I tend to get a little POd. And I'm seeing way too much of that these days.

Since Rosity is the true 'flea market' of the 3D world, where anyone can sell anything, you have to put up with junk. There are pearls in the rubbish heap, you just have to look for them. The downward spiral is not sudden at all - it's been going on for a long time. But at the same time, the best stuff is gettign even better as the top end get even better at making stuff. When someone tries to sell a primitive 'table' made up of a few vertices slapped together in a basic modeler, for $15 or something, it gives me a good laugh. In 3DS format if you're not careful. And then you find Quarker's incredible hair for $6.95 and you go 'Oooh yeah!' Or BAT outfits for $5! :] Fish

well my take on this, in the past 5 months I've been a merchant the amount of merchants has increased by a bit over 30%. In my opinion that is quite a bit... so with all the new merchants, you are going to see a wider range of quality... not saying that the low end should go below a certain point, but the higher end quality items will go higher, thus making the low end seem lower... the evolution of the Renderosity Marketplace... :-)

Handle every stressful situation like a dog.

If you can't eat it or play with it,

just pee on it and walk away. :-)

....................................................

I wouldnt have to manage my anger

if people would manage their stupidity......

 

I think it is funny about the whole texture thing and how they cost more than the original item. What is up with that? I realize there's a certain process involved with making a decent texture, but c'mon..

Just as art being subjective, I prefer to think this type of thought being descriminating. Even if you think this way, it doesn't have to be pinpoint in public in such a manner. Renderosity's acceptance of merchant stuffs made me think of diversity. If there are no 'loads of junk' as you mention, will you appreciate the 'good quality items' more? I have seen quite a few artists, when they first started selling, their items were average, but then as they create more stuffs, it gets better. If they were not given a chance to sell their first product, will they turn up 'good quality items' someday? I've also seen some merchants with 'see if it will sell' or 'I just need to sell 1' attitude, but well if people do purchase their products, it's their business. Maybe it's not as bad as you think. I don't really mind glancing through the marketplace, afterall you can just click for details on what's attractive to you.

I usually just look at "what's new" and "what's on sale" unless I'm looking for something specific. Doesn't seem all that overwhelming to browse...and sometimes I see something I'd like that isn't advertised on the forum. I rarely look at the "what's hot" because that's as predictable as the "hot 20" but I do look at the whole stores of some vendors to make sure I'm not missing something of someone who I particularly like. I also think "junk" depends on the viewer. I wouldn't spend a dime on some stuff, no matter how great the quality theoretically is, because it has zero interest to me. Some of things I collect like mad, many of you wouldn't take a second glance at. That's okay with me...I support vendors that produce items that appeal to me and I don't waste time on the ones I know focus in areas of no interest. It doesn't take that long to figure out which is which.

Truly Milla, I keep lowering the prices on my textures with each thing I make. Here and other places you can't go lower than 5 dollars, even if you want to unless you are invited to do textures for one of the clubs (Platinum Club, ProClub at PoserPros, RDNA Real Deals). I've even tossed around the idea of placing a store for my textures on my own website, but I think it would be cost-prohibitive to do so with the small amount that I sell. Contrary to what some might think, textures are a lot of work - lots of trial and error, lining up seams, etc. Even with all that being said, I agree that lower prices will actually make more money in sales due to the fact that more folks will be able to afford and buy them. After all, this Poser business is for the most part a hobby for most of the members of the site. But I don't want to devalue my work either. Sometimes I work on a texture set for weeks and weeks. Laurie

hmm.. i think were on different wavelengths here.. by 'poor quality', i dont refer to the type of items people create, or the amount of skill they have in creating them. im referring to pricing, and item value. someone might not be the greatest texture artist out there, but if they spend the time and create their product right, with no bugs or thrown-together stuff, and price it to give the customer fair value for their money - they will have a successful product. again, this ties into my annoyance with the 'marketplace experimentation' and 'lets see if itll sell' attitude. you dont just throw a product together and use the marketplace as a testing ground to see if people will buy it. its not a testing ground, its a store that many of us take very seriously. you dont have to be the most highly skilled person in the world to create a solid product, you just need to be willing to invest the time and effort, and price-position it to give the customer true value for their money. because thats what this all boils down to - value. thats why things like poses sell. sure, everyone can create them. but a lot of time goes into proper natural poses, and people are willing to spend a few bucks for the convenience of not having to spend that exhausting amount of time to get them right. some people would rather pay $5 to save that time, others on mere principal would rather do it themselves, or dont place such a high value on their time. when you create a product you need to keep the following things in mind: 1. is a product on this level, or a better one, already available for free? (ie: if you model a bankers lamp for poser, and theres already two much higher resolution, more realistic ones in freestuff, forget it). 2. would the average poser user be able to create this product on their own relatively easily? -and if they could... 3. would it be time-consuming for them to do so? you need to provide something thats not already out there for free. it needs to be a product that the average poser user cannot create for themselves easily (ie: a 'hi-res cube' or some simple object created from poser primitives is not a good idea). if they CAN create it themselves (ie: poses, presets, lights) then make sure that you are providing them with something that saves them time. because if you dont provide them with something they cant create themselves, something that is a valuable time-saver, or something thats not already available for free, then you have no product. jarm - your product is a good one (although somewhat of a niche item), because it provides something that most people would not be able to produce themselves (few people have such high megapizel cameras). also, even if they did, its a timesaver - since it would take quite a bit of time for someone to go out and take all of those, and if someone needs them for their work its a very fair price. cheers, -gabriel (Blackhearted)

On the subject of "see if it will sell", I humbly offer up my own approach: post pics in the Poser forum and ask people. Yeah, you have a little public embarasment when people say, "Sorry, but no," but one can live with that, and I found the responses - including the "no" ones - to be very kind and well meant. As a bonus, you get constructive criticism useful in future creations. -- April "not yet to Merchant quality" Follies

I have to admit that the products Kurokuma and I release have a rather limited scope. Comparing the number of pinup renderers versus those that do combat, military, or sci-fi work gets you some pretty meager odds on the last ones. But we use them, and from our sales and wishlist reports, we know that others at least want them. And we've both been asked where to get some of the items we use, and have been asked to release them. So we did. It's a small minority out there. But at least they have a chance to use the items we create simply because we enjoy them.

Gabriel makes a lot of valid points which I think can be summed up in one sentence. There's a difference between making a product and making a buck. Everything has a value, partly decided by the market and partly by the amount of work that goes into it - but NEVER by the 'what-can-I-get-away-with-charging-here' philosophy. That's just plain crap. On the other hand.... People only learn by doing. There are a lot of good merchants who started out with small steps. People should at least be given the chance to try. We are in a democracy, right? Here's my experience. I started out 3 years ago making freebies, and have posted 40 or 50 of them at 3d commune. 2 years later, I made a photo studio for poser and brokered it through DAZ. After that a posable clock pack (ERC experiment). Since then, I've spent 9 months (on and off) making a room environment which will go out in a couple of weeks. The point of all this? Well, my freebies were pretty crap, but went down well. The DAZ stuff was better, and the forthcoming product will be (I think) amazing. So, that's a classic case of moving forward in small steps. Just think about this. If NO ONE would sell these products that MM is railing about, a lot of potentially good merchants would never even get the chance to become good. It's all very well getting praised for your free stuff, but it costs money to host, and let's face it, praise isn't much of an incentive. If you can at least make the money to cover part of your poser habit, it gived you the drive to go ahead and create more (hopefully better) stuff to sell. That's the REAL reason to allow all these products into the store. I agree there will always be crap amongst the good stuff, but hey, that's what life is like too. And who ever told you the net would be any different? mac

I've bought textures for Mike here that were around $20 and they didn't look anything like the image that was posted on the seller's page. I also agree that many texture items are nothing more than rip-offs of other people's work. Some textures even look like they came from DAZ. I have also bought some of the "junk" items and have been disappointed that the item wasn't the same as advertised. Complaining to the merchant doesn't do any good and they never list the negative comments on the product page which is suspicious in my opinion.

Poser 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Pro 2014, 11, 11 Pro

youve kindof contradicted yourself. i dont disagree, but: youve pointed out that youre moving forward. your early stuff, released for free, you admit wasnt that great (ive never seen it so just going by what you say here). then you released at daz afterwards, and now have another product here. well - thats what i think every budding merchant should do. start out with freestuff - build up a userbase through there, and then when they feel they have items with real value put them up for sale in the MP. "If NO ONE would sell these products that MM is railing about, a lot of potentially good merchants would never even get the chance to become good." noones saying they shouldnt sell them - just that many of them really belong in freestuff. cheers, -gabriel

"and they never list the negative comments on the product page which is suspicious in my opinion. " i dont think that merchants should have the ability to toggle comment visibility. if some comment is truly inappropriate or untrue, or a flame attempt by someone who just doesnt like the merchant then a simple message to an admin will have it removed. i display every comment. i believe i have one thats negative - its on the way i organise my filestructure and names not the product itself - and i have that displayed with all the rest. cheers, -gabriel (Blackhearted)

But finding hosting for freebies is a monumental pain at the moment, with pop-ups and spyware on the free pages, irritating many forumites, and several member-run hosting sites closing because of abuse. Unless you can pay for a full site of your own there are very few options.

Dam what a sad old time we are all haveing, the only thing i want to say is that over the last few months iv,e seen the free stuff drop right off, i think more people are selling there stuff, than offering it for free, the reason i first came here when i started with poser was for the free stuff to be honest, i think ever one should have a hard think about what is going on here, when you first start out on Poser your not looking to spend money your looking for freebees, by offering good free content you get people to go to the store to look for better content for Poser, im glad this issue has being raised mabe we can find some way to get things back on the right track, well people take care, and please dont take things the wrong way for what i have said is true... cya all..

ford3auss, youre very right. you know whats frightening? when i started out here there were under 400 merchants. now that number has more than tripled in under two years. the average quality of products in the marketplace has dropped as well. not saying there arent good ones - in fact there are many talented new merchants. however, it seems to me that a lot of people are attracted to the marketplace by the lure of making easy money -- little do they know theres no such thing. meanwhile the massive deluge of these 'lets see if it sells' products is diluting the marketplace.

Gabriel, I understand your point and agree with you. But my point is that in the first 2 years, when I was learning, it all went out as free stuff. I only went to DAZ when I had something I believed was worth the money and the months of work I put into it. That's probably what a lot of merchants are NOT doing. IOW, they're selling what should be free. mac PS small correction 'then you released at daz afterwards, and now have another product here' No, both products are at DAZ.

To clarify, I'll repeat what I said earlier. There's a difference between making a product and making a buck. mac

Blackhearted, you are one off the reason i have not give up on this place, you free content has all ways being great and still is so please dont take my comment to be directed to you or any off the other great people who grace us with there freebies, the people who offer good content know who thay are so i wont waste your time or mine, i just get sad when i come here and see whats happen people, it,s so hard for us all these day,s to make a living, so a little give and take is what will make this place go a head and not back , like i said before this issue is very real for all the people who grace these pages, so every one should have a long hard think about there products, and what thay are offering, well people take care...

MM doesn't have much of a variety there. His tastes seem to be quite limited. So naturally whatever doesn't fit into his idea of what is good is 'crap'. Bet he thinks all the Koshini stuff is crap. LOL The problem is NOT quality. If you want quality, it's there. The problem is quantity even of quality stuff. That's fine with me..more to choose from.

spit - theres no way to 'tactfully' approach this discussion - no matter what, people's feelings are going to get hurt. there is a problem in the marketplace. but i do know that renderosity is working on it. i think a stricter set of guidelines as to what is accepted and what isnt is the way to go, also a stricter set of guidelines as to product promos. runtime DNA is going about it the right way. i think that, first off, 3 product promos should be NECESSARY, not optional. i think its owed to the customer to give them at least 3 previews of the product youre expecting them to spend their money on. i also think that at least a committee should look over the marketplace submissions and at LEAST give advice on the price. ie: if someone puts a set of 4 poses in the marketplace and expects $30 for it, you KNOW its not going to sell. i think some intervention on the part of the marketplace staff should be made there to advise the person to lower the price to something more realistic. the marketplace staff could also look over the products that arent selling so well, and perhaps give the merchant some feedback and suggestions - ie: how to present it, what possible improvements/upgrades can be made, etc. cheers, -gabriel

Crap is something someone tossed together just to make a buck, Something anyone can do in a few minutes. Sure they may have saved someone 2 or 3 minutes by selling that stuff but come on.

1. a person should make an item they know will sell and that will be in high demand. 2. Don,t do it because your trying to make a buck real quick. 3. take your time in developing your store items and remember people expect the items to be well created. 4. remember copy rights on star trek and star wars do not belong to you. 5. people have to browse the stores many pages, Dont't cluitter it up with your junk if your just trying to make a buck and sacrificing good quality.

Koshini looks like a toy little girls used to play with.

By the way if you put me down for the items I purchased just remember that insult carrys over to the merchants I purchased from. You might want to tone down your remark that I have nop sence of taste based on my merchant list.

Im not negative I just think some people sell stuff just to make a buck. It may seem that way but in reality Im really a nice guy, I just have stong opinions about some things, Is that supposed to make me the bad guy?

I didn't say you have no sense of taste, just said it was limited to a few types of things.

.

umm.. yeah ive noticed people saying what merchants they buy this and that from - and id like to make a suggestion: in the interest of keeping this a constructive thread and not one long advertisement (and potential flamefest), can we keep merchant names out of it? because i see this deteriorating either into merchants getting into a huff over being included in some 'im not buying from them' category, or an opportunity for friends of merchants to shamelessly endorse their products.

nop sence ???? I think all that was meant is that we each tend to be biased to think other things are not as high quality as the things we particularly like to purchase. I don't like fetish gear. I don't care how high quality it is, it wastes my time to view it becuase I have zero interest in it. Does that mean fetish gear is junk? No. It means it is junk for me but only for me...no matter the price, no matter the quality, because I personally would never buy it. Does that mean I expect it to be taken off the marketplace? No, because most people here want it and get excited for each dental floss harness that is issued. That's fine. I skip past the dental floss and go on to something that really interests me. I don't expect everyone to share my tastes, and I don't think things that are not to my taste are automatically junk to other people just because I don't happen to like them. You also have to take into account the level of ability each person has. When I started with Poser, I bought light sets. Why? Because I didn't have a clue how to set up lights in my graphics. Now, I probably wouldn't buy a light set. For one thing, there are wonderful free light sets available and, for another, I can set up my own to my satisfaction (may not look like much of an improvement to someone else but I don't do graphics for other people). Same thing with textures and models. I don't do either so I buy them. If I ever got to a point of being able to do either, I would probably buy less. Oh well. I have a limit to my talent. I don't hurt you by buying what I need that is something you think is beneath you. It's just a matter of different tastes and different needs. It really isn't that hard to pick out what you want and skip the rest. I like having a variety to choose from. Perhaps Renderosity needs to do more testing, but it is hard to get consistency from volunteers. I would like everyone to have three views of their products (three real views, not three of the same thing) because often times it is hard to get a sense of what the product is from just one. But after that, it is buyer beware. Vote with your money. If a vendor doesn't sell, I doubt if they will continue on the marketplace.

There's a large difference between "junk" and things you don't like and will never use.

Mesh_Magick, dont take it to hart m8, i think you raised some good issues, i only hope it does not get pushed under the table like most things here...let,s not turne this in to a bitch fight people, let,s try to talk it through, like adults..

Well spoken and great advice that I will take heed too.

Ok maybe calling it junk and crap is too strong a word for it. Im going to start browseing by merchants for now on, At least from those I buy from and trust.

umm, no - im not 'quality biased' against items that i dont buy. theres a lot of very well done stuff out there - was just looking at a car model that looks amazing for under $20, theres a wicked mech model, etc. i wouldnt normally use this type of thing in my renders, but i recognise the top notch quality and im considering buying them. what you make has nothing to do with quality. i could model something as simple as a high-res wine glass, set it up with morphs and excellent material settings, and i am positive i could market it based on its top notch quality. however, there are a lot of things in the store where its evident that people didnt put much time or consideration into, aside from an attempt to make a quick buck. "You also have to take into account the level of ability each person has. When I started with Poser, I bought light sets. Why? Because I didn't have a clue how to set up lights in my graphics. Now, I probably wouldn't buy a light set. For one thing, there are wonderful free light sets available and, for another, I can set up my own to my satisfaction (may not look like much of an improvement to someone else but I don't do graphics for other people). Same thing with textures and models. I don't do either so I buy them. If I ever got to a point of being able to do either, I would probably buy less. Oh well. I have a limit to my talent. I don't hurt you by buying what I need that is something you think is beneath you. " i agree. i would still buy a light set, however, if it were sufficiently complex enough and priced so that it would be valuable to me by saving my time. if it would take me 4 hours to put together just some of the light sets i need, then the $5 or 10 it costs in the store is worth it to me. but thats how i started out. i would create things for myself - my light sets, tattoos, textures, etc were just things that i had made for my own use and had been using for months. when people started commenting and saying that i should sell them, i finally did and they sold very successfully. btw - i dont just think that freestuff should be used as an 'initiation' for merchants before they get into the MP, but also as a continuing thing as a gift to customers. im working on several new things to put in freestuff actually (but need to find some place to host them), and i always update my older products even though it doesnt make me any money to do so - just as a gift to those that bought them. cheers, -gabriel

pooka i dont think anyone is referring to the types of items in the marketplace here, but the quality and value level of some of them. even though i may not buy military vehicles, i still recognise that yours and kurokumas are an asset to the marketplace because of their quality. 'junk' would be if you had put them together in a few hours from poser primitives and textured them with solid material settings. it has nothing to do with the item, but the way its put together and priced.

"however, there are a lot of things in the store where its evident that people didnt put much time or consideration into, aside from an attempt to make a quick buck." Much true, Gabe. I've stopped with a loose jaw and stared a few times. I wouldn't go so far as to call it junk, mostly in an attempt to be diplomatic, but I have wondered "Why??" a few times. Especially with, as JoeyAristophanes pointed out, texture products that had very obvious seams visible in the promos. My quibble with the discussion was that it seemed as though everything not a certain style was junk, just to clarify my stance here.

Crosspost! giggle I was referring more to the vehemence used in posts that are now missing from the thread. Like Koshini and her accessories being "crap." Not liking them doesn't make them "junk."

it's AMATEUR, not amature

Gordon

Wasn't there a website that wrote very detailed, impartial critiques of Poser-related software being offered here and at Daz? Now that was a GREAT idea! I think what Renderosity needs is a full-time "critic" to help wade through the morass in the marketplace -- just as a film critic wades through the large number of bad movies that come out every year. No doubt such a critic will be insulted, despised and accused of favoritism, just like real film critics are. But the bottom line is that this critic would ultimately steer buyers toward the really good stuff and away from the bad stuff. I've noticed in the past that if you say ANYTHING even remotely critical of anybody's wares, then they come down on you with swords drawn. But there is a lot of garbage in the marketplace and I've been burned a few times. Recently somebody posted a picture of a "work-in-progress" in the Product Showcase forum, asking for comments. I sent a message providing a link to a competing similar product, with the idea that the merchant's work-in-progress might benefit from seeing what's already there, and possibly do better (it was my subtle way of saying that the work-in-progress wasn't all that great, in my opinion). Immediately some bonehead came down on me for doing this, complaining that I wasn't being nice or playing fair. I guess you're supposed to be all "ga-ga" over each new thing posted, even though it might look like crap. Being supportive is sweet, and it's saintly to be all warm and friendly in the regular Poser forum when a newbie posts an art image and asks for opinions and help. But when somebody is trying to get into my wallet in the Marketplace, then I'd like to have the freedom to be critical. I'd like to see the Product Showcase forum be less of a love-fest and more of a gauuntlet for potential merchants, so that their wares are truly ready for prime time when they go on sale. I'd also like to see a real, live critic give fair, honest, detailed opinions of what ultimately goes up for sale in the MP. Now THAT would really shake everything up overnight! -jjsemp

Question for the court here... Are the promos in the Product Showcase already copyrighted? Since you are showing items in a reproducable form does that constitute copyright? It seems like the item is not yet finished. What if someone has an earth-shattering idea that will be sort of out of the bag, so to speak, if they promo (not saying I do have such an idea). I always wonder about someone elso doing a "rip off" of something they see in the PC. I have heard that it is difficult to protect form. And from what I have seen it would be possible for someone to go hey that's a great idea and make their own pack or product. I know this happens in brick and mortar business all the time, so I suppose that is just healthy capitalist funtion.

I know of course that promos are good things and that the general spirit here is one of great generosity.

About lower quality items. We have to be very careful here. I imagine that modelers and texture makers that make our great film animation works these days would look at EVERY item sold here and at DAZ as>.... well you know where I'm going. We have to face the facts, Poser is a low end program we can all afford and it cannot model. Anything outside the scope of the primitives has to be modeled by someone. We can't make motion picture level stuff at all.
There is fantastic stuff out there though, and the people that need it are going to have to buy it if they can't make it. So we should allow anyone to sell their stuff as always. If renderosity can host it all, then it should be there.

I don't know for sure why my time looking at peoples stuff I don't want to buy should be enough reason to say they can't give it a try. Usually I can see from the product images what the deal is with the item.

Renderosity recommends all of the good suggestions of previous posters as far as looking at other products and free stuff and charge correct prices, and so forth.

Now as far as someone advertising a product that does not live up to their claims, that is a different story. However we all know of a certain product that did not live up to claims when it first came out. Now it works very well. How do we as customers get refunds from merchants when this happens? From what I can see we may not be able to. I may be wrong on that though. Doea Rosity have a return policy?

That's "gauntlet," not "gauuntlet." Sorry about the typo. -jjsemp

I don't think merchants should restrict themselves to only things that will have a lot of sales. That might limit the marketplace to just sexy, scanty outfits. There's nothing wrong with trying to appeal to a small audience that is underserved. In fact, it might open up whole new markets and new areas of interest. I suspect that Mike textures don't sell anywhere near as well as Vicki textures. What would happen if everyone stopped selling Mike textures because the market isn't that big? We'd have even more NVIATWS pictures. I do agree, personally, that there are items in the MP that don't seem very professionally done, but there's also items by new merchants who are just starting out and haven't achieved all the skill of some of the old-time professionals. If the new merchant has something at a good price that saves me time, I might buy it even if it isn't the most breath-taking, awe inspiring item I've ever seen in my life. I factor the cost, time to duplicate, flexibility, and overall quality together in my purchasing decisions. I don't base my purchases solely on who has contributed freebies first. Some merchants are actually a group of people and the freebies might be under individual accounts. Some people have contributed with forum help, others with tutorials, etc., so just going by freebies doesn't mean much. On the other hand, having a few freebies can tilt the balance between me buying and turning away MP items. If the really poor quality stuff is ignored, the "guilty" merchants will either improve or get the hint and leave, clearing out the marketplace. That's how I see it, anyway. Cres

You know there is a community wishing well? You should have saved your self sometime.............. Here, I'll even give you a quater..... Ive made my wish lets see if it comes true.........

There's 1,200 merchants here? (See fStop's comment, #40) Whoa, I had no idea. So I guess there's maybe ... 4,000 items here? I think RDNA has about 20 merchant shops on its web-site. Well, if that's the case, there's a couple of practical things to consider: 1) I agree that Rendo definitely needs to tighten up its quality control for new items. Customers can't wade through that amount of stuff meaningfully as it is, so why add purely crappy things? You'd think Rendo would adapt this just as a matter of hardware survival. 2) Rendo also needs to improve its product database, again so people can locate something among the thousands of items. As others have observed, Rendo's search capabilities are just crude. Frankly, I've had the impression that Rendo's database was never meant to handle this kind of commercial application -- you can't even sort a subcategory by price. But 1,200 merchants here? Really?

Well, it's partly a matter of attitude. There are heroes like Koz who produce first-rate stuff and give it away because they care about the community. And there are prats who spend 30 minutes twiddling dials and then try to flog the result to some gullible punter to make a buck or two. I do get a laugh sometimes when browsing the marketplace and see some of the ludicrous things offered, sometimes at quite high prices. On the other hand, some of the products are of very high quality, and I respect that, whether it is an item I'm interested in or not. My suggestion would simply be to list the number of purchases of each item in the same way that the number of downloads in freestuff is logged. That way, if anyone tries to sell junk, they will have to contend with the humiliation of seeing their low sales figures displayed. I don't see any increase in the percentage of junk items lately, though - it's been pretty constant IMO.

Does anyone here know if v3's head will replace Mikes head for mike 3, Mike 3 is said to have been uv mapped to fit v3 textures......

I find that like with most things, the cream rises. You can generally spot good work from the thumbnails, but there are times that I've noticed an item that looked cool and wondered how on earth I missed it. I browse the new items everyday, and if I'm not paying good attention, I can overlook somthing I should have added to the wishlist. There's a lot of products to sift through, and not all of them are great, but everyone has to start somewhere. A new modeller could blossom into a better creator given time, but if they're squelched early on, they may get discouraged and give up. The comic book industry suffers from this in the form of the only major distributor, Diamond. To be listed in thier catalog, you must submit a finished book and be approved to be included. If you don't pass the scrutiny, you don't get to sell your book through the major channels (I know this, because I've published my own comic twice, and it was carried both times, but waiting on the thumbs up or down was kind of nerve-wracking). If an Internet marketplace has unlimited space, then there should be room for all. I'd rather have too much to dig through then not enough. -Jeff

"I think what Renderosity needs is a full-time "critic" to help wade through the morass in the marketplace -- just as a film critic wades through the large number of bad movies that come out every year." umno. renderosity is so fucking cliquish (just look at the hot20) that i shudder to think how full of corruption such a system would be were it to exist. think the hot20 is bad? well - imagine what it would be like with money at stake. "But 1,200 merchants here? Really? " almost. 1107 right now. thats up from under 400 just a year and a bit ago. both a good and bad thing, IMHO. cheers, -gabriel

That might limit the marketplace to just sexy, scanty outfits You mean, it isn't? :)

I think what Renderosity needs is a full-time "critic" to help wade through the morass in the marketplace -- just as a film critic wades through the large number of bad movies that come out every year.

Ummm ... to put it mildly, that wouldn't work.

What happens if the critic decides they don't like an item in the RMP? Then the merchant will accuse Renderosity of trying to damage their sales.

If the critic likes something and someone purchases the item based on the review but doesn't like it, then Renderosity will be accused of lying to get more sales.

Accusations will fly back and forth on favoritism, being hated by the staff, etc., when one product is reviewed before another.

And if Renderosity reviews items off-site, then any negative reviews would be seen as attempts to hurt competitors.

There's a reason that Consumers' Guide relies on subscriptions as their only source of revneue. Otherwise they can't help but have a vested interest in pumping (or softening reviews for) certain products.

Cheers!

I must say about all of this if an item truelly is as Mesh said "crap..hastily thrown together to make a buck" then they won't make a buck will they?It is not Renderosity's problem to decide on the merchantability of a product, just the workablilty. This kind of attitude toward new merchants is one of the many reasons why I will not ever sell anything here..

one thing i agree is that renderosity definitly would ened a more accurate/advanced search tool both for commercial and free stuff... but that also imply reediting all the free and commercial contributions to add the required database parameters :( often i look for something with a key word and it give me out totally irrelevant things, but not an item with that keyword exactly :(

I've bought a couple items in the Marketplace (non-figure/clothing-type textures packs) that were a waste of the couple bucks I paid for them, but also some things that were very good. There also seems to be a awful lot of people selling stuff these days. Maybe it is the lure of making an easy buck, but to tell the truth, it isn't all the easy to make real money out of Poser stuff, I aught to know, I do it for a living. Maybe they all got layed off from their day jobs, or something. Anyway, while I would love it if all the new guys quit selling stuff they can't really make any money on (and do Free Stuff instead), so people would have that much more money to buy MY stuff, I don't expect that to happen, it is a free country last time I checked. The store itself does all it can, they actually have pretty high standards for new items (however, the "old" stuff never had to meet them, and some never would have, either). Let me suggest this, though- if you buy items of no use to you, complain to the merchant, complain to the store, don't do like I did and just write it off as a learning experence and "gotta remember not to buy from them ever again".

You know what? In the end, the MP is just the same as Freestuff - It piles up higher and higher, and there will be good, bad and indifferent stuff all mixed up together. A year ago, DAZ made a smart move. They went through every item on the site and jerked the crap, explaining to the merchants involved that non-selling items were putting customers off visiting DAZ because they couldn't find what they wanted in amongst all the junk. (DAZ didn't put it quite as crudely as that, but that was about the size of it). So unless Rosity institutes some kind of annual clean-up, the situation isn't going to improve. I'd be against a critic, but I would be in favor of an annual review of what sells and what doesn't. Set a minimum limit based on some kind of average, and cut out the dead wood below that figure. I mean, if you sold 6 copies of your $5 light set in a year, can you really expect it to stay up? mac PS Jim - I keep hearing about these 'easy bucks'. Do YOU know how to go about making them? LOL.

btw when i hear about market place, i always fear that aside from 3d modeler artists there is no room for anything else.. maybe photo realistic veryhigh res textures... also (i may push people a bit too harsh but it is my way of speaking to shake people on a sensible matter): if there are so many junks, why not forbid/prevent new memebrs to post on the marketplace and only leave regular merchants contributing ? (oki i know it sounds awful and against any kind of freedom.. but i like to highlight excessive and extreme poitn of view, just to see how far all we can go... dont think i share the ideas i write :)

They went through every item on the site and jerked the crap If that's true, they made some really odd choices. For example, they jettisoned a morph/texture package for the M1 clothing called "Radical" that had some truly cool work in it: useful clothing morphs, fun texture styling. I still don't understand why that got taken down, and I'd bet there are a bunch of other products that got shoved off that shouldn't have been.

Well, it used to be easier than it is now, never was really all that easy, though! When I used to be in this store there was some talk about cutting out items that hardly ever sold, or moving them to another place, but many of the other merchants were against it. Might have been good for the customer's though- who is going to wade thru 50 pages of similar items? Only things that sell are at the front of the lists. The first rule of selling here is "always have new stuff, as people don't see your old" ;-)

Items that haven't been purchased in a while are put in the Warehouse and set at a permanent discount. Eventually they're completely retired. I'll ask about the improved search engine. We've had a lot of people ask about that in general. I know that sometimes it can be a bit hard for the merchants to categorized their stuff and some just pick whatever they think will get more hits, regardless of appropriateness. (I don't know if a system is in place to cut down on this yet.) Cheers!

I don't think you can go by lack of sales. There's a lot of quality goods that were purchased when they first came out but aren't being bought much now-- sometimes because you can barely find them-- Sharkey's gear, for instance, has been all but swallowed up in the much less imaginative slew of fetish ware that we've been flooded with. ame with Bat's Cleric Outfit-- It's innovative and incredible, but covers up a lot of vicki3 and I'll bet doesnt' sell well. There seems to be an far of judging by quality. Heck, I cansee thick bulging models without fine detail-- why can't Rosity. Some of this stuff I wouldn't even download for FS. And believe me when I say I would buy just about anything. Love CryptoPooka's military stuff-- I'll get around to tank-girl yet.:) Texture always seems to get the short end-- good texture is invaluable. Fine detailing and each change in texture a real change not some diddling with the hue slider in PhotoShop-- that really maddens me. 3DCommune is sorting through their merchants and lightening their load. According to what I hear, they want to concentrate on quality. They must think it can be done. Rdna made the announcement that they were concentrating on quality many months back- and you know what, I buy nearly everything they put out, because they stand behind it and it is as good as they say it is. If renderosity can't do this, it has to be because they have made a choice not to go for quality. Emily

Oh...yes, Queri! That Cleric Outfit from Bat is WONDERFUL!!! As for why there are so many merchants, I don't think they think they can make a killing. I think it's mainly for pin money so they can purchase other Poser stuff. :)

Queri that is so true. There are gems hidden in there. The problem is they're buried, and therefore aren't seen and don't sell. Renderosity really needs to rethink how things are laid out.

Calypso Dreams... My Art- http://www.calypso-dreams.com

Renderosity Gallery

i liked the way the old hot sellers was laid out. when you clicked on it, it took you through the top selling products of all time here, in their order of sales. now, when you click top sellers, its only RECENT top sellers. which isnt all bad, but there should be an option to also sort it as top sellers from day 1.

{{{{{Here and other places you can't go lower than 5 dollars, even if you want to unless you are invited to do textures for one of the clubs (Platinum Club, ProClub at PoserPros, RDNA Real Deals).- LaurieA}}}} Hi LaurieA :) I wanted to correct one small thing in what you said, if it is ok :) Our lowest price on PoserPros is 3.50 ordinarily. For the ProClub it is true, we do allow folks to set prices to 2.49. I am not sure what the others are all about, but the reason our "club" of developers is invitation only at this time is strictly for quality control reasons, so that we can ensure that the quality of things developed for this area are top notch :)

Well, if anybody gets this far down, here is my beef - some things in the marketplace are just BAD product - defective - don't work - don't render peoperly etc - I'm not talking about artistic preference at all - just technical quality. I have bought several such things, and I have always done the right thing by contacting the merchant, etc. The problem is most of the time, I get a polite email from the author saying "sorry, and update will come" yadda yadda. But the update never comes - and now, because I waited so patiently, I can no longer get a refund - but the item is STILL being sold to unsuspecting people who may not spot the problem untill they install and check the thing maybe weeks later. I think this is just WRONG and I want to at least WARN others that this product has a defect, but if I make such a comment (even if it is valid and made with sensitivity), the author simply does not show my comment on the product. While I don't want people to get flamed unnecessarily, I think that if an author has the right surpress negative comments, it MUST be subject to the approval of some independent person. If the comment is VALID it should be posted even if the author does not want it. This simple system would at least discourage some people from putting up things that they surely know is crap, and allow the rest of us the ability to at least trust the comments that we read by knowing that valid negative comments have not been surpressed. As it stands, knowing that authors can surpress any comment they wish, diminishes the value of the other comments to me.

"Hi LaurieA :) I wanted to correct one small thing in what you said, if it is ok :) Our lowest price on PoserPros is 3.50 ordinarily. For the ProClub it is true, we do allow folks to set prices to 2.49. I am not sure what the others are all about, but the reason our "club" of developers is invitation only at this time is strictly for quality control reasons, so that we can ensure that the quality of things developed for this area are top notch :)" I understand completely about the ProClub policy Mehndi :o). Daz does the same and I think the whole RDNA site runs that way. It does ensure that quality is as good as it can get. And I WASN'T aware that you can go as low as 3.50 at PP. That's good to know :o)! Laurie

Not everyone has Cable or DSL, So browsing all those pages can be slow and time consuming.

Crescent wrote: "Ummm ... to put it mildly, that wouldn't work. What happens if the critic decides they don't like an item in the RMP? Then the merchant will accuse Renderosity of trying to damage their sales. If the critic likes something and someone purchases the item based on the review but doesn't like it, then Renderosity will be accused of lying to get more sales. Accusations will fly back and forth on favoritism, being hated by the staff, etc., when one product is reviewed before another. And if Renderosity reviews items off-site, then any negative reviews would be seen as attempts to hurt competitors. There's a reason that Consumers' Guide relies on subscriptions as their only source of revneue. Otherwise they can't help but have a vested interest in pumping (or softening reviews for) certain products." My response: To put it not-so-mildly but bluntly, I think it would work just fine. As I mentioned in my original post, of course a critic will incite a lot of anger, name calling, and cries of conspiracy or favoritism... ...just like REAL film, literary, theater, and art critics already do. But that doesn't mean they shouldn't exist. Newspapers, magazines and TV hire critics all the time. We hate them, but we love them. It'd be no different here. And I don't think any blame will land on Renderosity. Computer magazines which are full of ads to sell things hire reviewers to review software all the time. Why can't Renderosity? Personally, I'd like a real intelligent, opinionated critic or two to help wade through the garbage and warn us of the pitfalls in the marketplace. Maybe somebody will start a web site totally unrelated to Renderosity that will take on the task of impartially and fairly commenting on some of the stuff in the MP (I still think one already exists but I can't for the life of me remember the name of it -- anybody able to help here?). --jjsemp

What I love are all the non 3d related items sold there. I still half expect to open the marketplace and find someone's rear left tire from their AMC Javilin for sale. What I am disappointed about is the lack of quality on some products and the lack of QA time. I can understand unforseen things happening ie an American product put on a French machine and it can't find directories etc. but having .bum files referenced or textures simply not found is out of line. Worst yet are clothes items that don't have the vertices welded. That's a huge pet peeve. Boy that Vicky suit looks great IF I DON'T BEND HER! But I've also see bad things from DAZ as well. One suit had a head band attached to the right collar instead of the head. I had to go into 3d studio and fix this myself or I'd have a fantom head band floating around every time I'd bend the figure. Also another pet peeve is lack of optimizing. Having meshes so vert heavy that they kill a 2 gig ram machine is unacceptable expecially if its an item like a belt or shoes or some such inocuous thing. Also having non character items being characters instead of props is a pain. A necklace should not be a conforming character if it does not bend. Earings should not be conforming characters. Same with bracelets. I have a wrist watch sitting in one of my articulated prop character dirs I will probably never use cause its a character; for a watch! Now if Poser had a way to filter the characters on its pick list so it could only show the root figures instead of every clothes item then things would be easier. And what is with the constant focus on the same things over and over again. Talk about market saturation. How many skin texture sets does the market need? I would imagine 4 or 5 good ones would cover 90% of the requirements but every other day there's a new "Brandy" or "Mindy" or "Bambi" or "Babette" character with "super high res textures made from real human skin!". Why would someone think they are going to make money introducing yet another skin texture and compete with the other 50 or so sets for sale and the other sets for free. Hey here's an idea. How about an overlay makeup pack for P5 material nodes. Now that would be useful. Some set of BW nodes that do an add or multiply and you can set their colors for blush, eyeliner, eyeshadow etc instead of having 12 face textures mixed and matched on sheets. Great way to give any p5 Vickie figure make up without munging the original texture to do it. The material nodes have tons of possibilities from bruise overlays to tattoos to cuts/scratches/ to sweat... all without duplicating someone else while providing a unique item for sale.

well i have a 56k right now and yes it can be long and tedious to look within either rmp or freestuff... but it can GREATLY be improved by a more accurate/complex search engine i think

As a buyer, I tend to look for things that are off the beaten path. I don't agree that one should not make an item that may have a version in free stuff. And that such an item is unsellable, because the two lamps in free stuff may not be what I am specifically looking for to match my vision that the sold one is. There are plenty of free ships out there, but that didn't stop me from buying one, because it fit the vision better or it's useful due to it's material breakdown. For me, shopping consists of what items I can use in the most images, regardless of the artist, though I give greater weight to purchases by merchants who I know are good at what they do when deciding, but if it's something that will do the job, I'll buy from a new artist just as quickly.

To me, the following would be useful:

1> Full feedback (good or bad) posted unless the feedback is of a malicious and/or incorrect nature. How can the buyer know if what he's buying is good if all that the merchant displays is good reviews and no bad? If the merchant is any good, the product feedback should display that. At the very least, it would give a heads up on what to expect that may not be in the promo images.

2> If it's a model, the material/vertex breakdown would be very helpful as one of the promo screens. The reason for this is that products that can be broken down into individual parts which may have further uses (for instance, the wheel from Poserworld's ship and the Rigging from Pauli's were combined to get the look that I wanted). Such a breakdown (along with the polygon count) would help in knowing if products do so. I bought an item where I was told the items inside were movable and I took that to mean that they were separate props like the Great Hall by Daz, but in reality, they were all one prop and moving the items (grouping them) was a nightmare.

3> The improved search engine would be good too...

I look at the What's New everyday and honestly, I don't see the big backlog that you all are claiming. Even after being gone more than a week, it took about 20 minutes to catch up to see if there was anything I was interested in. No, I don't look at everything, because I'm not interested in everything, but what I am has always been easy to find if it's there at all.

I just wish there was more stand alone objects (models that have numerous purposes) and sets that are not designed for one render, but they seem to be harder and harder to find in the Marketplace.

ShadowWind

Attached Link: http://www.critical-depth.net

*Maybe somebody will start a web site totally unrelated to Renderosity that will take on the task of impartially and fairly commenting on some of the stuff in the MP (I still think one already exists but I can't for the life of me remember the name of it -- anybody able to help here?).* jjsemp - you're thinking of Critical Depth (link above) for the Poser related product reviews.

I do agree that all comments, negative and positive, should be posted under products, as long as the comments are relevant of course. Otherwise the feedback to me is rather useless.

Calypso Dreams... My Art- http://www.calypso-dreams.com

Renderosity Gallery

I agree about the comments; that's one of my pet peeves. You can't comment unless you've bought the item in question, and it seems to me that in that case, you've also bought the right to complain. If there's an exceptionally, unnecessarily nasty comment, then I'm OK with the merchant being able to appeal to an admin to have it removed, but in general negative comments should go up as well. Have a little faith in your customer base. I think most of us are intelligent enough to ignore comments of "ur ting sux. It dozn work." buried among dozens of glowing reviews. It would also be nice if we could edit the comments we've made. So, you know, if we have a bad day and go off half-cocked and leave a bad review and then realize that we didn't RTFM or if we have a problem that the merchant then fixes, we can change the review to reflect that.

I can only say is breathe deeply and browse TurboSquid for a while. Things could be much, much worse.

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - H. L. Mencken