I use Poser. And other tools, including Blender. Not DS. That's just the way it is :) I date back to autoCad before it had 3d; ran on DOS and used LISP. I wrote LISP for AutoCADs first 3d version, to drive a water-jet that cut aluminum we used to build a "tool" which we used to cast a carbon-fiber/nomex composite race car body. Things were so easy back then :D

I enjoy working with La Femme (which is why I started using Poser again). I had quit CGI after SIGRAPH 2018. The fun seemed gone.Sometime around Poser 11.1 I just quit using Poser.

I did try DS and G8, drawn in by the beautiful catalog images at Daz. But when it came down to it, I had to work very hard to just to produce those images. And I'm on a Mac so nvidia render options are not easily gotten without a lot of money. I do have a very (very very very) powerful computer. More cores and RAM than should be legal. It's just not Nvidia (Apple's choice, not mine).

But DS was not the best "just let my creativity go" kind of thing for me. Kind of like Blender. Even 2.8 (which is way better, coming from other apps). The GUI just keeps coming between me and easy creativity. Sort of like Superfly in Poser compared to Reality+Lux. The second is almost magical photorealism. Yes, I can get that from Superfly. But only with a lot of node work (and the requisite research and knowledge).

La Femme got me interested in CGI again.

Anyway. I also try my hand at developing for Poser. So far, only simple things. Character morphs. Clothing. Some objects. Plenty of scripts. Rigging and such is a chore. But then I expect it to be. Good JCMs are the biggest chore. I've also played with dynamics, and dynamic (tris work best) exported as OBJ then remeshed in blender to clean subd-able quads and make into comforming. That's not bad either. Quad Remesher kicks booty for that.

I would really buy more ready made stuff except that so much of the stuff I would like is G8(DS) only. I have bought some and exported it to poser. But so far my methods of doing that are very manual.

I get the notion of vendors producing for larger market and clearly DS/G8 is way larger than P/LF. At least, to judge by the products available. Some of them are really nice.

I don't want to talk about Daz/Poser compatibility split (long done), any market tactics (just business), or personality/company conflicts.

And this droning is just background.

My question, and I have no idea, is: is DS/G8 easier to develop in/for, is it the same (just different) than P/LF, or is it harder?

I'm assuming, it's more profitable.

From my perspective ... there is just more demand for DS products. I myself am a dedicated Poser advocate. It's not about ease ... it's about what sells. I am hoping that La Femme/L'Homme become much more popular and and with the other figures that are now included with Poser (the HIvewire figures) more and more products will be developed for Poser. I run the La Femme Fan Club on facebook for Renderosity and we discuss what we would like to see for the figures and I put up the latest things on sale for her. There are a lot of vendors there and you can ask for products directly from them there if you engage in social media.

DS has always been content driven ... so content development and sales has always been more prominent.

Poser originally was feature driven. What the program DOES. And originally if was more of a bridge to other programs. With Bondware (Renderosity as Poser's new owner) there is a shift to more content driven features within Poser. Features will still be developed, certainly, but content will be emphasized since that is the core of this site.

I hope that explains things a bit.

My question, and I have no idea, is: is DS/G8 easier to develop in/for, is it the same (just different) than P/LF, or is it harder?

Way easier to develop for (because there are huge varieties of tools out there to help you do it, and because poke-through and tweaking for body morphs are things of the past since there's native collision detection.)

Mind, I understand why you thought it was a steep learning curve and a hindrance; the two applications simply work differently. Poser is the same Kai Krause inspired suite that has been around for almost 25 years now. DS has a user interface based on and inspired by Modo, Lightwave, etc. Poser has a very rigid directory hierarchy (Poser), while DS is more free-form, with only textures and Geometries ("data", or the object files) really requiring that they be in one spot - otherwise you can arrange things any way you want. That free-form-not-sure-where-the-widget-lives-now file setup relies on you to put things where you want them, which can frustrate some folks.

The point in DS though isn't to just use the UI and directory structure that you're given, but to customize it to make it your own, to take charge of it for your needs. Compound this with a slightly different pipeline for doing stuff, and it's easy to see why long-time Poser users find it frustrating at times.

Personally, I can use DS as easily as I can make coffee in the morning, and I don't even really think about the slider/dials or suchlike, because everything is right where I'm used to seeing it. I used to do that with Poser, too... though it would take me some time to get used to using it again on a regular basis now.

I also used a Mac until recently... but even though I have to put up with 'doze to get that nVidia goodness of a 1080GTX in a mobile form factor, the iRay render engine makes it all worth it in my opinion (especially since MacBook Pro quality has slipped over the years - my work laptop is a latest-gen, and it requires rebooting almost as much as my stupid 'doze laptop does...)

I couldn't find the la femme fan club in facebook. :(