Heya LadySilverMage :) Wanted to pop in and try to answer your questions a bit :) Firstly, I was referring to a new guild effort in the works by some of the artists here (and I do mean in its very barest idea level of infancy). I of course cannot be sure of a final name for it, but I am referring to it for now as the Free Market Guild. Let me explain how it is different from the current Renderosity Merchants Guild. With Renderosity Merchants Guild, there are only about 20 or so artists who are "members". These people were chosen by the owners of Renderosity for their high sales. So it was more an award of merit, but somehow it got named "guild" and that may have accidently caused alot of confusion, and yes, even pain, for other artists who were not invited in, and who also keep saying, "guild... you can join a guild... I want to join, how do I join..." and no one answers them with the specifics, since the specifics are fairly snobby sounding when told in a bald faced way, meaning, "sell LOTS of stuff." Ok... so that is the state of affairs on that existing guild known as the Renderosity Merchants Guild. What some here have been discussing the last 3 weeks or so is a triple pronged effort. It will probably be alot more inclusive of alot more ideas too once heads have time to think it out, and once a brainstorming meeting can be organized to be called also to be able to be attended in an open chat session here of those interest. For starters, this guild would be a real actual honest to god you better watch out medieval style guild. Meaning it is actually OPEN to being joined. And not just by Renderosity artists and members, but by BBay, Renderotica, 3d Commune, PFO folks, anyone and everyone from various sites who have an interest in the guilds objectives, and who want to committ themselves to those objectives and help others reach those objectives. At this point there is no discussion of any membership fee, though there has been some discussion of ways for guild members to voluntarily "give back" as you will see at a later point in my explanation :) Some of our goals and objectives: Formed by a small group of the "highest ranking" artists in the overall community. These are names you know already, and I would dare say at least respect. Controlled, operated, and managed by the members, not by a company, or a store, or a particular website. Membership Fees: None monatary fees are planned so far, though contributing to either education or free stuff may in fact be the "fee" in the end. Voluntary testing services for those who wish to have their product tested by a double blinded panel of artists in the guild in order to recieve a stamp/mark of approval. This testing is still up in the air as far as what criteria, but a good system might be a checklist that is run down of basic things, each one having a certain number of points attached, and then one gets a total points value, and from there a grade. The idea is for any artist selling anywhere, or even free stuff artists who give away their work, to have a way to have it tested independently for good quality. You know, basically Kid Tested, Mother Approved, sort of Good Housekeeping type seal. We aim to have this testing available to all artists, not just guild members, though alot of how many items we can test will depend on how many members there are able and available to do testing :) Another goal is in fact revolving around free stuff, and there has been alot of opposition to this goal and controversy, even a threat (later retracted) to ban those who would join such a guild, and I guess there will continue to be controversy. The goal is simply to release into free stuff excellent quality merchandise by the guild artists, as they have time, can afford it (since so many of the artists actually derive their literal money they live off of from making products for Poser), and feel like it. If these items released to free stuff happen to be a better crafted solution that saves customers from spending money on a product which is being sold somewhere that is inferior, then the goal has been served, as well as the community. Another goal under discussion is centering around some of the very top artists, whose effort this guild idea is, to share some of their "trade secrets" with others, so that anyone who wishes to make better quality things, either for sale, for free, or just for themselves, will have a chance to actually learn if they put their back into it and take that opportunity. The overall goal and motive of this guild would be to encourage the release of better quality items through any tool at our disposal, be it training, voluntary reviews, or out and out rabid "competition" through the release of superior items crafted to replace an exceedingly poorly crafted item, so as to offer an alternative for those seeking such an item. The reason this has not been made public before now, is that it is a VERY serious idea and plan, and therefore is taking real planning. It cannot be swiftly decided who even initially qualifies for an invitation to a meeting on the concept, since we are not going to use dollar value sold as our criteria of who is good or not good. However, since the existence of such an idea being worked on has been made public, before others misunderstand its intent, having heard all sorts of panicced fears out of other artists who are speaking in fear and ignorance, it is best to try to describe the thought processes going on so far. Hope this helps answer a few questions.

It can't be all that exclusive - they let me in. ;] Er... A secret freestuff forum. Coolness. Er... what do you do with people like me who post both store items and freebies? We obviously know too much. Must be spies and espionage agents. snicker "Does that mean that not everyone can contribute to the store? That only a few are allowed to do so?? Who is beholden to whom?? " Nah, Silvermage. So far as I can tell, anyone can contribute to the marketplace. Only requirement for membership is that one produce something the want to sell, that makes it through store testing.

"I am a good person now and it feels... well, pretty much the same as I felt before (except that the headaches have gone away now that I'm not wearing control top pantyhose on my head anymore)"

Monkeysmell

Thanks Mehndi for that. But I'm wondering now, does that all free stuff will then have to be approved or is this "guild" going to be seperate from 'rosity?

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I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
-Galileo

This guild is SEPERATE from Renderosity :) As I said, it is an open call for ALL artists of any site to better themselves and their work, and serve their customers, or fans of their products even given away for free, more richly. Things will go on as usual here with Renderosity, and with other sites too no doubt. Anyone can sell, anyone can put things in free stuff, anyone can post to almost any forum, all that :) But with this guild, if you so wished it, even if not a member, you could send a copy of your product, identifying information as to who made it would be temporarily removed, and have it put out to a little rotating double blind testers panel, to go over. Then they give it a Free Market Guild seal of quality, and send you a lovely little logo image you can then add to your images to advertise your that product with :) I figure it should help sales of those artists who bear such a seal for independent testing, and even raise the download rate of those artists who are choosing to give something away :)

I think I'm understanding this... but lemme check... so, this "guild" would be a group of invited members, OFF site, so seperate from the existing "communities/forums/websites" where they would share their knowledge/experience/secrets in order to improve their own skills... then this group would voluntarily have their products tested blindly by a group of guild testers, and when the testers have said "Yay, you're stuff is good." they would be allowed to advertise that fact... with as you mentioned a graphic or whatever, that then would either be offered for free somewhere, or sold wherever they'd like to offer it for sale? So that you'd have a way of knowing that those selected products meet a certain standard? The only thing I'd want to know is what if you're not invited into the guild, but you'd like to have your own products tested so that you could say they meet those standards... I mean it would be a benefit for a LOT of vendors to be able to say "Hey, my stuff is good... look, see my fancy sticker! I've been appoved!"... I think this is a great idea, if it's what I think it is... except in the respect that not everyone would be able to have their products rated... it could be something that did cost something to be a member... such as a certain percentage of the cost of the product or something, so that you wouldn't have to pay out just to have your product tested and find out that it's not good enough, but then if it IS good enough you haven't wasted any money... but then you could argue that you've wasted the time of those who've had to test it... anyway... I think this is a good idea... I mean as a customer, I'd like to know that something I'm planning on spending my money on will be what I expect it to be... I'm kind of glad that this was brought out into the public, even though it isn't a completed idea... I find it interesting... so I'd kind of like to know as things are updated... I really hope that the idea doesn't get killed by cynicism... hmm... did I spell that right... okay, I'm gonna go finish eating my muffin now... mmmmmm... muffin.... :)

Just wondering if you could actually do a double-blinded test on certain people's products. By this I mean that some people have such distinctive styles that their stuff is instantly recognizable to anyone who spends the slightest bit of time on any of the forums. I do not think it would be possible for the testers to be truly blind when testing these products. An interesting problem. Daio, who has to review experimental designs and the like almost daily.

"Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on your computer." -- Bruce Graham

hmmm.... if it is going to be seperate from 'rosity then why is it being discussed on a board that not everyone participates in? It seems as if it will be made up current 'rosity venodrs or else the discussion would be taking place in the "open" so to speak...

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I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
-Galileo

Does this have anything to do with the fact that Curious Labs is adding a "market" to Poser?

Heya Cin, to answer a few of your questions :) Yes, under the current plan, ANYONE could submit his work for voluntary testing. Membership is not needed for that. However, where membership does come into play is in having enough manpower to manage to do testing of more than a few things at a time, since we would probably primarily be turning to in house testers/members to ask them to volunteer to pitch in on this effort. Invitation Only? Why NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! I would NEVER be involved in anything like that, ever ever ever. The criteria for joining has not yet been totally worked out. Alot of it has to do again with "quality of work" and being committed to guild ethics of quality in all one does. In the beginning (sounds like the bible almost... heh), of course, to try to find some folks to even join, we are going to have to send out some invitations, along the lines of, "Dear Traveller. We congratulate you for all you do for the community to give back, and to uphold the HIGHEST of quality standards in your own work while doing so. We would like to invite you to join us in a new guild being formed called The Free Market Guild. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask them!" etc :) Daio, to try to answer you... the answer is not such good news. Yes, some of us have recognizable styles. It cannot be helped at all. For example, as my granny would have said, "I would know Thorne's hide in a tannery." ;) So... in this case, one must be a calm ethical and good hearted professional, and go forward, chin up, and test with similar ethics to the way doctors treat patients, and firement treat those they rescue. You just do not allow yourself to fall to temptation. Ethics... ethics will be a part of this effort. Being committed to good sound fair guild ethics. Now... if something were submitted and then it was found that it had so many problems that in good conscience one could not go forward with giving it the seal, this is the procedure I would try to put forward to you all. First a letter trying to explain to the person why it was rejected, the areas it did not meet guidelines would be sent out, with suggestions on how to actually go about fixing these problems, so they can then fix it and resubmit :) Having readily availalbe to all public tutorials we can refer the person to will help alot there I am hoping. Secondly, we go back to those doctors ethics. You shut your mouth, and you keep your mouth shut. It is not our place to humiliate a soul. It is a private matter always. No one need ever know.

Oh dear, more questions to answer ;) LadySilverMage... the reason it began in private ICQ and emailed talks is because that was most convenient for those who had the idea I guess. Honestly... I am not the originator of the idea... and it is unfortunate it has come out in the open before a good set of bylaws could be published, a brainstorming session inviting over various folks from all communities could be initiated, etc, to get more high minded goals and needs of the community met in the initial idea. But... since as they say news travels fast, this got leaked straight into the two merchants forums here, and a good sized discussion got begun ;) Now it is more a matter of me personally choosing to speak to thoughts on it, not as an actual representative of this, so much as attempting to alleviate fears some have had, and to explain to others just why, etc. So that explains why my posts are here, at Renderosity... since this is where I sort of hang out and post. I know the idea had been to get the ducks in a row so to speak, get up a lovely well thought out, well explained document, and go around to everyplace one could find to post it, informing all of this new Arts and Crafts Movement, and letting all know they may be one of us :) Poppi, no, beholden to NO ONE. NO ONE means Curiouslabs, though if individual developers at Curiouslabs and Daz wished to join up as members, they would be welcomed with open arms, since they are fine developers who set high quality standards in most things they do :)

Oh... one more question I notice that I failed to answer, sorry Cin :( You asked about a way to compensate testers for their time. See what I mean about not yet being very far down the road on getting this all worked out here? ;) That discussion had not yet come up. I think... and this is just me very literally thinking out of the seat of my pants here, that I would personally, gladly consent that if anyone testing my work wished to keep a copy for themselves, they would be welcome to do so, as payment. However... alot about this idea is about FREEDOM and CONSENT... so if one sent in something and said, "but I would prefer you not keep it after you are done, but could it please be tested anyway..." I know that I personally would delete the product from my own hard drive honorably, and it would never once interfere with my ability to make a value judgement on quality :)

Well, now. This sounds like a good thing.

Mehndi... now you're reading my mind... well not really, 'cause I mentioned it, but after I did I thought to myself "Hey... testing something and then getting to keep it would be a pretty good payment." I've tested out a couple of things (literally a couple, as in 2!) for vendors who shall remain nameless, but if you look in my gallery you'll figure it out. And I got to keep copies of them, which frankly I was just glad to be allowed to help test them out, and if I had been asked to delete them, well I WOULD have, but I wouldn't have been happy about it... but then I also would've gone and bought them as soon as I had the money... sheesh I'm so poor...

all right, hold the phone. in any store, in any mall, or by itself, there's a back room for employees only. customers don't go there. employees go there and they have meetings, and they discuss business plans and other stuff that customers are not privy to. (they eat their lunch there and whatnot, as well, but obiviously that doesn't apply here.) they discuss policies and sales and advertising etc etc. are you gonna have a spazz now that stores have secret meetings in back rooms? you know what they're plotting in there? how to sell you stuff. you wanna run in and bust 'em? so that's what the big secrety mystery forum is for: the employee back room. if something gets screwed up in the store, the vendors run there and yell and jump up and down for somebody to fix it before we all embarass ourselves and make the customers wonder if we're a buncha incompetent goons running things, here. you know how customers get upset over the least little detail going wrong. perception of quality, etc etc etc. so far, i havent seen a big conspiracy to put subliminal messages in the forums to make you buy more stuff. or any bill-gate-like plans to force you to pay for stuff even if you don't buy it. honestly, people, store goings-on are really rather boring, and why do you wanna be bothered with it, anyway? now as for this guild idea.... i did have an idea that the commercial poser artists (at least the independent ones, if not all of 'em) should band together in some kinda group who could pool resources like lawyers and accountants whatnot, should any of the group need them. which would probably mean the membership would be a paying one, which has its own problems. but i take it, mehndi, that your group doesnt have any plans for anything like that.

Right Bloodsong :) So far, we are going to rely on an almost "religious" committment towards a good quality movement mattering enough to most of us, that we will have no problems manning the helm with enough ethical people to handle testing, writing a few tutorials to teach good development, since it would break my heart personally to not give that coveted stamp of approval without also offering a way to learn to improve so you can get it after a few fixes... etc. No plans yet to charge. No plans to be site focussed. This means all places are open to being accepted, be it Daz artists, Commune Artists, Renderotica Artists... even the artists on the little site (oh god I am sooo sorry, I cannot recall its name) that sells the absolutely WONDERFUL animals :) I know, I did not list every site... but my brain is failing me here due to stress. Stress. Yes... so Im gonna go sit down at a theatre and take a night off, rather than let Tammymc kill me with stress today ;P (Heart problem, sorry guys). I have been fired as a moderator of my forums, for daring to make a stand for quality, and for a new by artists for artists guild, which I guess they feel is an attack on the existing guild in some way, and hold me responsible for, since I willingly put my neck on the chopping block, and even when called on to do so, refused to name the names of my "cohorts" rather than see them suffer as well. Better to have ones head chopped off and go to Heaven for telling the truth, and for warning some of you in the various merchant forums of an admin level threat that has been made against anyone who would dare even join such a guild, than hold silence. If any of you joined us, you should know what you face is how I see it. He hates me, he will hate you ;)

InDepth Reviews has already set up an independent review board for vendors - at least for vendors who sell through Daz or 3D Commune. You can find out more at: http://www.critical-depth.com/Reviews/ First review of a product brokered at 3D Commune should be up in about a week. Jade

"Now... if something were submitted and then it was found that it had so many problems that in good conscience one could not go forward with giving it the seal, this is the procedure I would try to put forward to you all. First a letter trying to explain to the person why it was rejected, the areas it did not meet guidelines would be sent out, with suggestions on how to actually go about fixing these problems, so they can then fix it and resubmit :) Having readily availalbe to all public tutorials we can refer the person to will help alot there I am hoping. Secondly, we go back to those doctors ethics. You shut your mouth, and you keep your mouth shut. It is not our place to humiliate a soul. It is a private matter always. No one need ever know." Very good. Everyone wins here. jon

~jon
My Blog - Mad Utopia Writing in a new era.

"honestly, people, store goings-on are really rather boring, and why do you wanna be bothered with it, anyway?" Y'know, I really could have cared less about any of this till bloodsong, etc., started telling us not to worry our pretty little heads. Those are the magic words for arousing suspicion, if you ask me. If it's all so boring, then why not do it out in the open? Everyone will lose interest in the first ten minutes, and you guys can have it all to yourselves again.

hehe! Hey guess what?! I post in the "Merchant's Only" forum and I talk about FREE STUFF too- I'm all about free stuff, the problem being that there is a growing number of items with price tags on them that should rightfully BELONG in the free stuff and not in the store. Mehndi and I and some others have been formulating this idea for the Free Market Guild for some time now. The ideas is simple, and would work something like a "better business bureau" for modelers. It's certainly NOT about money, or who we like or don't like, or what our own PERSONAL tastes in models happens to be. It's totally about QUALITY CONTROL and the lack thereof among some brokering sites. I have before and will continue to post ABSOLUTELY FREE a higher quality version of some poopie that I find cluttering up store pages, wherever that might be. I am not talking about personal taste or preference, or snobbism or elitism either for that matter. I am refering to a set list of tangible and absolute standards of quality that any model should rightfully meet before being considered a sale item, irregardless of whether or not I personally find the item distasteful, or I think it is the best thing since sliced bread. Either way, if it don't meet the standards, then it don't cut the mustard. I am very sick of the "let the buyer beware" attitude. I say, as I said in the Merchant's Forum, "LET THE POOPIE PEDDLERS BEWARE"- 'cos the Guild is gonna getcha...

P.S. It was my idea to begin with, and I ain't skeered to let anyone know because I firmly stand behind and try to practice what I preach. 'Nuff said. =};-}>

I LOVE this idea. I truly do. (Although, most of you know...secret anything drives me nuts...Never, ever was I surprised at Christmas.) I just read a thread about the commentaries in the marketplace only reflecting the "good" things on an item. Now, this new guild...well, I guess if you could display that logo, you would show that your stuff was decent. This is great. In a system like that, I would sell my own stuff. (I was turned off on our marketplace because of well, some of the stuff is not even any sort of quality....You know...those folks who are here a week, asking questions in the forums, and plopping up a market.) This could be a really nice thing. I am so very glad you all came up with it. Okay...first time since the WTC attack.... Pop...pop...pop!!!

P.S. again- Dear Mehndi, please feel free to post anything from any of my personal messages to you concerning this issue, that you think would help further our cause of quality control. And though I think trolls are the scum of the earth and would never post or "leak" private posts from the merchants forum, as has been done here in the past, my own words are MINE and I will repeat anything that I have myself said that doesn't mention names or refer to any specific individuals or items. It is WAY PAST TIME for Quality and Honor to become good things again, and let the almighty DOLLAR BE DAMNED- beware of any "secret police" who would try to ban you for simply practicing those virtues. The Once and Future Thorne

When I was a mod here there was more "hiden" boards: The Mods boards, the admin boards, etc. I agree that some kind of stuff can't be discussed in public and this call was for merchants who don't use to visit the merchants forum, sorry if this makes you all wonder what was discussed there. Best Regardings Virus Founder of the very very first Internet's 3D Artits Guild: The Propsguild :)

SAL9000 - Hello Dr. Chandra, Will I've dream?

One last post before I head out ;) Some of you may have gotten emails from me in the past, but most of you never have. I sign my emails thusly, with words that define the very core of my existence: A man who stands for nothing will fall for anything. Malcolm X In answer to the In Depth Arts Review process, it is WONDERFUL, and I hope to God someday they get around to reviewing my own work that was released to them over a month ago for that purpose at their express request. But it seems they manage only about a review a week... I am hoping once I grow this movement, once Thorne and I do, since he has now decided to come forward and state he actually is the originator of it (Thank you my darling Pooka for standing by me in my time of need... I have been and always shall be yours too, no matter our fussing at one another at times...) anyway, that once we grow it up to a Big Kid On The Block as it were, we will manage to actually provide LOTS of reviews to all those willing and needing them.

Thorne does that make Mehndi the 'scum of the earth' for posting a private email in the C&D forum? http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=407825 Who it is from and what it was about is irrelevant.. It is in essence the very same thing as posting a message from a private forum.. Worse still if you consider it was meant for one set of eyes only. So one has to ask the questions.. How 'ethical' was that and would Mehndi have any qualms about posting private messages? Would Mehndi have any qualms about posting an email any of us send to her in private? Apparently not. Trust just flew out the window.. Just calling it as I see it. FYI Thorne I have the utmost respect for you and your work.. This is not meant as a go at you.. I just find it Ludicrous that a person who expends so much energy telling everyone how ethical she is does this.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

It sounds good Mehndi, but what you are saying is that the merchants will also do the testing? So if you are not a merchant but want to help the community you will not be able to because you are not a merchant, or a producer of a product either for freestuff or for any store? If it does grow up to be the big kid on the block so to speak, and the vendors are busy testing products for other vendors, will there be products to test? I have a concern here for artists like myself that do artwork, but don't really produce anything in a model or a texture that they care to sell, rather they just use what they make for themselves. So we would not be good enough to join the "guild" or what? I'm sensing behind this enthusiasm a bit of snobbery or the willingness to leave us "commoners" out of the whole mysterious process. There is a lot to be said for having someone fairly new to Poser testing a product..as a matter of fact with the proper guidelines in place, there really shouldn't need to be a high level of knowledge for a lot of the products. Some yes, but not all. Testing should be done by all levels of users, because what is easy for someone that has been using Poser for a few years, may have a newbie totally confused and we all sometimes forget what it was like when we first came on board. Just thinkin' Pendy

Ok, so I lied ;) Swung back by my machine and saw the ebot notice in my email so had to go follow it to see what had been added... bad Lizzy. Turn off the machine if you want rest ;) Helen, as is stated in the site info here, and in most internet sites. You send out crap and hate via instant messages or email, and you can eventually expect to see it posted somewhere so that you come to face what you said in private. Otherwise, there are not witnesses to abuse and injustices on the internet. Even the presidents email was read, and publically published at a certain period of time not long ago, when the information was pertinent to an issue. Your feelings for me personally aside, we would welcome you into our guild idea, or welcome testing your work, since yu are a fine artist, and that is all that matters :)

Ooops, one more question I see ;) Now Im really overstaying the time I had planned to go and make dinner and go to a movie :) Pendarian, the guild is open to anyone who makes good quality things, be it stuff for sale, stuff for free, etc. So out of that pool of people, would come testers. Ideally, these will not just be merchants, but everyone who has time and wants to help out. And I would hope, as I have said, in time, once we grow it up a bit, to have a large enough pool of folks that we would be spreading it out a good bit, so that no one feels too burdened. I am not talking a handful of people in a little treehouse all off by themselves congratulating themselves on being part of a little exclusive club, but trying to grow a Revolution here guys ;) Something huge in time, with the hands it takes to man a huge ship so to speak. But all things must start somewhere. We have 3... ooops, I take that back, we may have 5 ;) Got two folks "applying" to get in via instant message a bit ago :) Thus do tiny things grow to large things. One person at a time. I am nothing if not patient.

Mehndi I have no illusions what so ever about this "you can eventually expect to see it posted somewhere so that you come to face what you said in private" None what so ever.. However just because it happens does not make it right or acceptable. There are proper channels for this "Otherwise, there are not witnesses to abuse and injustices on the internet." In the case of that particular email just put a filter on your email not to accept any more.. Simple... "Even the presidents email was read, and publically published at a certain period of time not long ago, when the information was pertinent to an issue." If the email was one in regards to his running the country. then could that not be considered a breach of security as well as privacy..?? Personal feeling.. well I really don't have any not having met you on a personal level. I admire your work.. However I will never trust you with a private message or confidence.. I would give you an example but I will NOT repeat any message not matter how tame in a public forum that is private..

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

Helen...This is a good idea. It levels the playing field. Talent becomes as important as "who you know". One of the major things I HATE about this place....there is not a level playing field. Those in power, of course, are determined to keep it...At the cost of secrecy and alientaion of the "unwashed masses"...I WILL NOT refer to myself as a commoner, thank you very much. Are you now, going to try and get Mehndi and Thorne banished? I knew, when I saw this post...my first comment was ...grrrrr....That someone would eventually stoop to trying to make this an horrendous offense. And, some of us wonder how come the recent atrocities were committed? Doh. Poor Precious Poppi

Vette said: "Please understand there is no intention of limiting store items to a certain group of people. The MarketPlace was established for the community and helps keep it going from day to day. And because it serves the community will be open to all members whose products meet the submission guidelines." And, IMHO, that pretty much sums it all up. Should The Marketplace become some exclusive retailer, where "...only the finest of the fine..." is allowed, or should it be open to all, and free from harrassment by those who may be Better? I guess there's alot of money to be made here. I think that ultimately, the Powers That Be at Renderosity, ought to be the ones who decide the direction of the store, as well as the direction of quality control. The group who wishes to slant it all in its' own favor, does so in its' own interest, FOR its' own interest, and with very little concern towards the consumer.

And...without secrecy...well, the cells of terrorists, who reside in my area, could not have done what they did to the WTC. May Renderosity become free, and fair, and based upon merit, instead of the "buddy system". Poor Precious Poppi

I happen to agree that the guild mentioned in Mehndi's posts would be a great thing! A separate and independent guild. I put SO much into my work trying to achieve the best possible quality I can. I would LOVE to have my work technically rejected with constructive comments, ideas and help for improvement. Yes, it's an ego buster at first but that doesn't last long when accompanied by help or resources for improvement. That's what a guild is! And I can be banned for saying this? I can be banned for joining a guild such as this? And Mehndi was stripped of her mod status for this? I really don't get this at all. This type of guild would be a benefit to the entire community not to mention the Market Place! I think any kind of quality control shows great concern for the consumer ensuring that they are getting what they have paid for.

No poppi this in NOT my intent 'Are you now, going to try and get Mehndi and Thorne banished?" I just pointed out that Mehndi talks about ethics. Thorne said Trolls who post private messages are the scum of the earth. So I posed the question 'does posting a private message in a public forum' = an unethical scum of the earth "That someone would eventually stoop to trying to make this an horrendous offense. " Point out to me where in my post I actually mention the new guild.. I have not passed judgement on the idea one way or another at this stage. My concern was one of trust... or lack there of. Oh dear Poppi equating what is a practiced business procedure (brainstorming = private forum) to 'the cells of terrorists, who reside in my area, could not have done what they did to the WTC" is extreme to say the least.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

***Those in power, of course, are determined to keep it...At the cost of secrecy and alientaion of the "unwashed masses"...I WILL NOT refer to myself as a commoner, thank you very much. **** I'm a vendor but I'm happy to call myself a commoner. Why? Because I'm first and foremost a contributing artist here at Renderosity. I still, and will always, contribute to free stuff when I have the time. If there is some big secret organisation going on here I can assure it it hasn't been up for discussion in the store forum until now. As a vendor I can read the forum (and do so regularily) but up until now this whole thing with Mehndi and Thorne has NOT been in there. Unwashed masses...give me a break! Shall we all go back to biblical times just so you can be a matyr? One more thing. Am I in the same league as a terrorist now am I, because I support a forum ONLY for vendors? Well excuse me but that's just nasty.

Unwashed masses...give me a break! Shall we all go back to biblical times just so you can be a matyr? Oh, my....no. I sell my work in the real world. (If I am feeling martyred, it is because of real world problems cutting into the tourist money that is so absolutely necessary to life, in my area.) Oh dear Poppi equating what is a practiced business procedure (brainstorming = private forum) to 'the cells of terrorists, who reside in my area, could not have done what they did to the WTC" is extreme to say the least. If we are speaking, strictly of business, Helen...Have you read, heard spoken of the insider trading that went on right before the attacks? "Betting" on a huge drop in the market...in aviation, insurance, and finance ...up 90% over what has been normal for decades. I do believe that some "brainstorming" was involved in that, don'cha know? Afterall, what is "insider" trading?

Xena, you and I have traded products, and once I bought one of your sets if I recall right, so I know your quality level personally and will vouch for it any day of the week :) I would love to have you among us. We are not all easy to like, we do not all have the same ideals in every way, but the common factor in all who want to stand with us would be a strong desire to better ourselves, our community, and above all our quality. Let us not waste a chance for something REALLY good that we can ALL benefit from, by falling down to fears of one another, of ulterior motives, of snobbishness, and hidden control mechanisms, when if there were any of these, would this be being so openly spoken of that I chose to literally go on posting, knowing I would lose my job to stand up for this idea? Do not waste at least that.

Im sorry to ask this, but it's been a terribly long day. I spent an incredibly large amount of money getting my brokes fixed today, finally broke down and bought EA's Alice only to find out it's incompatible with XP. My daughter (7) stuck an octopus tentacle to her head and ran screaming through the Vietnamese resteraunt screaming that the aliens were eating her brain. In short....I'm tired. Could someone, in email if it is better, please try to explain to me (in 50 words or less) just what is going on here? =) Thank you so much.

Poppi now you equate terrorists with your mainstream business man/woman and business practices... "Have you read, heard spoken of the insider trading that went on right before the attacks?" Get real.... sheesh

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

The big bird pooped on the little bird. Then the little bird tried to clean the nest out ,but the big bird dont want a clean nest, so the little bird has to go make a new nest , cause its tired of the big birds doodoo. umm... I think that bout sums it up Got it?(and who says you never learn nothing new here) ;)

Thank you TJ :) I can always count on you to be relatively sane.

TJ...nicely put...succint. Helen...research is a good tool...Check it out...It can be habit forming. And, YES, I very much do equate the recent attacks on the WTC with the drop off of tourists in South Florida beach towns to folks being afraid to fly, airports experiencing amazing problems, and living in a new "NO FLY ZONE". As for "insider trading" on the attacks...YOU get real...It happened. Check some sources before you would even try and deem to slam me in a public forum. Poppi

Pariah... okay, so I love your daughter now... I laughed so hard when I read your post that I almost spurted pepsi through my nose, which, if you've never done that, it burns like the dickens!

Hey guys, Someone pointed me in the direction of this thread and I found it very interesting reading to say the least. I am going to offer my opinions on the subject, you can take them as you want :-) I think that if the 'founding fathers' of this movement or guild can keep the fire lit long enough it would have alot of potential. Keeping that fire lit is an uphill battle though. You guys sound like you have a whole lot planned... I would recommend starting with one thing and get to where you are doing that one thing to the best of your ability... then move on to the next thing. Good ideas tend to snowball on you in such a large and active community as the digital art community. If I were to start something such as this I would pick the core component of this guild and focus like a laser on just that component. My site started as a 3D wallpaper site three or four years ago.... that is all I did for over a year. I think that if you keep everything honest and fair you might have the start to a great movement. If egos and tempers get in the way then you will have a big ugly mess on your hands. Again, these are just my initial opinions on what I have read in this thread... I don't know any details. For what its worth I wish you guys the best of luck and I hope this guild turns out to be an asset to the digital art community. If nothing else it will be yet another way for buyers to make sure that they are getting quality merchandise from thier store(s) of choice. To Mendhi: I do apologize for the delay in getting your products reviewed. Personal issues at home (wife having surgery and then a family illness) have kept me from being on top of things like I normally am... this coupled with the events going on in the world over the last two weeks have led to a slight slump which we are just now breaking out of. I do assure you that no one in my group has downloaded your products yet since we only download what we are actively reviewing. I am expecting about five or six reviews to be published withing the next couple days. Then we will move on to the next group of products (including yours.) Thank you for your compliments regarding our service and it is truly our pleasure to be soon taking an in depth look at your products. Mendhi and Thorne, feel free to email me if you would like to have my unbiased input/opinions on your plans. I might not be a great artist but I have been in the trenches for a bit. Not trying to talk down to you like I am an Oracle or something... just offering assistance. Eric

Poppi You keep changing course.. "And, YES, I very much do equate the recent attacks on the WTC with the drop off of tourists in South Florida beach towns to folks being afraid to fly, airports experiencing amazing problems, and living in a new "NO FLY ZONE". " This statement above while true, has nothing to do with comparing terrorist activity and brainstorming in the mainstream business world. I know this happened.. 'As for "insider trading" on the attacks...YOU get real...It happened." I am well aware it happened. Amongst the terrorists.. I am also more than capable of doing research.. Quote "An elite government task force, along with the Securities and Exchange Commission, is investigating the possibility that someone associated with last week's terrorist attacks tried to profit by shorting the stocks most likely to be affected by the disaster." Source http://www.usatoday.com/money/general/2001-09-21-suspect-options.htm Qoute"WASHINGTON -- The government is investigating whether terrorists tried to profit from stock and options trading before last week's World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill said." Source http://www.freep.com/news/nw/terror2001/finan21_20010921.htm Note in both these examples they refer to those being assosicated with the act of terrror.. Not your main stream buisness populous. As for slamming well your the one that wrote. "That someone would eventually stoop to trying to make this an horrendous offense. " This was in reply to a post I made that had absoutely nothing to do with the topic of the guild.. Which started this whole ball rolling.. Helen over, out and outta here... It's been fun playing with you.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

I'm all for the new guild, maybe it's because I'm old, maybe it's because I have children, maybe it's because I'm just plain wierd, but I happen to think quality is about the most important thing to consider when shopping any where for anything...unless of course you're 7 years old and just got a $10 bill for your birthday...So I would love to see some sort of quality control that would allow me to know at a glance that that a product would do exactlly what I'd expect it to do with no complications...In order to have quality control there must be standards and standards do change as the community devolopes...even in the real world... But the guild didnt want to stop there, the guild also wanted to offer the best possible resources to new artists...A place where the artist could go to learn all the tricks of the trade before venturing out into the market...A place to all learn together and raise standards as the knowledge grew...6 months ago no one knew what the heck a mat pose was, and now its almost considered rude not to include them... And for this, a fairlly noble effort, a moderator looses her job, flames are flying from all directions, and the perverbial shit has hit the perverbial fan...I dont understand it...why?... Why is wanting quality control such a bad thing? Why would any merchant worth thier salt be afraid of such a thing? Why would the admins of this site be afraid of such a thing? I honestlly dont understand it...

This statement above while true, has nothing to do with comparing terrorist activity and brainstorming in the mainstream business world. Shoot...girlfriend...They brainstormend...and, and, GASP...IN SECRET. Dmentia....exactly. This is a wonderful idea. I honestlly dont understand it... Imagine being new here....there is much to understand. I guess I am too new, and left out of the well...r'osity loop..private, or public...to get an understanding, easily. So, I draw my own conclusions. They are not flattering to the site as a whole. Poppi

Yep Poppi have to say your right, but then we are talking about a mentality that verges on the insane. Of course they did it in secret.. The may be insane but they weren't stupid. A group of people whose ideologies differ so vastly from the main stream and what is considered the norm, that President Bush felt the need to point this out in his recent address... And NO you cannot compare these fanatics and there practices to the business practices of the mainstream business world.. We are after all a benign group, who simply discuss ways to improve the Market Place. Both for the vendor and the customer.. If the fact that it is vendor only gets your nickers in a knot... Well so be it.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

Actually, as a vendor, i can honestly tell you there's nothing being spoken in there that doesn't appear elsewhere in these forums. The only excpetions are that Monday night is pot roast night and every other Tuesday, I wear a pair on pantyhose on the top of my head snd skip around the forum singing the original theme to "Fame" in my Yoko Ono voice.

I for one think it's a wonderful idea! Cookie :o)

Some one sent me an email, I guess trying to get my goat for standing up for what I beleive in...Some one sympathizes with my "poor" sales...Being that I'm completelly open with the fact that I support this guild, have from the beginning and will till the end, I have no reason to hid my response to that individual...the following is my response.... First of all, my sales are excellent thanks for your consern, my health is poor, but thats an entirelly different matter... I havent attacked any one, I've defended myself and the things I believe in, and if you can't accept that about me, then I feel very bad for you...You defend your beleifs I'll defend my own...I know the market place has lost very loyal customers, there once were customers who purchased one of every new thing to hit the store, they could afford it, and they threw money around like confetti....One I know of inparticular didnt even have a clue how to use the stuff, she just collected it, had to wait until she went to visit her artist friend in another state so she could learn how to use all those wonderful goodies she had bought...Guess what happened when her friend informed her that alot of what she had bought was crap, and being that she had held on to it for so long before going to visit her friend she could not return it...She still purchases religiouslly from those merchants she found out she could trust during that venture, but she wont touch a new artist with a ten foot poll!...So in affect I didnt loose a customer, but everyone to become a merchant from that day on never got that customer...You can say I'm looking out for myself all you want, but really I'm looking out for the budding artist out there who do quality work...I feel really bad that this once loyal to renderosity customer has become loyal to only a few...She could afford to buy more from new artists, but she doesnt trust the quality control of the store enough to take chances any more...in the beginning she did...so who lost?...

Well then let those who support it, support it. Let those who don't, not support it. I will prefer to use my own network of beta testers. I am, honestly, sorry to hear about you ill health. I hope it is something that you can overcome. I am not at my peak right now. A chest cold coupled with asthma and seasonal allergies do not make for good bedfellows. Best of luck to you.

Helen, not to put too fine a point on it, but you say, "This was in reply to a post I made that had absoutely nothing to do with the topic of the guild.. ", so I have to ask you, why post to this thread at all then, since this thread is about this guild? :) It does seem you got what you wanted though, to stir it into a hornets nest. I expect any moment now it will get moved to C&D so as to deprive most artists of knowledge this movement exists, since most do not read C&D that read here. Ah well, I shall repost, repost, and repost, anywhere and everywhere, with a FAQ we are working on now about the idea ;) To Eric of In Depth... thank you for you input! :) I was not meaning to sound critical at all Eric, I had heard you all were up against some problems lately, and as I said, I am nothing if not patient :) Waiting my turn and time for a review does not bother me at all :) My only point was when folks have said this is your turf, as was said in this thread, and more explicitely in another inside the Merchants Forum, is that you all can barely keep up. Our wee grassroots effort would also suffer the exact same syndrome too, barely managing to keep up :) But if there are more hands manning the cannons, more shots get fired :) As in, more reviews maybe get done. I believe the plans at the moment are to continue explaining and answering questions, since alot of these questions are actually having me and others think of new ideas. This is great stuff here :) And then, compile all the "answers" worked out in these threads into a FAQ, post that to all forums that we can reach to post to, and again answer questions, then call a general public meeting for any and all who wish to attend to help us brainstorm out goals, and ideas, as well as "application" process ideas to join for those wishing to join :) A few points to make: We do not aim to beta test for others :) Each of you should still use your own beta testers. We would be willing to look over your "ready to put out to the public, or already in the public" product :) We do aim, each of us as far as I know who have directly been responsible for the initial ideas of the guild, to attempt to teach what we know to ALL who want to learn it, not just the chosen few, so that anyone who wants to learn to do better work may do so :) At first, things will be slow, and we face sore and severely determined opposition, who would rather discredit us than see anything of this nature arise. Someone earlier in one of the threads mentioned martyrs. Once, someone here told me that for all the times I throw myself onto the fire, I must be the reincarnation of Joan of Arc ;) My mother used to say to me, "Fools rush fearlessly in where angels fear to tread." Then later in my life, I learned to believe that to Allah, fear of dying in battle for what is right is a sin. If something is right, you go even to your own death, since there lies Paradise. To me, this has become that sort of thing over time, the Quality thing, as Quality levels have grown worse, and as store responsibility grew less and less, and vendor responsibility has grown less and less. A battle that I knew that if I took up fighting, I would metaphorically die to fight. Yet to not fight this fight would be a sin :) Do I feel fear? Yes. I am very very afraid. There are people today who have risen against me who hold power to remove me entirely for my efforts. Will I fight? I will go on fighting this battle, but I do not plan to be a martyr ;) This is right, and it is good, and it will win in the end. Sometimes, all it takes to win is being willing to show up. Today, those of you who have shown up, take my breath away.

Hmm... I guess there must be a lot of stuff going on that I'm either not seeing, or just not picking up on... the way this whole post started out is way different than what it's going on about now... "If you want to defend your rights and show that a minority elite group can't rule what is good and bad for the Markett place please post your concerns and comments at the merchants forum, under Vette's message. If you don't take care of this now, your stuff could be removed or rejected in the future. So common here and defend your rights to sell." Which is why I kept watching this post to begin with... I think anyone should be allowed to sell whatever they want, no matter how crappy it is in anyone else's oppinion, we (at least here in the US) do live in a capitalist society... true, quality should be a concern, but if someone wants to sell something, and someone else wants to buy it, then that's their right to do so... so the initial post bothered me to a degree... but then when the discussion about this new "guild/group/whatever" came up, I thought (and still do) that it was a good idea... in a way it seems to me, a garauntee that the product you're about to buy, or(from what I've gathered) about to download for free is worth your time and money... I have to say that I haven't bought anything that I haven't been pleased with from any poser-related store/site... but then I consider myself a pretty conscientious (is that spelled right) buyer... I try to look for gallery images, or posts that show what the product is/will do before I buy it... but if there is a way of knowing right away, via some sort of "Stamp of Approval" that the quality I expect is there, then it saves me the time and effort... maybe I'm reading this whole thing wrong, and I'm way off base, but this whole thing seems to be a voluntary procedure... if you want to have your product "tested" you can, and you don't have to if you don't want to, but if you do, and it is approved, then people will have a little assurance that they'll probably be pleased with their buy... and on the flip side, if you submit it, and it isn't approved, there's nothing to stop you from still selling, or giving away your product, just don't tell anyone you submitted it, no one but the "guild" members would know, and true they COULD run out and tell everyone "Oh that's no good... it didn't pass our tests" but that will do nothing but discredit their own efforts, and fewer people would submit, thus ruining their worth... so it would seem silly, to ME anyway, that they would do that... I guess I don't understand why so many people seem to have gotten hot under the collar about this... but like I said, there is probably a lot of stuff going on that I'm just not aware of, there usually is in situations like this... I truly am open to any comments, particularly those who think that this isn't a good idea, as to why it isn't, I guess I'm just not seeing the downside to it...

Cin... there is something in all of us as artists, each of us share it in common. It is a fear of rejection. It hurts us so deeply, the pain is almost unbearable. So many artists have even committed suicide over feeling their work was somehow not accepted in the past... this is how serious a problem this is inside each of us who are artists. In no other trade/calling have I seen it to quite this level as in artists. I think the thing that is going on here, the downside of it, is that people fear they will be rejected perhaps. Or even just fear the pain it will bring others to be rejected, even if they feel certain that their own work will pass, and so would rather this not happen at all than that anyone ever feel pain. From such compassion are saints made :) However... I too feel the same fear we all feel of rejection. As a store tester, when it came time to have to even tell anyone that they needed to fix something, I struggled, it was hard, it hurt to do it, and I wrote the softest spoken letters I could find it in me to write, praising all I could see that was good first, to let them know I DID want them to "fix" what needed fixing, and resubmit to me. I never got anything from those whose products I tested to include in the Marketplace, other than praise and thank you letters, thanking me for trying to actually help. I could not imagine wanting to be mean to someone by rejecting without cause. I cannot imagine rejecting without telling why, and then without trying to help that person find a way to resubmit so that I can then gladly and happily not reject again. And then.. in the end, this is not about rejection from the store. Our guild effort is not about the store, who controls the store, whether the store here will ever change or not (it won't, since those who try to change it for the better will be overcome by those who prefer entropy), or anything at all to do with this store. All it has to do is with a new guild idea. A guild made by artists, run by artists, with achievable objectives that artists can feel good about joining in with, and even benefits to those who do not wish to join, such as the freely viewable information on how to do better craftsmanship we plan, and the independent testing services idea :)

Mehndi never, ever be so presumptuous as consider you know why I post to any thread... I posted to the thread in reply to Thorne giving you permission to post the messages he posted in a private forum.. That is PART of this thread.. Permission I thought wasted.. as you have shown a total disregard of private information and confidentiality by posting a private email in a public forum.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

Helen, I won't let you draw me into whatever it is you are doing in here with others, the sort of heated little debate you have going. You and I, we have no problems between us, as far as I am concerned :) I have only one comment, which granted, will probably not make a whole lot of sense to most here perhaps, unless you actually do know me. Today is a GOOD day to die. It has been a VERY good day. :)

Mehndi on a personal level I also have no quarrel with you.. However I do question things. You use innuendo and manipulation of words to make things seem what they are not.. You try to credit me with things and actions that are not so. Actually I quite admire your use of the written word.. You have the ability to weave into a sentence something that is pure fantasy yet make it seem true. 'The pen is mighter than the sword' and how well you wield it. I have no hidden agenda, I am not here as part of some secret society, ploting away.. I post as and individual as is my right. My opinion as valid as yours. I have not given an opinion one way or another regarding the new guild. I have too little information to do so. I do however question your passing judgement on others work. I do not feel I can trust you.. Honesty is always best do you not think..?? You often say you value loyalty.. I value that also, along with integrity. As they say actions speak louder than words and your actions in posting that email speak volumes to me. Besides breaking confidentiality you broke copyright. Sad when you consider you were the moderator of the copyright forum.. This is starting to look like you want your guild be if by fair means or foul... Just not how I do business.. So I will have to ponder long and hard on this one.. Thats me done with this thread.. I am sure you will want the last word.. :)

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

But...WHY the emphasis on secrecy? Why is the merchant's forum so secret that one cannot even post their OWN thread, without fear of reprisal? In real life, institutions that are honest and above board do not mind a little scrutiny. And, the converse. I can understand the merchants not wanting the public at large to participate in their discussions, hence bogging down their system. However, I do think that the public should have the right to scrutinize what is going on with their marketplace. After all...it is the public who keeps the marketplace going. If everything is honest and above board, secrecy should not be a problem. If you want to defend your rights and show that a minority elite group can't rule what is good and bad for the Markett place please post your concerns and comments at the merchants forum, under Vette's message. If you don't take care of this now, your stuff could be removed or rejected in the future. So common here and defend your rights to sell. This is the thread that started this one.....I am out front asking...are some of our merchants attempting to monopolize the renderosity marketplace?

On the HONOR system, on YOUR honor- anyone that reads this ENTIRE post here, by me, feel FREE to pick up a FREE Poser prop at the bottom of ALL my words... (Yes, Poppi, your name is mentioned....) ----------------------------------- Goodness gracious! PLEASE let's try to refrain from all the bashing here and let us get one good idea across plainly before it turns into a flame war! Sheesh.... It's about quality, and being tired of seeing substandard merchandise cluttering up the store, the same stuff that used to be put in free stuff for a while at least, until the modeler got the skill and the self confidence to submit it for sale, and by that time we had learned a little better what to do, how to do it, and what NOT to do... and about being sick and tired of being a regular customer at this store and the "let the buyer beware" attitude. I just added up my purchases for this year from the Renderosity Marketplace- in all I have spent

$542.64

that's JUST from this store, and just durng the past 1 year (not counting about an equal amount spent at DAZ and other places). As a regular and frequent buyer, as well as a merchant here, it becomes a little frustrating after a while dealing with what has basically become a digital flea market where you pays your money and you takes your chances. Well I took no chances with the $542.64 that I spent here, because I checked out each artist that I made purchases from as much as could be possible- gallery posts, what others had commented on a particular item, etc. And I thought it would certainly be nice to have some sort of set of REAL Standards of Excellence so that all this be-waring wasn't so darn necessary... In America, the very heart of free enterprise, there are standards testing facilities and organizations by the score, both governmental and privately owned. Poopie peddlers cannot hide behind the phrase "free enterprise" because even in America we do like quality- just ask the U.S. car manufacturers what happened back in the 1980's... ...and then those car manufacturers WISED UP and started doing some REAL quality and safety testing, and created sets of absolute standards by which to rate a vehicle's performance and quality and safety levels... and then it kinda got cool to drive an American car again... (no, I've always driven Ford pickup trucks, even the bad ones, but they're somewhat better now). People demanded quality, and for a while the only place they could get it was in a foreign automobile. THAT was FREE ENTERPRISE at work... but that same free enterprise demanded that there be quality and a way to tangibly measure that quality beyond "...well, I kinda like the green one..." ...and so the idea was born. It was a better idea than my previous tack of posting in Free Stuff a better version of some junk that somehow made it's way into the marketplace. And then I discovered that I wasn't the only one doing that... But what really got my fire going was hearing, WEEKS ago, that RCook was ranting that anyone undermining the Holy We-Can-Do-No-Wrong Marketplace should be site banned, and then using that same tired old threat to try and intimidate Mehndi and Goddess knows who else into giving up any idea of quality standards imposed from outside at all. SHAME ON HIM. THAT, POPPI, IS PART OF THE REASON FOR SECRECY... Truth is, for everyone that rants on about how everything should be free and there should be no marketplace at all, MUST understand that without the Marketplace, this place we all love so well to come and vent our frustrations would probably not survive. It just plain costs money to run an operation of this size, and the owners and operators MUST have a way to pay for that. But they now run the risk of discrediting the Marketplace that helps pay for this operation, by diluting the overall quality of the Marketplace as a whole. As I've said before I don't make my living from selling my models- and I personally prefer the barter system to dealing with any cash at all- hey, I'll trade you my faerie for your cool warrior princess... but I think that puts me in a good position to be able to speak out about some things, this hot topic being one of them, because MY bottom line doesn't necessarily have dollar $ign$ strewn across it. Now that you've all calmed down, I'm glad you can see the rationale behind it- it's not money, and heaven forbid it AIN'T about trying to start yet another snobby clique for the express purpose of excluding people- it is 100% about quality and honor, and being able to have it mean something about your hard work and craftsmanship, that you've reached a certain milestone for your long hours of painstaking care and attention to details and should rightly be rewarded, if that is your wish, by knowing that you've done something that meets a high level of excellence by being accepted into the store. Do you think that those several pages of standards that DAZ holds it's vendors to, is about them being snobs? Hardly. No reason we can't have our cake and eat it, too... Now since reading all that has gotta be hungry work, y'all have some free birthday cake on me... just click on the image to help yourself. May the faeries bless you all, Thorne, a Renderosity original =};-}>

Thank you, Thorne, for the honesty. Lately, it has been rare around, here. (Am having the cake with my coffee. Is it your birthday? If so...enjoy.) Poppi

Please forgive me Russell, my only excuse was that I've been up all night with a bothersome Vickie doll.... I INCORRECTLY gave RCook's name above as the one doing the threatening- it was not Russell at all, it was JeffH. That is, it was JeffH and NOT RCook that couldn't bear the idea of quality standards for the Marketplace. I apologize to Russell for my error. Thorne (it's my little "adopted" twin faerie grandaughters' birthdays- 7 years old and full of meanness as any adult... ;o))

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/viewed.ez?galleryid=88949&Start=1&Sectionid=0&WhatsNew=Yes

It's when I see things like this that I really think this new guild is a must. Cookie

My dear loyal and trustworthy little helper- we aren't naming names here yet, with one noteable exception that is, now that I got it right. Thank you for your unswerving support li'l faerie, you have a genuine faerie heart and it's in the right place. ;o)

Just wanna let everyone know that I'm not trying to point fingers or anything, I REALLY don't know the details of that situation. I DO however know that I've been seeing more and more stuff like that, where people are complaing about problems with what they've bought and the person that they bought it from not helping. I also know that I've had a few friends of mine tell me that they've bought stuff that was very poor quality, and didn't want to "waste their time" posting about it because they knew it would be either A) Not approved to be left as a comment about the product. B) Be deleted from the forum. I can't say either way wether this is true or not because it didn't happen to me, however when I hear things like that it makes me realize that the honesty & integrity I thought was here really isn't. Okay now back to my safe lil mushroom... Cookie P.S. you are most welcome sweety :o)

all right, let me get this straight. 1: i still have no clue what virus was talking about in the first post, here. what elite somebody or other is trying to kick everybody else outta the store??? 2: somebody wants to start a poser artists' guild, and if you qualify as an artist that puts out high-quality items, you get a guild seal of approval. this guild is utterly independant of any forum and has nothing to do with any vendor venue. so why do the vendor venues care??? seems to be somebody thinks the vendor venues think that if this independent guild doesnt give somebody or other a seal of approval thingy, that this poor person will not be able to sell stuff in the vendor venues. but if the vendor venues aren't associated with the guild, then having a guild seal of approval doesnt affect, one way or the other, if an artist places a product in the store. somebody else seems to think that the guild is going to grant these 'gold medals' or whatever to only people they like, and that this new 'clique' of artists is going to put everybody else out of business, because 'everybody else' doesn't have this 'gold medal.' am i following this story here? i think you're all nuts. :) and i told you the big secret going on in the back rooms of all the stores, including this one. sears, j c penny, macys, rendersoity; we're all plotting how to sell you stuff. what signs to put up on the shelves to make you want to buy stuff. what to do about shoplifters. what do you think we're doing? go to your favorite store at the mall and ask 'em if you can sit in on their next 'secret' employee-only meeting they're gonna have. at least we're no a fast food joint, scraping your food off the floor and spitting in your drinks and stuff. :)

After reading this thread in parts as it was posted, thank you Thorne for finally getting to the bottom of it all. As a consumer here in the store, it would be extremely nice to have some kind of seal of approval that the product would work as advertised. I too look for forum posts and any gallery posts about a product, comments from those artists I have come to trust by watching them here for over a year, before I spend money on something. I think it's a great idea. Shame Mehndi had to lose mod status over all of this. While I don't always agree, she has her heart in the right place and she's a damn good artist. (my opinion only)

Hey Guys, I would recommend that Mehndi, Thorne, and all those involved with setting up this guild continue to meet in private until you work out as many kinks as possible in your plan. Then, when you have what you think is a solid plan, I would present it to the community for questions and comments. All of this 'debate' is bad press for an idea that hasn't even taken any shape or form and it gets things off to a bad start. I understand that it is raising lots of GOOD issues but I also feel it is creating lasting impressions on people as well. If you need a private place to meet and discuss your plans I can help you with that. To Mehndi: I think that Jade was just pointing out the fact that we are already in the process of bringing something similar to the community.... nothing more. I cannot comment on what is being said in the marketplace forum because to the best of my knowledge I do not have access to that forum. I did ask Vette here at Renderosity if they would be interested in starting the same sort of partnership with me that 3D Commune and DAZ have but never received a yes or no back from her. Last I heard she was going to think about it. I think (from what I am reading) that our two services will have one major difference. The Guild would be running items through a checklist and giving out a seal whereas our teams will be writing up reviews of the products. Your service could possibly be compared to the "Inspected by Number 12" stickers we see on products. I do not say this as an insult because I do think it is a novel way to do quality control... plus it will make it possible for your group to grade larger quantities of items. One last note... kind of a shameless plug if you will... the following DAZ reviews are scheduled to be released this weekend: Light Horse Mappak Dark Horse Mappak Charger Mappak BMW Z3 Thanks for listenin' Eric

Personally, I would consider the guild seal as something along the lines of an underwriter's laboratory sticker or a good housekeeping seal of approval. Both are indications that a product has been thoroughly tested and has passed the stringent requirements for quality held by the testing agencies. It works for me. And as someone who has spent over $2k in the renderosity marketplace alone since it's opening (this figure does NOT include expenditures at DAZ or BBAy) I would more than welcome something like this. In fact, I can see where it would actually help to INCREASE sales and would be beneficial to all concerned. Think about it. Kate

I will rescind my comment waaaaayyy up above , i.e., "...FOR its' own interest, and with very little concern towards the consumer." Because I do all of a sudden believe that possibly the consumer is being taken into consideration as being more than a walking credit card. My big concern would be, what exactly is "substandard", and how is it decided? On terms of usefulness? On terms of degree of difficulty? That is, if this thing be made by Johnny Q. Public with a little time, will it be disqualified, as being too "simple"? For example, there are alot of free modeling programs about, but I have yet to see one which is particularly easy to learn quickly, in order to make more complex things. But an experienced modeler in The Guild might blow off someone's creation as being too elementary or simplistic, even though I suspect alot of people might be willing to buy it, since they don't know how to make it on thir own, or have the time to learn.... Will this Esoteric Alliance be thoroughly non-biased? And finally, will people even care? For example, My mechanic absolutely despises Quaker State motor oil, and has said so, repeatedly. If he owned an auto shop, he would most definitely not carry it. Strangely enough, I've been using it for years, with no problems, and I'm not about to stop just because some hick bumpkin has a problem with it... Not exactly on-topic, but that's my analogy, and I'm sticking to it. :) In short, what is hoped to be gained? Higher quality, or less competition?

Oh Lord, I can only imagine the crap that I am going to be under for posting to this, but I have to say that I support this idea and here is why... Standards is what everyone in this Community has when it comes to the websites. Renderosity upholds a standard when it comes to posts in the forum, or nudity in galleries. In this regard, 3D Commune and The GRC is no different. Even in Renderotica we have standards as well when it comes to posts and galleries as to what is allowed and what isn't. Why should the Online Stores be any different? I have always stood by the "Test" before "Sold" principles when it comes to the online stores that DSI runs. It is very important to do so, not just for the artist who created the Product for Sale, but for the customer that is going to buy that product. Granted, it may take more time before the product is released, but it insures that the customers buying that product would be satisfied enough with that product to return to buy other product in confidence that they aren't going to be "screwing the pootch" with their next purchase. So yes, something along these lines are indeed needed and I support it, just like I support our guidelines. Yes, it sucks when we tell "so and so" that the product isn't quite ready for sale yet, but allot of vendors end up emailing Diane back and say: "Hey, thanks, I didn't see that." rather than get upset. My only concern and question would be... How do you plan to bring all of these artists together and keep past/present politics out of it? I ask this, because you are talking about gathering a group of talented individuals together who have at one time or another been a victim of the past political structure that haunts this Community even to this day. I can assure you that there would be some of those artists that would completely object to my being in the Guild because of past feelings... and as a result, come a time when you will have to reject a potential artist, or be pressured to do so, by another artist... or some wont accept your invite, simply because "so and so" is already in your Guild. True, it is unfortunate that this would occur, however, it does and it should be something that you consider happening. I hope it works for all of you and I hope that it works out for the Community. But, I as a producer of product now, hessitate at joining your venture only because I think your idea would suffer if I played a part in it... which saddens me. Jack

As far as a guild the standard the guild uses to "grade" products, that will be decided by the guild...So if you want to monitor and add your input to what that standard should be, get involved, everyone is invited...To not join because you dont like some one already involved would be to allow those who are involved to make descisions without your input...Everyone's input is appreciated and should be heard by everyone... This guild should not be about who is who...this guild will be about quality. If we cant all put our past sqabbles that have nothing to do with quality behind us and make a mature decision as a team, then there will end up being a problem...I guess what it boils down to is whats more important to you personally?...Slitting the throat of an enemy or saving the life of a friend, I know my analogy is slightlly extreme, but if you think about it, thats what it boils down to...personally I'd rather save the life of the friend... Personal Note to Jack Never knew you well myself, didnt go rushing off to commune in your defense when all the mess went down, didnt like or dislike you personally, just didnt know enough to care one way or the other...I will say how ever that Diane was the BEST I ever worked with! I would honestlly buy from her personally before I would buy from any other store if she was selling something I needed, she'd be the first place I looked, not just her products, but products approved by Diane, I know how hard she was on me, and so I know that anything she approves is "good quality" to not have some one like Diane in this guild would be a terrible loss, and if your standards jack are like hers, then you'd be a great asset as well! Not having her around to approve my work and the work of others is kinda what made this guild such a must...Sorry not trying to blow smoke up any one's butt here, but I do miss Diane :(...

Whatever happened to good ol' Caviat Emptor; "let the buyer beware"? I can pick up a copy of Consumer Reports and find out if the latest thingamabob is what I want, but I'd personally be far more likely to look around and decide for myself, and then only blame myself if I end up buying a bunch of useless, non-functional, scheisse.... This whole thing, to me, sounds like some sort of exlusionary plan to try to insure that the Best Of The Best stay at the top of the heap, whilst being disguised as an attempt to up the quality across the board. And of what philosophy is this idea born? A slew of really good 3D-types got together and decided that it's their service to humanity to effect the betterment of the merchants' offerings? If so, is it to actually achieve this state of Utopia-In-3D, or is it so they aren't inadvertantly clumped in with the loathesome group of substandard 3D Profiteers? When I go to K-Mart, I can accepot that alot of the crap on the shelves is crap, but it doesn't mean I'll buy it. Why should The Marketplace be any different? Whatever happened to Caviat Emptor?

That's kind of the point... and I'm not affiliated with this guild really in any way, other than thinking it's a good idea... you can go to KMart and see shelves and shelves of crap, but then you can also see on the shelf a quality piece of merchandise with the "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval" stamp on it... it lets you know that this piece of merchandise has been tested, and found to meet a certain standard of quality. When I go to buy, let's say a blender, I'm more likely to buy the one that's been tested and approved by a third party testing agency, than I am to buy just whatever is closest on the shelf to me. From what I've read that's what I see this guild trying to do... provide a way of knowing that you'll be getting a quality product... And just like at KMart, not having the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval doesn't stop merchants from selling their goods, or consumers from buying them... and there's still no garauntee that if you buy the blender with the Good Housekeeping Seal that you'll be happy with it, or that if you buy the one that doesn't have the seal that you'll be disappointed. I for one wouldn't let this "stamp" affect whether or not I'd buy something... if I saw something that I wanted, that hadn't been tested, I would still buy it... vice versa, just because something has been approved, that would make me buy it if I didn't want/need it...

I could be wrong, but it was my understanding that one of the original plans was to single out certain For Sale items and create near-duplicates, but offer them for free, in effect, completely negating the attempts of the seller of the "substandard" item in question. An officila stamp or seal of approval is a good thing, of course, especially when it comes from a respected body of cohorts. But to use the Quality Control premise as an excuse to simply eradicate current "lesser" contributions, and to discourage the submission of such, is despicable. Like I said, I may be reading this incorrectly, but then again, it's possible that the "official" response has been tuned down, more appropriately.... I still have to question the motive, the end, and the means, as does everyone, before making a personal decision that this is OK. For me, it doesn't matter; I trust my own judgement. Equally, I think all others should do the same. What I see is a self-appointed group of high achievers, looking to monopolize a booming market, seeking justification and approval. Yes, they are willing to let the future Best Of The Best in on it as well.... I have to wonder about the arrogance which goes into this: This is the self-appointed group who Makes The Rules and Sets The Standards. They know what is best for us, right? And they sure as Hell will be able to determine that which we need stay away from. I bet after a good while, none of us would dare buy anything lacking The Stamp...except at our own risk..... Again, I see a group attempting to capitalize on a "need" that they themselves have attempted to instill within the 3d-whatever-buying-public. Note the people so-far who are approving: They're all among the Biggies...

Well, I've kept quiet about this, and I probably should have stayed quiet, given how volatile this subject is. Its very hard to take a stance on a subject when your livelihood depends on keeping good relations on all possible fronts. So, here goes my viewpoint, and that's all it is, and I certainly don't mean to offend anyone here with it. Yes, in my opinion, there is a problem with the renderosity store. No, unfortunately, I don't think this guild will offer much of a solution. I also have to ask the question: has anyone stopped to consider that the stores might not accept ads containing such a "seal of approval". Its not in a stores best interest to create two quality control standards in their inventory, and that is what a "sticker system" would do; regardless of whether a product had ever even tried to get a the "sticker" or not. I also don't think you see this kind of problem at Daz, due in part I think to some of the things I will discuss below, so I will only be referring next to what I personally view as the root of the problems brought up in the thread; the marketplace here. The problems in the renderosity store are not as simple as I think its been made out to be. This isn't only an issue of artists releasing work of suspect quality, but also the fact that the renderosity store appears directionless, and confusing. I also think this is one of the main reasons some artists have shied away from trying to sell in the renderosity store. A store has to have goals and strategy, and be mindful of the health of the overall "Poser" and "Poser-Related" product market, not simply stacking everything up in a "room" and letting customers wander around. I think there needs to be more inventory accounting, more inventory consolidation for older products where viable, and general organization that's just not getting done now. I think a bit too much of that management has been left in the hands of the artists themselves, and I don't think that's good for renderosity's marketplace to be stable. If the store was managed more efficently simply on the logistical side of things, I don't think this problem would be as noticeable as it has become for some people. There perhaps also needs to be a more rigorous and publicly stated set of standards that people can be assured are being met, and if not they have legitimate claims for complaint. Clearly there are some things that are subjective in rating an artistic product, but even still I believe you can narrow them down to basic goals for store testers that would hold true to any product of similar style. Has anyone attempted to work with renderosity on improving the situation? I cannot believe they would knowingly prefer an unstable and possibly self-destructive market situation to an alternative. And, perhaps the short-term solution for buyers currently concerned over quality issues is to only shop in the Best-Sellers category and letting more confident buyers set the tone of the marketplace. I think its there that you will find the patrons of store have put their own seal of approval.

"Yes, they are willing to let the future Best Of The Best in on it as well...." Has anyone excluded you yet? I've not heard one word from anyone try to exclude anybody. "I have to wonder about the arrogance which goes into this: This is the self-appointed group who Makes The Rules and Sets The Standards. They know what is best for us, right? And they sure as Hell will be able to determine that which we need stay away from." Again, noone has told you that you can't be in on it, so why not help set the rules and standards, rather than sitting around complaining about someone else doing it for you. "I bet after a good while, none of us would dare buy anything lacking The Stamp...except at our own risk....." Well basically you said in this stament: "Whatever happened to good ol' Caviat Emptor; "let the buyer beware"?" that you wanted it to be buyer beware anyway, so lets not complain about "at your own risk" now. "Note the people so-far who are approving: They're all among the Biggies..." That statement is way off too, as I TOTALLY support the idea, and I'm pretty sure you've probably never even heard my name. The fact of the matter is, my husband and I used to buy stuff from here, we've seen some really poor quality products and because of that we've decided that we will only buy from DAZ from now on because we KNOW that DAZ sells quality products. I'm ending my rant now. Cookie

Dmentia, :: Thanks so much for the compliment. When I go to K-Mart, I can accepot that alot of the crap on the shelves is crap, but it doesn't mean I'll buy it. Why should The Marketplace be any different? Mike, The Marketplace as it stands now IS different. K-Mart does not allow anyone and everyone who wants to sell something to sell in their store. They have buyers who decide what product will be sold in their store. And those buyers are going to have some sort of standards as to what merchandise gets sold in their store. Granted, they may not be the same standards as Macy's, but there are some standards. (And actually, their standards have established in your mind the idea that a lot of the stuff in their store is crap. You go in predisposed to think of the merchandise as crap.) That's not elitist. That's the way retail generally works. And most retail establishments like K-Mart and Macy's will take that product back within a certain period of time if a customer is not satisfied with it. They don't make you deal with the manufacturer of that product unless it becomes a warranty issue down the road. I realize that with downloadable product, returns are a much trickier issue. There's nothing physical to take back and no guarantee a person will delete said product once receiving a refund. However, if a retail establishment has to deal with an extraordinary amount of returns on a certain product, you can bet the buyers will think twice about carrying that product in the future. Many, certainly not all, products are actually tested by buyers before an order is placed for that product. And a customer at least gets to look at what they are buying when buying it in a brick and mortar store. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as long as a product submitted to The Marketplace is packaged correctly and works as promised (meaning it has the correct files, etc), it is allowed into The Marketplace. That's fine, if that's the way Renderosity chooses to run their store, but it can't be equated to K-Mart or any other brick and mortar retail establishment. It might be more closely equated to mail order in that the customer only sees an advertising representation of a product before purchasing. But even most mail order houses have buyers that decide what product goes into their "store" and they stand behind that product. Renderosity's store is really more like a cooperative or bazaar where pretty much anyone who wants to set up a storefront can. And the level of customer service and quality control they give can vary widely. Like it or not, any experience from one vendor (most especially from more than one) will have an effect on the other vendors. This actually works somewhat in the favor of lesser quality goods. It benefits them much more to be surrounded by quality goods than it benefits the quality goods to have lesser quality in their midsts. I don't think that is elitist. I think it is reality. I completely understand these vendors feeling the need to find some way of assuring consumer confidence, since the Marketplace absolves itself of responsibility for it. I can't say yet whether I think the idea of a guild is a good one. I'd really need to know much more about how it would work. Personally, I think it is much better to have the site owner take responsibility for what is sold in their store. Does that mean that there will never be unhappy customers? No. But it does help establish a reputation for a store as a whole. And that reflects on all its vendors. Diane

Heya Bloodsong, in answer to your question: {{{{{1: i still have no clue what virus was talking about in the first post, here. what elite somebody or other is trying to kick everybody else outta the store???"}}}} A) Though I am not a mind reader, and therefore cannot be certain, I think it was in response to Vette's thread where she mentioned having heard of the guild effort of ours, and asked people's ideas and input about the Renderosity Merchants Guild seeming to mistakenly be believing some things about this guild effort, as effects Renderosity's little in house guild (which is NOT the guild we want to make, change, alter, or have anything to do with), inside the merchants forum... and maybe he feared that somehow this new guild controls in some way who can sell and who cannot, and whatever other fears he may have had. {{{{{2: somebody wants to start a poser artists' guild, and if you qualify as an artist that puts out high-quality items, you get a guild seal of approval. this guild is utterly independant of any forum and has nothing to do with any vendor venue. so why do the vendor venues care???}}}} A) Again, this is speculation. Maybe the vendor venues care because it is a wild card, not under their control. Therefore, a potential threat? I havent a clue. This guild idea is not something that would in any way prevent anyone from placing his products into the store anywhere, anywhere there is a store that will take them, no matter what review your products were given, bad or good. Bad reviews basically mean you might be aware you have some things to work on, and you can if you choose to do so. Since that information would be confidential, no one would even know anyone had "failed". Good reviews though no doubt, folks would want to shout from the rooftops and we would happily shout with you :) As to granting to personal friends and favorites, this is why in fact the double blind system needs to be instituted. One day Dmentia, Thorne and I faced the fact we might feel BAD if we ever had to give a bad review to a friend, and therefore get tempted to give them a good review. By having it be blind, who has tested, and as blind as possible who you are testing for, one can struggle to not fall prey to the granting the gold seal to personal friends and favorites. It is the best that can be done. We all have friends. We all have feelings. No one likes to hurt your friend. But we can recognize early on the temptations there, and steel ourselves for the battles ahead that each of us, internally, will face in time. As to why this has been a big secret... it is not :) But everything must start someplace. This started with a private talk between a few people, each of which prior to that talk had been somewhat acting as a vigilante in a way, trying to do something on their own about Quality... each in his own way. The common denominator in it is they all talked to me. I then began to try to focus them, get them thinking down the same paths, thinking less like vigilantes, and more focussing on how we can accomplish raising quality standards with an achievable set of goals by working together as an organized team... and thus grew the idea for a Guild. Thorne began the quality movement ... and I was willing to act as a conduit of communications since I know others who might feel the same way, and a way to keep narrowing the focus down to what the real goal was. So, for a period of time, when things were still being thought through, and make no mistake, they are STILL evolving and being thought through, by necessity it was private talks. When it became apparent to us that certain people on staff here felt so threatened by this that they might actually go so far as to wish to ban anyone involved (clearly they misunderstand the intent of the effort), we also have had to go deep deep underground too for a time. In these dangerous days, how else could it be? The goal though defined the intent. Going public, and going public as fast as we could manage to do so, soon as we had a legitimate goal and purpose and idea worked out. Much like in most things in life, for instance a cure for Cancer, you might not hear about it the second the chemist, and biochemist, and biologist put their heads together to compare notes and say, "by george, we may have something here... lets do a few experiments to see..." but make no mistake, the second they are fairly certain they have something, that same small fraternity of scientists would move to publish FAST... not only to share the wonderful news, but to establish credibility.

<< Personally, I think it is much better to have the site owner take responsibility for what is sold in their store>> Hi Diane! I totally agree with you there. I would think that if a site is going to commit to an online store, then inventory responsibility (including quality) should definately be their baby also. Otherwise, the site would become known more for their bad store rep instead of the good forums. The customers are members and if they don't care about the customer, then do they really care about the member? I purchase a LOT of stuff from here, some from 3Dcommune. Heck everyone has seen my credit card at one time or another :) I was taught by one of the best (Diane) on how to test and what to look for. And I'm going to say this and I'll probably get hit on the head for it BUT...if I had a choice..if all things were equal as to the products in the online stores between here and 3dcommune, I would pick the 3DCommune in a heart beat... Know why? Because I know what the testers put those products through, I know how freaking picky they are (I'm one of them) there is no one there that is afraid of hurting a vendor's feelings by asking them to improve their product. We don't necessarily take everything that comes to the store either, we have turned things down because the craftmanship was not there...and I see it turn up here and wonder why. Plain and simple...I spend more here simply because most of the vendors that I buy from are here, unfortunately..why they are not over there too is beyond me...but that is a different subject. All I'm saying is this...the store needs to take responsibility for what it allows in....whether it be customer service, refunds or whatever. It just seems to me that for the past six months it has been more concerned with "how much stuff can we get in here to sell no matter what the quality is and by the way let's tell the vendor that they aren't charging enough and they need to change the prices before we will put it up in the store." (that happened I know for a fact, I have friends that are vendors to and they talk when they are pissed off trust me.) Anyway...I'm probably going to get blasted for this, but it's all the truth. And if I have to go down in flames, at least I can go down knowing I've told the truth :)

Okay, so I can't go back and edit the post. Mehndi, I'm not sure if a "guild" of sorts is a good thing, maybe maybe not. Takes a lot of planning etc as I'm sure you are finding out. I just hope your heart is in the right place for doing this, that's all. But consider this...if an online store is doing it's job, then a guild such as this really wouldn't be necessary. Vendors SHOULD have confidence in the store that they sell their wares at, because they also have a stake in the store's rep, good or bad. They should have faith in their beta testers and the store testers. If they don't then they either need to get new beta testers or a new store, simple as that. Mayhaps with all of the talent at this site, they should turn their energies into doing what you are proposing here, and helping the site that everyone seems to love so much. Just a thought.

{{{{you are talking about gathering a group of talented individuals together who have at one time or another been a victim of the past political structure that haunts this Community even to this day. I can assure you that there would be some of those artists that would completely object to my being in the Guild because of past feelings... and as a result, come a time when you will have to reject a potential artist, or be pressured to do so, by another artist... or some wont accept your invite, simply because "so and so" is already in your Guild.}}}} Jack. smiles You and me babe, go way way back. Few here are ignorant of our past, since we both are most talented at shouting at the tops of our lungs and issuing rallying cries like few others out there. Unfortunately only a few may know, though there is also ample evidence of it out there, that some time back, you and I made our own peace that we found our way to. I consider you my friend. There, said it at last, and out in the open too, so shoot me somebody! You have great skill at organizing people to goals, and moving people forward. In any effort such as this, those skills would be needed. I hope we could have you amongst us in this effort, since we actually DO intend it to be "neutral ground" where all may come together in the name of Quality and bettering ourselves as vendors, artists, members. You would be welcome. Diane. chuckles The days you and I spent, early on, when the store was naught much more than a twinkle in our eyes were some of the best for me ever. We actually DID stand for values and quality, and we stood for them together. You are one of the best testers out there, I know, since I worked with you. Though I know that it is very early on to see how this initiative will all work out, I also know you too would be wanted, and welcome, among us. The past is the past. Let it remain dead and buried.

I cannot see why anyone would be adverse to quality testing of products. I thought, as artists, we were all interested in improving what we create. I thought, that we really wanted "helpful" comments, on our gallery pics. Some of the folks who contributed to this thread have been, understandably, apprehensive about rejection. But, you know, a rejection...and, the necessary redo...is a whole lot better than a bunch of dissatisfied customers, clients, if you will. I saw a question about items being rejected because they were "simple". Simplicity is very often beautiful. In modelling, well simplicity means a low poly count, and that is important to many. It also means less of those obnoxious ugly bumps and ridges that one sees in some models. If there is a group of "friends" behind this movement...Well, don't all movements start that way? Maybe, it is just me, but, I have never started a movement by myself....(well, just a joke here, a bowel movement.) I would like to sell, here, in the r'osity market. But, I have my standards. There are so many things that I consider beyond bad items, that I have wanted no part of the commercial side of this place. And, to the last bit...the ugly part... This grabbed me....Why, because it was sort of what I envisioned when picturing the "secret" vendor forum...Not gossiping about us plain "members". Nope, something far more sinister...Something along these lines. "how much stuff can we get in here to sell no matter what the quality is and by the way let's tell the vendor that they aren't charging enough and they need to change the prices before we will put it up in the store." (that happened I know for a fact, I have friends that are vendors to and they talk when they are pissed off trust me.)

Yes Poppi that last part is ugly.. Ugly because it is based on untruths.. Unless you were in there you can not say it is fact.. I would suggest you chose your friends more wisely, because the ones who told you this have no concept of the truth.. They bald face lied to you. Yes admin will tell us if they think we are under valueing our work but the final decision on price is the vendors... No force is exerted by the store admin.. NO the store admin do not tell us to fill the store with crap. That statement is totally ludicrous. Think about it.. If you want to find out the 'real' truth, then I suggest you put your money where your mouth is.. Put something in the store, see how the process works. Instead of spreading unfounded gossip. I get so pissed off when people who are know not of what, they speak cast doubts and aspersions on anything.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

I wasn't going to post in this thread, but the temptation has grown beyond my ability to resist. I'm not going to knock anyone because the concept behind this guild is perfectly sound. A group of known, achieving, established artists testing files prior to sale or free publishing. Brilliant idea. The idea of reviewing products as introduced by Eric I thought was exceptional. An independant non reliant group of people who take an item test the heck out of it and review it. I like that idea a lot and over time the reviews would grow large enough that it would be possible to make an informed judgement on what's purchased based on those reviews. What I don't understand, and please excuse me for my stupidity here is what are the guild offering that isn't already in place? Let me elucidate. The guild will help and publish "tricks of the trade" "secrets of the creators" - in other words, those successful and popular vendors will tell everyone exactly how they do something so that everyone can do better. WIP, Tips and Tricks, Tutorials (all currently existant on Renderosity and 3D Commune, PFO and I believe on Renderotica) There's also the addition of Poser 101 and Bryce 101 (beginners forums) at 3D Commune and the Art School at 3D Commune. There's the Poser forums here, and on all the other sites, 3D modelling forums etc etc. So my question is. Why form a guild to offer services that are already in place rather than using those existing services to achieve exactly what this guild is going to do? Now, my next question. Freestuff. Is it fair to judge that on quality? A LARGE amount of freestuff is from people who are new to the communities. These people are learning and are eager, nay, extremely enthusiastic about sharing what they do. I personally know people that get a HUGE kick out of sharing their stuff and seeing it used in an image, I know I certainly do (though my stuff is gone for now thanks to my site getting shut down). Helping freestuff loaders to learn to make better things is easy. Use the existing infrastructure put in place by 4 online communities to do this. Helping them make better stuff can be done in the aforementioned forums, why "judge" them? Am I misreading that? I have a problem with making a better version of a crap store item and putting it into freestuff. No, really I do. That's nasty. It is. Someone made something to sell, "someone" let it into the store and now someone else is going to judge it and give away a better version? Ouch. Can anyone else see the vitriol and rows that are inherent in this? I do NOT have a problem with a bunch of artists, especially skilled artists who are willing to share knowledge and that skill to help people make better products. That is probably the single most shining example of generosity around. But it's already in place. Why haven't these leading examples of wonderment, these people desperate to share their knowledge and their skill already done so? PhilC is making a cd of his knowledge and including a bunch of in progress files. Steve Shanks is committing what he knows about making clothes to record for others to use. Brycetech has made a huge effort and now there's a new project Posertech in order to address a whole bunch of ideas, problems, tutorials and other stuff to help people. Kozaburo shares his knowledge freely and without complaint. The infrastructure is already here. Why not use it? Why create a "new" guild to do that? I don't get it. Now. What are the ramifications of a guild of artists, a group of "elite" artists testing stuff. None. It would be a great bonus to an item, free or store, to know that it's been approved by the likes of Traveller, Jaager, Steve Shanks, PhilC, Anton etc etc etc. I know I'd be chuffed to bits if one of them turned round and said "Hey I like that file Quest, well done." I'd be proud enough to bust. A seal of approval for goods. Yep, like that too. It means that a group of people we all know for quality goods have looked at that file and said "Yes, that meets the standard we would set for ourselves." A good point of reference I think for purchasing quality items. I like that. But. I can speak for the 3DCommune because I sometimes test goods for them, and I'm hard on them. I know the others are too. It's not a matter of "does it work", it's "Does it work well, does it look good", and a whole bunch of other stuff. There's no favouritism there. For example I recently rejected an item from someone there who I hold in the highest regard because of something I thought would cause a problem. Friendship, respect, doesn't enter into it. Money is at stake, as is the satisfaction of a customer. And that's paramount - especially seeing as I might be that customer. I don't see that the guild is offering much in the way that is different from that. Don't get me wrong here. I approve of the idea of artists gathering to help others achieve the standards they have achieved. I don't understand why the existing infrastructure can't be used. Mehndi, please understand I'm not attacking your idea at all. It's a damned good one. Perhaps as Eric suggested, you focussed like a laser on your primary motivation - quality testing of items - and stayed with that until you were established it might be better than to explore what actually looks like another budding site war. Some of the things your talking about doing with this group of elite artists is here and on other sites already. Please, consider using those facilities to share your skills and knowledge rather than creating further rifts between forums. By all means, gather artists under a Guild banner and follow this dream of quality, it's a good one but it won't mean anything if this blows up into another rift or site war, it will just hurt the community more. There is so much that could be achieved and so many people that could be helped by people like you, Thorne and many other accomplished artists and modellers it would be a shame to see so much talent taken away from this and the other sites and circled around another series of wagons in another site in another set of forums when the existing ones aren't being used to their full potential. Go for the quality control. Let other vendors and artists know that there are respected artists in the guild who will be testing the files. By all means produce a guild "stamp of approval" and discuss this with the existing stores and sites - I'm sure that some of them at least would be willing to listen to you on that subject. But please, don't start tearing the forums apart again. Use them. If the vendors really want to share their "trade secrets" then do so in the existing places. Everyone would appreciate that far more than having yet "another" site in the community. Quality good, splitting of community into elitist sections bad. Did that make sense? I hope so.

So not true Helen. It was a fact, I have no reason to believe that this person would lie. They sell here at Renderosity and do quite well in fact. I didn't say that they decided not to do it, and I didn't say that it was stated to them in the vendor forum either. So, before you start calling people liars perhaps you should get the the full and complete story before you post about something that you know nothing about. It didn't happen to you, but it did happen to someone that you know and have spoken very highly of yourself. You have no clue as to what each individual vendor goes through in private. I would be more then happy to discuss the circumstances with you, but not in a public forum. I do not lie, I have no reason or motive to. I am a customer here as well as a member and have on more then one occasion purchased your products..but you know what? After what you just said, I think you've just lost a customer. Not that you would care anyway, but if you treat me like this in the forum, if I have a complaint or a question about your products, how are you going to treat me then?

To me you made very good sense. When you mentioned pride...well, that is a flaw we all may have. I do think that hurt pride causes alot of problems, in this place. Positive stuff...there is alot that can be implemented in this community. I, for one, would like to see..."classes". Shoot, all the forums have chats, now. I know that I am relatively "new" here. I did not go through the "flame wars". I squawked and squawked, about things that I perceived to be unjust, only to be given some kindergarten style justification by one mod or another, as to why I was wrong. I did not believe....I KNEW the hot 20...Sorry, folks.....Well, if you get 300 hits in a day and a half, and so do a few of your nearest neighbors in the gallery....and, well...hey, now...they make the 20...they have names that are well known...actually, they are vendors...check out old threads in c&d from like, feb., and march, if you think I lie..just type in Poppi. But, I was given the normal, ridiculous, mundane explanation on how the 20 works....Right...my nudes got more Papa Joe Greasy..D's than all the rest. (Even, my friggin CLOWN...omg...too funny.) I am so happy about this guild. I think the playing field should be based on talent, and, quality. Also, I am so tired of people lying to me. It wouldn't make me so upset, if, the ones who do it were at least clever. That last paragraph felt soooo good. I give it a Pop...pop...pop!!!

I wasn't going to post again but... pendarian I do care about my customers.. I care a LOT.. "I have a complaint or a question about your products, how are you going to treat me then" If you have a complaint or question with my product I will do my whatever I can to help resolve the problem I value my customers and if anyone has troubles or concerns with anything I make they are more than welcome to contact me. I do not shun my responsibilites.. Heck I have been known to throw in bonus stuff when people have had downloading problems.. And that is something I can't be held responsible for and out of my control. My way of saying sorry for your inconvenience. However Read Poppies post she implies this is common practice with in the vendor forum.. "Why, because it was sort of what I envisioned when picturing the "secret" vendor forum...Not gossiping about us plain "members". Nope, something far more sinister...Something along these lines." Then you post 'and I didn't say that it was stated to them in the vendor forum ' I see now I was wrong with my statement about the choseing friends and calling them liers and for that I apologise. If what you say is true then it is 'Wrong' very wrong.. Poppi's post does imply this is common practice within the vendor forum.. I have NEVER seen this.

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Senior MarketPlace Tester

If anyone sees a mind wandering aimlessly around..... It is mine. I want it back.

Helen...you seem to have a problem with me. So sorry. However Read Poppies post she implies this is common practice with in the vendor forum.. "Why, because it was sort of what I envisioned when picturing the "secret" vendor forum...Not gossiping about us plain "members". Nope, something far more sinister...Something along these lines." If something is secret...Well, bust my britches....I will just go along and draw my own conclusions, as to why it is secret. Anymore questions? I mean you no harm...honest. I just want things to be a little more equitable, honest, forthright, here. I hate it when folks lie to me. I have been lied to everytime i posted about a "serious" issue, here. If you don't want to be part of the solution...Oh, my...fill it in. Poppi

Oh, and, since I am not in the vendor's forum...Some of this is simply what I copied and pasted from others. Sorry, if I confused you, helen.

Well, I'm not going to argue about this, but to me..Poppi's post doesn't imply that it's standard practice, only that she is afraid that it may be so. Be that as it may, even if it only happened once, that is one too many times. Not everything that goes on between admins or mods or whoever and the vendors is in the vendors forum. The same goes for any of these forums, not everything goes on in the threads. As I stated before, I have no reason to lie, I am not a liar by nature nor do I say things for the shock value or to stir the pot. I do not gossip.(at least not unfounded gossip) I would not have even mentioned the incident except I felt it was relevant to what was being discussed. Next time I won't say a word, I don't like being called a liar in a public forum. I did not say that anyone told any of the vendors to put crap in the stores...none of the vendors I buy from would do it anyway, they'd tell them where to put it if they tried to coherce them into doing that. I was merely stating that this is what appears to be the mentality of the marketplace, anyone can sell anything it seems. I am one of the fortunate ones, I have so far seemed to steer away from most of the less then quality items..but then I investigate as best I can the vendor before I buy. But some of the newbies don't have that luxury, or don't think about it, they assume that because it is in the marketplace and someone is asking money for it, that means it's good. Not any different then going to a store and paying money for a product, the customer does not think that the store would intentionally sell them something that is of substandard quality. It's a matter of trust and it's rapidly eroding in the marketplace and it's very hard to get that trust back. I could speak volumes about quality control and how important it is to a store, no matter where it is. It is important that the store and the vendor work hand in hand, they are on the same team. Every vendor is important, I don't care if they sell one item or ten. Everyone should be held to the same high standard of quality and if they can't, then they need to hone their skills until they can and then be excepted into the marketplace where people spend their hard earned money to support a hobby or a livelihood. Everyone should be given the same consideration, the same treatment the same perks no matter who you are or how much you sell. Anything more then that and then you are pandering to egos and creating resentment and suspicion among other vendors...and that resentment and suspicion spreads to the customers as they hear the complaints of the vendors. It's a vicious circle. I'm sure I'm not saying anything that those that are interested in this thread don't already know. One last thing and I'll close... sharing of knowledge is a wonderful thing. It is what turns a community into a family. Sharing what you know about your craft, whether it be modeling, texturing or how you created a particular render is a gift, not only to those that you share it with, but to yourself also, as you realize just how lucky you are that your talent is such that people want to learn from you. Sharing should come from the heart and not anyone's pocketbook nor should it be reserved just for those that are deemed worthy. It should be for all that thirst for the knowledge. Questor, I think I've been hanging with you way too much :) I agree with what you said..all of it. Pendy

Pendy, so nicely stated.

heya, pendarian! Gotta agree with what you and Questor both said. I think that we DO already have plenty of places for people to share their knowledge and help people along in all the many forums that are already there. I also know that I, too, try to point people in the right direction when I find something that is not quite up to par in their products. And I NEVER play favorites. Everyone misses things sometimes. Even the best of the best. And yes, even the testers miss things sometimes! I don't always have all the knowledge to solve a problem for someone, but there are plenty of places to get that knowledge right there for the asking. Most artists are more than willing to help other people learn, just as they were helped in their learning stages. This community is incredibly generous despite what people seem to be saying about the stores destroying that. What they don't want to do (I've heard this from more than one of the big names) is hand people solutions on a silver platter. Those who are willing to look for the answers themselves (with a little guidance) are going to become the best of the best in their own time. Those that don't want to work at it won't. Poppi, I have to say something to you about the "secret" vendor's forum. There is a good reason for these forums to be private (all of us have them). There simply are things that need to be discussed between vendors and store owners that just don't belong in public. For instance, a question about when the checks are going out. That's just one example. There are other things that should be private, and because these are internet businesses with people spread out all over the world, having a meeting or making phone calls just isn't an option. A vendor's forum just makes it easy to communicate with everyone at once. These are businesses. And no business shares every little thing it does with the public. Not because there's something evil or underhanded going on. Just because it's really not the public's business. Do you share your tax returns or your family meetings with the world?

In answer to the last few posts from Questors on downwards :) Questor, if our goal was to form a new site that competes with the existing sites, I could understand your fears and worries. That is not our goal. Our goal is to form a body of people from all existing communities who share a strong belief and committment to quality levels in all they do :) Indeed, there are existing tutorials out there. I have learned so much from them, and will forever feel gratitude for the time others took to write them. The only problem I have with the current way tutorials and other knowledge shared is handled is it is spread all over the place throughout many seperate tutorials, and seperate sites, and so is rather hard to find and use. Our idea is a bit more comprehensive than that, as you will see once we manage to get a small demo made that I think Dmentia and I will turn our hands to over the next little while. Also it is to be noted, that I will plan to compile pdf versions of the work and place on the various sites. This is not therefore an effort to not use existing sites or draw folks away from those sites. Something to consider, is that we who are speaking, are speaking of our own knowledge that we have, which we have not shared. I have my own style, and some of my own tricks I have developed over time when I craft my work that has never been shared with a soul. It is "proprietary trade secrets", and I have viciously guarded my knowledge of how I do most of it, since frankly I need the money I make from my work to support my son. Dmentia and Thorne also have their own trade secret tricks that have never yet seen publication. So when we were talking amongst ourselves at our own frustration with the quality of work we see, at a certain point we came to the sudden realization that people might not be able to do better unless we ourselves stopped whining about how bad this looked to us, and tried to document what we know, and get others to work with us to document some of their best tricks and techniques, and out and out show people how to do better work. So, I hope that you all see. Our aim is to create something new. Not a new community, but a guild within the community. A guild focussed on Quality concerns, and since one cannot in good conscience judge quality without being willing to reach out and at least try to help folks learn to do better if they are willing to learn, it is also focussed there right now too. As to being willing to review work done by those who do not sell, and instead like to place work in free stuff, why would we ever wish to turn those people away? They are amongst our most noble in the community. If they want their work "kid tested and mother approved" why I'd sit up nights and lose sleep myself to do it for them. I applaud the free stuff artists, they are my heroes, and the heroes of the community, and no one should ever think to want to say they cannot have their things tested if they wished it, and wished to be in the guild with us :) One last note. When one worries about folks who have in the past placed things in free stuff to compete against someone doing a bad job and selling the bad job in a store, you are worrying about ANCIENT history, things that are NOT a guild goal, but were being done before Auntie Mehndi with the Big Stick came along to ride herd on the wee eager band of adventurous and energetic and passionate vigilantes I discovered one day, and harness that passion and power into something good. Forget acts of passion and focus on organized thoughtful efforts.

where to begin.... this is a monster thread, and i became aware of it because there is a link to it posted in the merchant's forum. i guess i'll start there. merchants don't do anything terribly interesting in that forum. honest! it's mainly as (sorry, so many posts ago, i can't remember now G) someone has stated above: vendors questioning admins on if the item they've uploaded 8 days ago is in pending/testing/whatever...or calls for beta testers among other merchants.... or, oh goodness, a cry for help on something. so. nothing sinister. but none of the public's business, either. it's our BUSINESS, our job, our own financial affairs. you wouldn't offer tidbits of personal information to a stranger on the street, about your bottom line, or business practices. why should we? just because y'all can't see and you want to? sorry. poppi? i'm not a terrorist, and i do resent the implication, even if you didn't mean it how it reads :) there are problems with the store, it's not perfect. but i happen to like it better than DAZ, because it's about money, yes, but it's also about community. it is!!! letting people submit stuff to the store, even though it's not the best of the best of the best, sir, is good! the stuff might be bad, but then they don't sell. the good stuff still sells. it's the consumer who seperates the wheat from the chaff, no matter if it's online or not. instead of starting a new guild, efforts should be made to refine and perfect our community. we have great resources here, and so many talented people! i don't want to say anything i'll regret here, so bear with me, please. i've been a member, for a long time. i am not boasting about that, but i have been. i have always been more of a silent active member though, and i've tried very very hard not to step on anyone's toes. if i had a penny for every time i've refrained from saying something, because i knew it would eventually turn around and bite my ass, i wouldn't need to sell anything here G i've made lots of friends here, but more importantly, (as far as i know) i haven't made any enemies. i have probably clashed with mehndi more than anyone else here, though there are no hard feelings on either side... (and mehndi, this whole post that i'm writing is not directed entirely to you, okay? G i do support the quality issue) so, with that said, i'll move on to the guild. i agree wholeheartedly with quality standards. just look at my store, and you'll know this is true. i am not one of the "biggies" here, though i am well known to some. there was a statement made (i'm really sorry, mehndi, but i think we are going to disagree YET again G), about the "little in-house version of a guild" here, and how certain someones would NEVER be part of that, ever ever ever. um, forgive me, but i thought you WERE part of it, and were quite proud and supportive of it, when it first started. i am a member of the 'rosity guild. so? it's not a horrible elitest society, but then, nor is it a true guild. i've already made my thoughts on that public, so i won't reiterate them here, because my fingers are already getting really sore . this new "by the artists for the artists" guild... what do i think of it? well... a couple of things really. Questor has it bang on when he says that the existing infrastructure should be used. it's so true! i honestly don't want to send my stuff for extra testing just to get a seal of approval by people i may/may not respect (and a side note: blind testing? impossible! readme's have artist's names, and are necessary... duh). the idea of copying an existing sale item and making one for freestuff to hurt that person's sales is incredibly abhorrent to me. that's all i'm going to say about that, because i can feel my temper slipping it's leash. if a person, like myself, has already established a rep for quality items, but doesn't send to this guild for their approval seal.... does their stuff suddenly become shit? to those loyal customers, no. but to any new ppl looking, probably. so, in essence, if i want to keep selling, i must bow down and grovel for yet more approval. it's putting vendors between a rock and a hard place, and i for one, refuse to be so bullied. i'm not saying i won't take part in this guild, but i'm not saying i will either. it depends on how it's run, and who's running it. because we all know, (and if you don't, clue in!) that it's not going to be an equal thing here. a guild can't be, there is a hierarchy, no matter how candy coated it is. if the guildmaster is anyone other than someone i know i can trust implicitly, then it's not something i'll take part in, even if my sales do drop. i could say lots more on this, but i promised myself i wouldn't :) i can see this whole thing getting out of control, and quickly. i can see it causing more problems than it's hoping to resolve. helen, dear friend, you are braver than i, and i highly respect you. you once said that you were honoured to call me friend, and i now return that to you twofold! bravo, dear :) finally, i trust the administration of this site enough that for a moderator to lose their position, it would have to be very serious, and that there is much more to the tale than is being volunteered - by anyone. mehndi, i'm sorry you've lost that position, because you have always tried to help people... but i will trust the admin's decisions until and unless every aspect is revealed. oh! and about the pricing? i don't know anyone who was told to change the price of their goods... i was encouraged once to raise the price of one of my characters, and i didn't... though i sure wish i had listened! the store staff are in a unique position, where they can see trends, and can speculate on what the market can bear. because i didn't raise the price, i underpriced one of my later characters, lost lots of sales because of it, and was flamed for starting a "price war". if it has happened that someone more than encouraged, it was very wrong. it should have been brought to russ or tim's attention at the time, so to become a non-issue. pariah... are you sure our daughters aren't twins? G mine has done stuff like that, and i laffed my butt off reading about yours! she sounds absolutely precious! okay. enough for now. there's SO much more that i want to say, but since i had to type the word 'much' 4 times before getting it right G, i think i'm done for tonight. it's waaaay past my bedtime.

i'm going to bed, so any posts regarding my posts aren't being ignored... i will respond if it's necessary :) boy, the temptation's there to say lots more, but... well, dammit, i WILL hold my tongue (fingers G) until tomorrow. peace, and good night!

{{{{there was a statement made (i'm really sorry, mehndi, but i think we are going to disagree YET again G), about the "little in-house version of a guild" here, and how certain someones would NEVER be part of that, ever ever ever. um, forgive me, but i thought you WERE part of it, and were quite proud and supportive of it, when it first started.}}}} Styxx old friend... you have read me wrong. Go back and read it again more carefully this time. What I am saying is that this guild is NOT the in house guild. It is NOT the Renderosity Merchants Guild, which is sales and dollar value focussed, and is closed to anyone who is not selected by admins to be there. This is the Free Market Guild. Two seperate entities. You see, the reason I have had to distinguish this over and over, is that many people seem confused and fearful that it is the Renderosity Merchants Guild we mean when we say "the guild" so blandly without clarifying. Vette too seemed confused since she posted threads asking if people arent happy with the Guild, when she heard about our guild in the making. She was asking about hers. We are talking about ours. Horses of a very different color. It started there, and the confusion has spread outwards. Just trying to keep reminding people this is NOT that guild, wont be, is not, hasnt the same goals, and there are certainly room for many guilds with many goals in any online community ;) Go ask the MUD folks if you don't believe me ;p

Ah one more thing Styxx, when you say this: " i'm sorry you've lost that position, because you have always tried to help people... but i will trust the admin's decisions until and unless every aspect is revealed." Does this mean that you would like me to post to someplace or another all the documents that do reveal everything, totally raw and unedited and captured by Adobe Acrobat? Indeed, it would be clearer to you then. I have held back my hand on doing so, other than to issue a warning to this community, at the cost of my job, that there is a person inside the administration, JeffH, who has ill will toward anyone who would become involved in this guild, and has said so, and has even stated his wish to ban these people. This is true, he said so in front of many many witnesses, twice. Anyone who is telling you it did not happen is lying to you. For revealing the danger those of us who participate in this guild are in, they say I have violated admin privacy and moderator guidelines. You see, administrators are allowed to threaten you in private, but no one is allowed to tell you that you are being threatened :)

Styxx: it depends on how it's run, and who's running it. because we all know, (and if you don't, clue in!) that it's not going to be an equal thing here. a guild can't be, there is a hierarchy, no matter how candy coated it is. Also WHAT it does exactly... which is not even decided yet. I wish this had been a bit more formed before making it out into the open. Unfortunately, everything that gets posted at Renderosity recently is taken in a negative light. The same thing posted at 3dcommune is taken positively and encouraged. I don't know why, it just is. (Example: kupa's post on registration.) Even as I type that, I'm tempted to add cynical comments here! Instead, I'll try to be supportive in case this does produce something good, and why should it not? What are the chances of it becoming a positive thing? Only as good as you're willing to give it! You guys planning on starting this guild, go for it, let us know when people can join in and where, and see how much good we can do :) Goodluck! By the way, Cake1 started a beta tester's database... I don't know what's happened to it but it might help somewhere along the line. It's still at http://www.cakeone.com/test/ Ok, now stop bickering about stuff and go MAKE stuff! ;)

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a sweet disorder in the dress kindles in clothes a wantoness,
do more bewitch me than when art is too precise in every part

I agree April. It was not our intentions to bring this to light just at this time, since we wished to get organized and have a properly written up FAQ of our basic ideas first :) But poopie happens ;p I confided in my boyfriend rcook, who mentioned it into the administrators forum, where JeffH and others took alarm and began to watch for this happening, then when I mentioned that there were people about to work on making some radical changes around here in the moderators forum, I was pounced on like a junebug by a duck, trying to get me to reveal more, and what is more, reveal who was in this effort. Vette next began threads querying the vendors to try to see who is in this effort. So at that juncture, I decided to go public and field questions as best as I could, as fast as I could for a long as I could, before this idea gets thwarted before it can even begin. We will be organizing a place where proper discussions by anyone interested can join in, sort of a meeting place as it were, and maybe some live online meetings if anyone has interest in those. I will announce where those will be soon. Waiting to hear back from Thorne on an offer we have had to give us a place to host discussions on this matter for all who might like to come discuss :)

Thats nice to hear Mehndi. Very nice. Because I can't think of anything more criminal than the collection of knowledge away from those who need it. I'm a firm believer in sharing what I know and I go to great lengths to help people sometimes. I have never held with the concept of charging for my knowledge or keeping my knowledge to myself, that is in my opinion selfish. Knowledge does not make an artist, a builder, a pilot, a trucker. Skill does that. You say you've kept tricks to yourself that help you. OK, keeping those tricks to yourself may have hurt others who could have done with that knowledge. Sharing your knowledge will not create clone Mehndi's selling in the store, not everyone will have the skill for that. Same with other artists. Only a very few can make hair like Kozaburo, and he shares his knowledge and tricks enthusiastically, yet I don't see any hair anywhere remotely like his. Each person is individual. The sharing of knowledge helps a person discover their level of skill and their individuality. I like that you would want to post a file of the combined knowledge of all in the guild. Erm, what's stopping anyone doing that now? In the tutorials sections of here, 3DCommune, PFO, Renderotica? I was concerned because of what you said early on. But the guild didnt want to stop there, the guild also wanted to offer the best possible resources to new artists...A place where the artist could go to learn all the tricks of the trade before venturing out into the market...A place to all learn together These references to a place that went through your posts... What other conclusion could I draw than you were going to form a site for sharing that would later charge people to enter so only the more wealthy could learn. That bothers me on a deep level. Your last paragraph is interesting because I wasn't referring to the past, I was referencing something you said. The goal is simply to release into free stuff excellent quality merchandise by the guild artists, as they have time, can afford it (since so many of the artists actually derive their literal money they live off of from making products for Poser), and feel like it. If these items released to free stuff happen to be a better crafted solution that saves customers from spending money on a product which is being sold somewhere that is inferior, then the goal has been served, as well as the community. Not "ancient" history at all, it's a threat of future action. There seems to me that there is a lot of thinly veiled threats there. As in. When "we" (the guild) judge your store item inferior and it is sold, we will release better product in the freestuff to teach you a lesson. Maybe I'm seeing boogeymen where there aren't any, and excuse my paranoia, but surely you can see what "could" be read into some of these guild concepts you are telling us about. I appreciate this is early stages and ideas are being hashed out. But in all honesty I don't see anything except the "seal of approval" - and that in theory is answered by Eric at InDepth and their reviews - that the guild is offering that can't be answered in the existing infrastructure. Collation of knowledge and tricks of the trade. Yes, but that too can be done in the existing infrastructure. The forums, tutorial and art class areas, beginners forums and current facilities are all in place without a need for a guild to contribute. All the individual artists could still share their knowledge, their skills, their tricks and tips. Of course, the existing infrastructure doesn't have in place any facility to charge for these things, but isn't that the whole point? Colleges and Universities that offer an industry level qualification charge. Are you going to do that? If not, what exactly is the possibility of a future charge being discussed for and what benefits will be accrued by paying said possible future charge? I can only ask questions based on what I read. So if I'm getting things wrong, I apologise. There are aspects of this "guild" that I do find distressing. The primary one is that of elitism. This is something that gradually destroyed the medieval guilds. They became very choosy over who could join and what position they could hold, the guildmasters became wealthy powerful individuals who also became extremely selfish, so I'm not sure the parallel should be drawn with your guild if it's intentions are as honourable as you suggest. I don't think that the seal of approval is a bad idea, unless there is the possibility that certain items because they're produced by certain people will be refused or rejected just "because" - another problem that was created by the medieval guilds leading to the so-called secret societies like the Stonemasons etc. Again, parallels can be very dangerous when they're used. I can see how some people would consider this yet "another" barrier to overcome. Beta testing, store testing, reviews, then guild approval then it can be sold with confidence. That's a heck of a lot of hoops to jump through. I agree that no one person is perfect. One person might miss something in an item they are testing for the store that another might pick up. But that is where standardised check lists come in. All manufacturers of goods follow this procedure. I have no idea if the testers for 'rosity goods do because I have no involvement here in that respect. I do have a check list for goods for my own use and that check list has been created over time from my own experience of making characters, textures, static props etc. And this is another thing. Everything I learned, everything. I taught myself. The tutorials I desperately needed - like joint parameters - were not available. So, like so many other people at the beginning I learned the hard way how to do it. Since then I've done what I can to share the knowledge and skills I've acquired. I like to think I'm doing a good job of that and I never turn someone down if I can help. I also never turn someone down if they ask me to make something. If I can do it, I will, and it is their's free to do with as they will. This is backed up by evidence so I am not telling lies here. I do not charge for anything I do. Because when I did need help there were people who helped me to the best of their ability freely. I really hate the thought of paying for knowledge and that is the one thing guaranteed to get a hostile reaction from me. I know I'm not perfect, nor am I highly skilled. I muddle through the best I can. People do sell their work through the stores and I have no objection to that at all. Some for pocket money, some to buy other store goods, some to live. Whatever the reasons for selling items is not for me to analyse and I care not. I will buy what I perceive to be quality and what I "need" that I either can't make, can't get free somewhere else, or can't do without. I'm one of those stingy sods who has to justify every penny. :) You have some grand ideas which quite frankly are already addressed and are not being utilised. I approve of the "seal of approval" but for obvious reasons this creates it's own problems and will generate claims of cliqueism and elitism. I'm not asking you to stop, I'm not asking you to give it all up as a bad idea. I am asking that you consider your position and motives and investigate the existing systems that are in place for helping, guiding, advising and sharing. Perhaps I am being paranoid, and perhaps I'm reading words that don't actually mean what they appear to mean, but your proposal of a guild worries me. It worries me as much as the introduction of the store worried people all those many months ago, and the introduction of "pay to enter" sites bothered people more recently. The community. By that I mean, Renderosity, 3DCommune, PFO and Renderotica are here to serve people. Serve them with goods in a store, goods in freestuff, free advice, help and a friendly atmostphere. In the main this is working and is successful. I don't understand why you and the other "best of the best" can't use these systems. As I said. Quality good, splitting of community into elitist sections, bad. The creation of a guild is an honourable idea and one that's been tossed around for a lot longer than 3 weeks. I'm aware of that idea being thrown around at the PFO before Renderosity was born and I also remember who was involved in that idea. It didn't happen for all sorts of reasons. What bothers me is not the creation of the guild, but the implications of it's creation and the implications of it's future condition. I will reserve my judgement on your attempts to form a guild until you've got a more defined policy in place and have some firm facts and documentation to hand out. Until then, while this is the only place I can discuss the thing, excuse my worries.

mehndi: i didn't confuse the two guilds. i was tired, but still not that stupid. i'm saying this: POST#30"Invitation Only? Why NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! I would NEVER be involved in anything like that, ever ever ever. " you are/were involved in the in-house guild, and proud and supportive of it in the beginning. this guild is by-invitation-only, sales-related membership, so this above statement by you is hypocrisy. (the in-house guild really has no goals, which i think could be remedied without too many problems.) and ABSOLUTELY NOT, would i EVER ask for details on something so private, mehndi. it was none of the public's business (until you made oblique references about it to the public). i don't expect to have to share private business with others, nor do i expect it in return. why you were removed from your "office", i truly, truly don't even care. but the way you've referred to it makes people distrust the administration. russ and tim and the rest are good people, overall, faced with a difficult job. they've never broken the faith with me, and until/if they do, i won't break it with them. that's really all i care to say on that. if that's naive of me, so be it :) and i still agree with questor, who says basically everything i want to say, only better.

Ooooooh you guys should see it! There's gold lining the floors and the walls and we eat lobster thermador and we puff on cigars while we chuckle in our elitest way about how much better we are than everyone else and how we should pay no mind to the crowd gathering around the guillotine and the pounding on the door below....

Questor, we have never once said we will charge anyone for anything. In fact earlier in this thread, someone asked how we would plan to have testers paid for their time, and it was a new thought, a new idea, since honestly it had not occurred to me that testers should or would need to be paid ;) I would not be asking to be paid. But as I said then, way up the thread, if someone wished to keep a model of mine they had tested as their payment, I personally would not object to that. I am sure others too feel that way. As for again, your fears that the guild would encourage people to Free Stuff, notice I said, "if someone happens to..." meaning I will not condemn it, nor encourage it. It is not my place. Nor will I personally knowingly target someone my own self. Have I the ability to understand why some here are doing this, or have done this? You bet your boots I can understand it, but I am offering a way to make a real contribution to the community as an alternative to vigilante activism. A way to achieve the same ends (one can hope in time), without resorting to need to Free Stuff. In all movements there are revolutionarys. They generally start out independent lone wolfs, acting almost as vigilantes. We have a few in the community. I found a few, and I can understand how they feel. I can even understand thinking of Free Stuffing. But I have not personally done so, choosing instead to think of a way to turn the energy and frustration towards good. When I mention a place, a site, etc, yes, no doubt we will form up a small website someplace, with our FAQs, our tutorials, etc also on them. Membership rosters maybe. Perhaps even a list, gallery, whatever, of things that have been tested and approved, since right now, quite frankly, we do not even know if any community out there will let us post our knowledge base, or let anyone use the Free Market Guild Logo. Many people and organizations have small websites. They do not in any way detract from the communities. Do not be so evil your own self as to assume our right to have such a website about our activities would be an evil thing on our part. You speak in ignorance and in fear, on what you do not understand yet. As to not sharing what I know, that is not quite literally true. I think if you check back through this forum, and the merchants forum (assuming you can get there), you will find I am fairly active (around 2500 posts in the last year alone) and alot of that effort in posting is trying to help everyone I can help. What I have not ever had time or energy yet to do was to write many tutorials in a formal sense. For that you would condemn me? I come now to offer to do so, and I am condemned because I have not already done so ;) I am amazed. With treatment like this, do you see where one could indeed turn all snobbish and want to keep ones energies for ones own self and owns personal friends? Thank god I respect the community more than that!

One more point I forgot to address of yours Questor, your point of how you give away things folks need you to make for them. So too do I. We have in the store a lady selling a faerie, whose source of wings for her faerie fell through on her. I made her wings so that she could go on selling. Lost sleep to do it. Did not charge her. Take no money off her sales. We had people here needing a decent non-adult texture for their Millenium Kids models, I have made them one and given it to them freely when they write and ask. I cannot post it, since the same texture is for sale on a product at Daz, and my redistribution of it is by special arrangement with Daz, thus it is not in free stuff, though I may make an effort to get with Daz on permission to post it. We have a lady who needed a very fancy arch for a render, I have been working on making it for her, simply because I CAN make it ;) (not done on it yet Debbie M, sorry, got waylaid by a spate of depression over the WTC and Pentagon mess... but Im back at it)... etc. So NEVER dare to judge me... because frankly, you don't know me.

And now to you Styxx old pal. {{{{you are/were involved in the in-house guild, and proud and supportive of it in the beginning. this guild is by-invitation-only, sales-related membership, so this above statement by you is hypocrisy.}}}} No dear. I was put into it the same way you, and everyone else was. Just told we were there. That we should be proud, great things were coming down the pike. I was NOT involved in the formation of it, the idea of it, the basis of it's membership status, being invitation only. This is what I am referring to. I would NEVER be involved in choosing to make something invitation only, if I were the one doing the planning. I fought a VERY hard fight to make that guild NOT invitation only, in the Administrators Forum, to no avail. The decisions on what it was were made by tammymc, Vette, and whomever else does these things. I was not listened to, nor consulted. Still... just like us all, I waited to see if great things came of it, if it had some real purpose, if it grew into a good thing. That is no crime and it is no sin, patience, and waiting to see. Unfortunately, another than what I told them it was at the time they announced it in the admin forum, just another best sellers list, it has not been anything. So... stop looking to pick a fight, it profits you and me nothing :)

Hmmm...a note about sharing trade secrets...its a noble idea and all, but its not un-noble to not do so...look at Colnel(sp?) Sanders(kfc) several restraunts do it, probablly because being a chef is alot like being an artist...if you tell everyone exactlly what your secret ingredient is, it kinda looses its novelty...Look at that masked magician guy?...he kinda ruined all the old illusions for the old school magicians...because he shared "trade secrets"...if doing that were such a noble thing, then why does he still wear a mask?...I mean realistically what is the point of copywriting work, ideas or inventions if everything should be common knowledge?...What is the point of bothering to learn things on your own and push the limits of what ever you're working with if everyone should be given everything at birth?...I'm not saying sharing is wrong, I share plenty, but I am saying telling me I'm bad for not sharing something is kinda ludicrious...

Well said Dmentia. A point that I should have made. Thank you :)

There are things you've said Mehndi that settled some unease I had. However. First thing Mehndi, before I answer your other comments, you ever call me evil again and you are going to have a really serious problem. You don't know me, don't ever make that judgement again. I have not judged you, nor accused you of anything and I fully expect an apology from you for that statement. HOW DARE YOU ACCUSE ME OF EVIL. I am asking questions that concern me, if you think that asking questions is evil you're in the wrong place and your guild idea is worthless. I fully expect a public apology and retraction for that. Damn you for that. I made the comment about how "I" do things so that you could better understand my concerns with the way you were phrasing your "guild". Nor did I voice any opinion about how YOU do anything, I made no judgement, no accusation, pointed no fingers nor did I name any names. So where again did I deserve that rebuke? Again I want an apology for an unfair and inaccurate accusation. I am very concerned about the elitism this threatens. I did not say it WOULD happen nor that you were promoting it. All I'm concerned about is further fracturing of the communities and a resource pooling of skill and knowledge that is inacessible to people. You addressed that, what a shame you had to result to deep and personal insults to do it. This site, 3DCommune, PFO, Renderotica already offer what you want to do, yet you steadfastedly refuse to utilise this structure, rather prefering to refer to a guild absent from all this, sharing when possible through it's beneficence. The only thing nobody offers, except Eric at InDepth is any form of review or quality level. If you read back over my posts you'll notice I'm quite enthusiastic about that and your idea of a guild stamp of approval on goods. As I have repeatedly said, I don't have a problem with your guild, so get off the high horse. Seeing as you obviously can't have a conversation or answer questions without twisting a person's motives I will wash my hands of this entire affair. I do not feel I desesrved to be insulted in such a despicable manner for voicing concerns and asking questions. I didn't insult anyone, nor did I point any accusatory fingers at anyone. Thanks for showing yourself in your true light. Is this the future? Someone shows a little dissent and would like clarrification and you insult them? Some guild that's going to be. I'm sorry Mehndi but you were way off base, and I am not impressed in the slightest. Evil? Judgementary? Who's making the accusations and judgements here madam? I dearly hope you will never repeat this nonsense if your guild gets off the ground with anyone else, because this is a sign of what went wrong with the original guilds. Thank you for opening my eyes.

Questor, I have not actually called you evil (or was not meaning to do so at least). I am asking you to not resort to the very evil you fear we are resorting to, by judging us and looking for flaws in the system that are not yet there. Thus my wording to not be so evil your own self as to think us evil. It was clumsy wording however, and it has not been my intent to insult you in any way. I am exhausted, as are we all here, with wrangling with this turning into some war some are seeking to make this into for their own private agendas. I have not even been bothering to deign to address the ones anymore who seem to be warring on a private agenda basis... only the people who seem to have valid and real questions, and are seeking real truths. Thus my answers to you in the latter posts. I know it does not mean much to you right now, but that I have been making an effort to answer you specifically is a sign of respect. Forgive me for being more aggressive than was my intention, and for hurting your feelings, since that was not my intent. So, one more question to answer. Why we are not using the communities as they stand for this? We are. It is from the very communities as they stand that we believe we can find enough artists who share our beliefs and want to be one of us. But we cannot confine this to the communities as they stand, since this is neutral, and it is not beholden to a community for its existence, and primarily and most importantly, we the founders are Daz artists... neutral artists without a community grounding as such.

I'll answer you Mehndi, because you deserve an answer, and were gracious enough to offer an apology in the form of a request for forgiveness. I offer that and I am grateful for that. Thank you. As I said earlier, and I think a lot of other people who haven't responded to this thread but are reading it will agree, I will reserve judgement on your guild until such a time that you have a more firm agenda and documentation to present to the communities. I do not, have not and am not objecting to your formation of a guild of artists. I AM voicing my concerns and concerns that I feel are shared by others who don't want to get involved in this. I do not know of any war being fought on a private agenda, but I am not privvy to what is happening behind the scenes or in your private mail box. Nor do I wish to know. I have my own concers, and as I said, while this is the only place I can discuss them then I will have to resort to this. Once you have somewhere - as you mentioned earlier - then I will be more than happy to take this discussion elsewhere and talk to you on a different level where perhaps you'll have a firmer idea of what exactly it is that you intend to achieve with your guild, how it's going to work and what the future is. I do have strong, and I feel valid concerns about this process. I will do you the honour of bowing out of this thread until you announce or tell me of this other place we can discuss this, or don't as is your choice. It is not my intention to further a personal agenda or any other kind of agenda. My intention is quite simply to set my own mind at rest that this is not another build up to yet another site war and fracturing of the community. I don't care what other people think about the guild, I really don't. The intentions of a guild can be quite honourable and can be a great service to the class of artisan they serve. The structure is all important, as is the honesty, integrity and fairness of it's heirarchy and leadership. Those are points of discussion for another time. Anyway. I will leave you in peace. For now. If given the opportunity I will be happy to contribute or simply discuss this idea of yours. If not, I will continue with my life as I have been and simply wish you luck. If you truly are intending to do as you say then this is certainly a shining beacon for all current and future new members. Excuse my pesimism, I have seen too many great ideas twisted by a few strong willed individuals. I look forward to your presentation of a discussion forum and a set of documents detailing the guild, it's aims, it's agenda and the future vision of it's staff.

Just a few more questions. 1.) Why is it important to seek a global solution to a what is by all visible signs a localized problem? 2.) Do you think that this will cause consumer product confidence disparties in products that never attempted to be rated under your system? 3.) Do you plan to draw up a public list of non-subjective rating qualifications so that artists can dispute your findings if the appear to be at odds? 4.) Do you plan to have variable ratings, or one size fits all? 5.) Do you intend to purposely seek out products, as a guild, you find to be lacking in quality in order to have the guild replace said products with freestuff, or stuff of lesser price? (which as a side note is against the law for any organization with busniess ties to the market in question.) Thanks.

smiles Questor, you have asked fair questions, and thought provoking ones. When I manage to get us a discussion board set up just for this very topic, you will be among the first I notify of where it is, and you would be most welcome. It has been a hard last couple of days. For your understanding and your patience toward me, I thank you :)

Oh and two more questions. Sorry to bug ya. 6.) A lot of content developers like myself do a considerable amount of private testing before release. Do you think that the testing-process duration of the guild would severely impact the release dates of products?Coordinating a test panel could be complicated when the test panel is made up of artists who are developing their own products. 7.) How do you plan to deal with issues of "conflict of interest", where and artist submits a product to the guild, but one of the panel members is developing a similarly themed product?

Heya Mallenlane, a few answers as best as I can :) 1) I am not sure what you mean by localized problem, maybe if you define that better for me I can get you an answer that does not make me sound like a doofus ;p 2) Our aim is to give consumers more confidence in what they purchase. Not less. 3) Yes, first we will hold a public discussion where all may contribute ideas on what are good things to check for, what good quality means, to help us to build a checklist as it were, off of :) Then this checklist as it were, will be publically published, and if anyone wishes us to test their work for them, they will get a report card that is easy to understand, going right down the checklist, with hopefully helpful comments on how they might better do something, if there was anything we thought they might do a bit better on, and in time, links to a knowledge base on how to do it, but at the least being willing to point out to the person how to achieve this in communications with the person. Following those suggestions would be their own choice. These tests will be communications, so that the person may then even respond, "ah but you misunderstood, I meant it to be that way, and this is why... it is a feature..." etc, which would then be taken into account before a "final grade" was issued. 4) I have stated in the mechants forum when asked a similar question that in art, as in all things, there is no one size fits all. Sometimes one will need to actually think and use ones wits when scrutinizing something. To give you an example. Last night I made two blocks. One with bevelling, one without. Technically the one without the bevelled edges should have shown a rendering artefact inside Poser. However, in my tests, suprisingly enough, it rendered clean with sharp edges. Now, if that block came to me, and I was going down the list, and got to the part that says, "Are the sharp edges of a model beveled so as to produce clean sharp edges upon render inside Poser?" I would have to conclude that in this case, it had been found it was not necessary, since with my very own eyes I could see it had all worked out fine, even without the bevelling, so no points would be counted off for that. See? 6) As I said to Questor, and in other threads higher up, several times already, no. I won't stop others who do so. I won't try to hunt them down. I know some are out there. We offer them a way to vent their frustrations with the quality issue in a constructive manner, and I hope in time anyone who is doing so will turn their energies and passion toward the Guild and a way that we can improve quality in a good way that hurts no one :)

Eeks, got my numbers out of order. Mallenlane, #6 above is answer #5 to your question #5. Sorry. On your other questions: 6) I hope that it would not be too much of a holdback, not much more in fact than the holdback in how long testing takes out at Daz. But alot of that depends on how swamped we get with testing, and how many testing volunteers we have to draw upon, so it is hard to answer at this point. One is not prohibited from going to release on something just because it has not yet been tested in fact, just like my things over at Daz are selling nicely despite the fact I am still waiting my turn for In Depth Artist to test and review them :) All things take time. How long you wait for release is your own choice. 7) Someone who is charged with such a duty would have to be tidying up things submitted so that identifying info like names in readme files and such is not included, and just giving a product a number instead, etc, before passing it on to testers. So that part has been thought out, trying to create a double blind system, where as much as can be possible, identities of submitters items are veiled, as are identities of who tested your work. As to other conflicts of interest that could arise, we will cross that bridge when and if we ever get there ;)

ok a rehash ;) 1.) I meant the problem appears to be centered around he renderosity store. Other stores don't seem to be affected with the concerns that guild is being formed to respond to. Shouldn't the focus therefore be on the problem? Local solution for a local problem. 4.) I meant in a more factual and accountable sense. Such as 1 - 5 numerical ratings, or bronze, silver, and gold stars? Or will it simply be approved or not approved?

and again on question 7. =) 7.) The concern was not so much that they would know the identity of the person sumbimiting. my concern was with the possibility of: a.) the panel member's review being colored by comparisons of their own product against the submitted one. b.) the panel member's product design being influenced by the product they are reviewing.

1.) Why is it important to seek a global solution to a what is by all visible signs a localized problem? Its not really as localized as it seems, and the solution isnt as narrow as it seems...Not only would the guild help to insure quality for customers, but it will also help customers to find sites that often get overlooked...Lesser known artist who do quality work will deffinatelly stand to benefit from the additional exposure...Customers may be more inclined to trust individual artist rather than being "forced" to trust the more established business'... 2.) Do you think that this will cause consumer product confidence disparties in products that never attempted to be rated under your system? I hope it doesnt cause customers to loose faith in artist who are already established and choose not to have thier products tested, that is not the intent...Instead FMG will be geared more towards the developement of "universal" standards which may be above or below some "personal" standards...So artists who already set high standards for themselves shouldnt loose business other than in the respect that there will be more "qualified" competition... 3.) Do you plan to draw up a public list of non-subjective rating qualifications so that artists can dispute your findings if the appear to be at odds? That is the plan eventually, no negative review will ever be posted publiclly without the creators consent...This isnt about making people look bad, its about allowing those who do "quality" work to shine... 4.) Do you plan to have variable ratings, or one size fits all? The plan at the moment is fairlly variable and objective, like a report card some what...but it could change as this is one of the many things that still needs work...something that members will probablly work till CG become obsolete, as standards change to keep up with progress... 5.) Do you intend to purposely seek out products, as a guild, you find to be lacking in quality in order to have the guild replace said products with freestuff, or stuff of lesser price? (which as a side note is against the law for any organization with busniess ties to the market in question.) This has been addressed and but for the record, no...the intent of the guild is to allow quality work to shine...not to make any one look bad...or to hurt any one...(I'm curious as to which laws you are talking about though, because I'm thinking just about every company on the planet competes with competitors in exactlly that way...wether they admit it or not...A couple in particular that come to mind is Microsoft and AOL)

Ok, let me try again here too then :) 1) Well... it is not our place we feel, to point fingers to which places may or may not have a problem. If Renderosity does have a problem and wants to work toward fixing it, that is a very good thing. Seeing such a grass roots effort rise up amidst them from artists on the calibur of Thorne, Dmentia and myself should be a wakeup call for any store, and personally were I managing it, I would be doing some serious change making and doing it fast, since their tailfeathers are afire and their ass is acatching ;) 4) Yes, there will be hopefully a checklist, but you add it up in the end to get points. Like "Cutesy ABC Blocks" achieved 80 points, + the fact that it actually did not need bevelling to look good upon testing, so a FREE 5 points as if it had been bevelled since it still looks great, brings it to 85 points, and we can proudly say that most folks out there will be satisified :) 7) People are humans. This occurs everywhere :) It occurs at Daz :) I know for a fact ;) I submitted two adorable child models at the very second poor Chad was proudly getting ready to roll his out. We worked out a solution, and we are both pleased as punch ;) I rely on honor, integrity, decency, maturity, and mostly posted and clear ethics, and commitment to those ethics. It is not our place to resent someone elses product that might compete with our own and let it affect our ability to do things. I also rely on people having the good sense to voluntarily refuse to test something, if they are asked, then discover it is something giving them a conflict of interests in any way.

Last word on it in this thread I swear.... I live in the same city as EdgeNet, Bondware, and the Renderosity Forums. I have met personally, face to face with both Tim and Tammy Choate at different times. My personal opinion of these people is that they are very likeable and courteous, they work hard at what they do and they take pride in their work, which is something to be commended in itself. The fact that I may disagree with some of their business practices does not take away whatsoever from the good light in which I hold them personally. Being something of a rogue around here, my well intentioned mischief making doesn't sit too well with some of the administration I'm just sure. Tim and Tammy have always treated me with the highest respect and I appreciate that from them. Some of the statements made seem to indicate that many of you believe that this very real community here at Renderosity is a democracy. It most assuredly is NOT. While they do attempt to listen to ideas and suggestions and implement some of these, the bottom line lies always and forever with the people who operate this system and no amount of posts, flames, begging, pleading, or appealing to reason is going to change some things once they have been declared THE LAW OF THE LAND. The recent uproar over the quite [adjective here] ruling on nudity is a case in point. Though the vast majority of members, at least the ones who speak out publicly concerning such things, disagreed with the sweeping scope of this rule. No one was ever told, to my knowledge, exactly where the rule originated. Howver, the rule still stands. Though to the administration's credit it was re-worded to be more generic as it applies to store merchandise. As the non-democratic status applies to the store, HA!!! No amount of goading, prodding, complaining, glorifying, praising, or cussing is going to change some things. One of those things seems to be to let anyone who can claim a copyright to any old thing put that in the store to sell for whatever price, as long as it is packaged according to the guidelines. Some people here seem to be worried about the poor vendors who are selling this lesser quality (I'm being nice) merchandise, even to the point of calling it 'despicable' that someone would DARE to try to make something better and give it away free as an alternative. Your loyalties are honorable, though misplace. What about the poor buyers who may end up with something that doesn't work correctly or is just plain poorly constructed in the first place? What is this I'm hearing from vendors?? Let them (the buyers) BEWARE??? Beware of what? What do you think the buying public here thinks about a vendor with that attitude? Lastly, this is a grassroots movement in a large community. It will survive despite the efforts of some to mow it down with ridiculous statements and accusations of 'elitism' and greed... I say the following to the good of my cause, but to my own disfavor and likely detriment of future opportunities- If I was about greed, I would release everything I have in my quite extensive personal character inventory, along with all the props, textures, the old Poser3 characters, and every single little odd and end good or bad piece-O-crap 3D THING I have ever concocted sober, drunk, asleep, or otherwise over the past 3 and a half years, and release to the several brokers around here who regularly write me REQUESTING that I do so. The sad thing is, I could release all of that stuff HERE. IN THIS PLACE. Because even the stuff that I made myself but wouldn't pass my own inspection, would pass HERE. We'll be back with some examples and a hardcore set of standards for you, soon. Thorne =};-}>

Thorne... you make stuff in your sleep... now THAT'S impressive. :) I need to figure out that trick... will that be one of the tutorials that you'll make once you're all up and running... "3D Modeling in your sleep, in 3 easy steps"? (I am joking in case anyone thinks I'm being serious, and I'm not trying to belittle anyone's posts... just trying to inject some humor into a rather hot topic...) running and hiding now

grins good one Cin ;) Humour is always a joy at times like these, keep it up :) And don't worry about the old Pooka, he has a broader and vaster sense of the fine honed prank and joke than most ;p

Damnit I haven't posted here since the split with 3dCommune.However I can't let this crap go on without putting in my 2 cents. While having a group of "totaly Bipartisan" group placing a "SEAL" of approval on a model could be benificiant to the community as a whole. I question the MOTIVES of the so called impartial jury whom have APPOINTED themselves to this endevor.All I can say is follow history on ALL of the Poser sites, and let that be your guide, some of these so called Freedom Fighters for justice and "high quality" goods have shall we say a TARNISHED record. Enough said!!!

I must give credit to the owners and admins of this site for their patience and support of free speech. I see three people openly undermining the Renderosity Marketplace and suffering no consquences. Dementia, Mendhi, and Thorne publicly denounce the quality of merchandise in the store, Thorne admits to releasing higher quality versions of items in the store for the sole purpose of undermining sales. I mean, if that's not an attempt to sabatoge the store, then what is? I see what's coming here, what's coming is a split between these three and Rosity, only they want to make it public and as nasty as possible so they can steal as many members as possible, create a new site, which, even though don't say it now, will contain all of their products and only the products they deem good enough. By combining their assessts, they will be able to reap 100% of the sales of their items and not the standard 50-50, 60-40, or whatever else there might be. This is an attempt to make more money cleverly diguised as community concern. Thorne pulled all of his free faeries because the realisation struck him that he missed the "Gravy Train", so to speak. Dmentia - you complain about lo-q merchandise hurting your sales, ever think that the fact that you havent released anything new since June might have something to do with it? And a $25.00 texture set for P4? How about that $142.00 cd. That's only $7.00 less than the whole Poser Pro Pack. (well at one time anyway.) Mendhi - I like the way you openly brag about how great your sales are. I went through the last 30 days best sellers list. Sorry you're having such a bad month. Must be a fluke or something. Word has it your are conferring with JDK about this guild. Some may like Jack, some may not, I'm indifferent, BUT, Jack is a shrewd businessman with a great talent in making money. He's also the top drama queen for nasty site splits. hmmm..... Thorne - I remember you saying something a while back about building all of your faeries around one base model, just a little tweek there and a little tweek here, change the clothing...bingo! "New" character. I mean instead of going out of your way to CYA, why don't you all just come out and admit you are going to start a new site, with a new store, and save everyone the trouble of yet another mindless site war. Really, 2 out of the 3 have been accused of intellectual theft. Yah yah I know, I know...you were both cleared of all wrong-doing....but so was OJ, baby. Like I said, I give the admins and owners of this site a lot of credit. Id have site-banned the three of you a long time ago. I mean conidering how bad you think everything is over here, one would think you'd be grateful to have the out. I don't come here often because I can only use a comouter when I come to visit my brother as my faith prohibits the use of electricity and running water. It is always fun to come and live in the new world. Cheers, Karl "Leggs-Akimbo" Stoltzfus The Digital Amishman

Heya Leggs Akimbo... I always did wonder that about Amish folks, why they will use technology so long as they are not owning it? Like running over to use the neighbhors phone instead of owning one ;) It was a very mysterious thing to me. Be that as it may, I have more respect for your faith despite it's mysteries to me, than you evidently have toward us. Let me address a few of your points. We all sell at Daz, and we sell damned well there :) We have old products here, and have not placed any new ones in a while, though if things could ever improve here as far as sales of new products, no doubt that would change. Since you mention referencing the 30 day list, it must mean your brother is one of the people who sells here. Is he feeling threatened by our Quality movement? Perhaps in fear that somehow this would cut him out of his own ability to sell? He should not be. We are not attempting to stop anyone from selling. We are working toward making an independent testing service as part of a guild geared toward high quality and education of how to achieve high quality. As to your oblique reference to intellectual theft, I havent a clue what you are referring to really, unless you have gone on rumours that are turned up on end and backwards. You see, I was not accused of intellectual theft of anyones product ever, but someone else was accused by members quite openly of intellectual theft of my product. I did not help to "prosecute" that person in public, in fact, when things were too far out of hand, I begged them for mercy for her, as a favour to me, if nothing else. So try to get your facts straight before you speak. Since you visit so infrequently I will forgive you this time ;) Again, get your facts straight. There are no discussions with Jack D Kammerer. Whether one likes or dislikes Jack is not my concern. When he comes into this thread and expresses good will towards people and the idea in general, but also expresses sorrow that he feels that he might not be let in, the only decent thing to do is reassure him fast that indeed, we would let him in. This is neutral ground, our guild. We would let all in who want to be there. He has not ever responded, but at least he knows now he is welcome :) Sometimes, that is all that matters. Our goals are not to start our own site selling our own things, and all that, at this time. Our goals are to start a small quality movement. Anyone who cares about quality is welcome to come learn from us, join us, be a part of it. Why is this so threatening? I haven't a clue. And lastly, we are not going anywhere...except standing right here, standing our ground, and asking artists to be cognizant of the quality they produce, work to produce better stuff, get involved with their work as a passion, not as a way to make 5 dollars extra. Bring to their work the same quality they would want in what they buy. Learn to do better work :) You have a nice day now :)

you dont have to be a vendor to see the bestsellers for the last 30 days.

hehehe.... Amish... wooooo!!! I gotta know Bast ol' buddy why whenever anyone questions your motives you always attack them as being afraid of your "standards"? I can see it's a well rehearsed scheme because your partner used the same tactics on me earlier. See, I am so totally unmoved by your "guild" and you that what you think about my products means nothing to me. "Our goals are not to start our own site selling our own things, and all that, at this time" AT THIS TIME... well that says it all.. Start a site, judge competitors works as unworthy, put them into free stuff instead, break their spirits, and AT THE RIGHT TIME, start your own store. You and your mindset are easier to read then a "Dick and Jane" book.

Well... now I don't want to get anyone upset at me... anyone who knows me knows that I'm a pretty nice guy and pretty easy to get along with... I guess I see things from a little different perspective than a lot of people who've posted here... a lot of you (not all, but some) are vendors as well... I don't sell anything here, or anywhere for that matter... I thought about it once, but then I realized that what I wanted to sell wasn't very good... of course at the time I thought it was great, and I thought, "Wow, I might be able to make a couple of bucks." I even put up a picture and asked if anyone would want to buy it... of course no one said anything about it, and I thought everyone just had BAD TASTE!!! Just kidding... but honestly, I went back and looked at it wondering why there was absolutely no response, and I realized that it just wasn't very good, and I kind of don't blame anyone for not wanting it... I would've felt ripped off myself if I had bought it... but now I'm way off topic... so my point... I guess I see this as a good thing from a consumer stand point... it's a reassurance that what I'm getting is worth my money... If I had gone ahead and tried to sell my stuff before people probably would've bought it, and they may or may not have liked it, but if something like this were around, I could've put it "through it's paces" before it even got that far, and I could improve both the quality of what I wanted to sell, and my own modeling skills in the process... frankly, I'd love people like Mehndi, and Dmentia, and Thorne to tell me what I could do to improve my skills... and while I may not like everything about the way they do things, they are good at what they do, I don't think anyone would argue with that... Additionally as a consumer, I would feel better knowing that something I was thinking about buying had been tested and found to meet certains standards, I would feel better about buying it, and again it wouldn't stop me from buying something that hadn't been tested, if I wanted it, and I thought that it was a good product, I'd still buy it... Wow this message took me like an hour to finish writing... silly people I work with kept interupting me... sheesh ;)

That a valid point Cin, and one reason why such a thing as quality control would be good. In the end with this sort of thing though, there are ways to test that don't involved guilds. This and other sites have such facilities already built into them. The forums, the freestuff. It's not hard to find people who will be more than happy to help you, to test your files, to talk to, to help you. It's this that puzzles me but I promised Mehndi that I'd hold off and I will do that. I can see what you're saying and it's true. It would be nice if there was some way to guarantee quality of an item before purchasing it. That in a way is what reviewers are for and InDepth are starting down that path, even DAZ are willing to let people review their products and that's quite a feather in InDepth's cap. I personally use people I know from this and other forums to test my stuff before I release it into a freestuff area. I have a character out at the moment being tested that I'm quite proud of and with any luck it'll be worthy of freestuff. I can understand the need for quality control and it is reassuring to know that some such system were in place. There are lots of proviso's for that though, lots and lots and lots that must be answered before something like that could be accepted and recognised by the community at large and vendors in particular. There has been too much of a certain type of behaviour over the last few months and there are some serious questions to answer to make sure that certain types of behaviour do not continue, will not occur and how certain attitudes will be "policed". Anyway. Yes, quality control would be good. That way there wouldn't be a need for anyone to post in any forum "I bought this and it's bleeding awful!" It would be nice too if customers made sure they read the onscreen and text documentation when they purchase something but it's not a perfect world I suppose. Vendors will question a "quality control" system very strenuously and will be wary of it for more reasons than just that it might call their goods into question. There's always going to be people who will hurl the accusation "You only object because you promote the existence of crap in the stores" when that is blatantly untrue when used against people with valid concerns and worries about their own products that ARE of high quality. There are lots of other issues in question as well so it's not just that vendors don't like the idea, they're genuinely concerned about a number of issues. A lot of people haven't responded to this thread who could have because they don't want anyone to think they're attacking Mehndi, her idea or being "against quality". This is a shame because I know some of those people don't intend that at all and are staying quiet for all the wrong reasons. A quality control concept really needs to be torn apart from every possible angle, it must have everyone rip it to shreds, accuse the originators of the foulest of motives and ideals and principles. Not because it would start a nice fun flame war but because the people involved with quality control will be on the front line and come under fire from consumers and vendors alike when something screws up. If they can't take the heat in a thread like this, they're never going to survive as quality control inspectors. There are so many factors involved that it's impossible for me to detail them here. And I'm not going to start voicing opinions and asking questions again. I'm reserving those. G We do need a quality control system otherwise people of lesser principle than you will sell what they think is "great" but is in fact utter garbage because without a level of quality stated it's impossible to refuse even the most simplistic objects. A tube with a ball on top could be sold as a pedestrian crossing lamp but no work has gone into it, yet there is nothing wrong with it. Even if I paid 1 dollar for something like that I'd be seriously pissed. :) Having said that, there might be people out there who would happily pay 5 dollars for that tube and sphere - if the textures are good, there is a certain level of detail, a certain level of "quality". See what I mean? Quality standards must exist, as must a logical standard of goods and value for money. Quality is good, arbitrary judgement is bad. Whooo, that was harder to write than I expected. I kept having to backspace so as not to break my word about asking questions. G

Those standard you are speaking about already exist in the stores, Cin, therein lies the rub of the whole situation. Items must have the correct Poser folder structure, textures cannot have seams, they must do exactly what they are supposed to do. Everyone has the right to put their merchandise up for sale. As a consumer, we all have thee right to check for feedback on the items, check the best sellers lists, and judge for ourselves. I don't need anyone to do my shopping for me.

"buyer beware" Pariah? That's not nice. :) No, seriously. If it's down to the customer to research store quality goods and the store allows a vendor to review opinions before posting them to the object what are the chances of a vendor allowing "poor" reviews on their product? I'd say zero chance. Complain about a product in certain forums and you'll get your arse chewed out with lots of "contact the vendor" comments. Even when having done that and gotten no or an unsatisfactory response, god help whomever complains publicly. Sometimes they get away with it. Mostly not. OK, there are certain safeguards. As you yourself are aware, there is a level of quality control at 3DCommune, a level that is set by the testers that fits in with how unhappy they would be over purchasing a faulty file. As you say, seams, structure, detail etc. There at least, the customer "can" be guaranteed a level of quality. I do not know and cannot speak for Renderosity or Renderotica stores, but one would think that people testing would look at it and think "Would I be happy with that if I bought it?" You say that there already is sub-standard stuff in the stores. A generalisation because you don't tell us what is sub-standard. Now if there was a way to look at something and say "Oh that's a good brand I'll buy that." Wouldn't that be a good thing? Allowing a store itself to set that quality seal is in itself a mistake because the store is reliant on income and cannot be trusted to the level of quality that some expect. That's why industry has watchdogs and quality inspectors. Now, having said that. Most vendors already have in place a system of testers, people who inspect and play with their goods before it's submitted for store approval. So, why does sub-standard stuff slip through? Is greed more important than customer satisfaction and quality? Quality is good isn't it? You do agree don't you? So, wouldn't it be better then if each store created a guild of it's own, from it's best artists. Not those who sell the most, that's just bullshit, but those who are the best modellers, the best texture creators, pose makers and also looked in their community itself for people who could be trusted to NOT share stuff as warez and call these into a "site guild" so that these people could monitor the quality and integrity of the files going into the stores? Yes a site hosting a store is reliant on that store for it's survival, but they also must be careful about a "quality approved" item because it's THEIR reputation on the blocks. So like the example above. The tube and sphere get rejected. But the sphere and tube, with the extra detail, textures and added excellence would get through. Hey, someone somewhere might need it. :) That way there wouldn't be a need for mucking around with things as the existing infrastructure and members list is being used, InDepth can carry on writing their reviews and holding the gun of "That's crap" to the heads of the online stores and we all win. Ahhh, but then people would say "But the site can't be trusted because they're biased." Well yes, but at the moment there is not Site guild that meets this need. And the site could not weigh the members in their favour because then their integrity comes into question, their honesty and a whole bunch of other things. I personally think that it would be a damn good idea for the online stores to do this. Because it states a "faith in the product" that puts their own necks on the line.

Pariah - by those standards then what I had thought about selling would have been fine... my directories were all laid out how they should be, none of my textures had seams, I even had MAT files that worked to change the coloring on certain parts, I had multi-materialed parented props that would've loaded for P4Female and P4Male, but it was still not very good in my oppinion, and I'm the one that made it... maybe I'm too critical of myself... I'll shut up now... at this point I think it's at that "wait and see" stage, and I'll bite my tongue (which hurts... there's metal in there!).

Just another two cents worth here...there are stores, such as Daz and 3dcommune that already put the products through some very rigorous testings. Some vendors also have very good testers before they even reach the stores and then are tested again before being put up for sale. So please don't be lulled into thinking that all stores have the same standards, nor do they even have the same commission structures for their vendors. This is NOT the only store in town, believe me, although the way some people are carrying on you would think that it was. (grc hasn't been around long enough for me to comment on otherwise I would but if Diane is behind it I'm sure it's pretty strict also) The whole point of this is....there are already standards in place and what Mehndi is proposing is something that is already being done and being done very well at 3dcommune and Daz. Anyone that has ever taken the time to visit those stores and talked with those that have purchased the products from those stores will find very pleased consumers. Not that things don't go wrong because they do, but they are backed by very effective and efficient customer service. It all boils down to trust...how much do you trust the people that run any store? How much are you going to trust those people that run any guild? I see a lot of store bashing, and no actual constructive help offered...UNLESS it has been offered and refused, which is quite possible. If that is the case, we must as members wonder why the refusal.... Another seal of approval? I would rather see better customer service and know that if I have a problem then it will be resolved quickly. This is beginning to sound more and more like not only a store bashing, but a vendor bashing as well in the guise of a guild and for the good of the community. Right now after rereading all of the posts and the answers given, I'm starting to get a real creepy feeling about this. The sharing of knowledge is already going on in the form of Art School forums and Poser and Bryce 101 forums. It's all there for the asking, if people would just participate. So how does this sound? Better that we start putting limitations on who can go into the store by the way of free stuff....as in okay you want to go into the store? You have to do a stint of one month of freestuff first, to make sure that your skills and products are in fact up to par. To me that would actually make more sense. After that, the products go into testing and if it is quality work, it goes into the stores. These are just observations and suggestions..nothing more. Mehndi....why this answer? <<Heya Leggs Akimbo... I always did wonder that about Amish folks, why they will use technology so long as they are not owning it? Like running over to use the neighbhors phone instead of owning one ;) It was a very mysterious thing to me. Be that as it may, I have more respect for your faith despite it's mysteries to me, than you evidently have toward us.>> You ask for respect from someone that you show none to. You managed to lump all of the Amish faith into one paragraph..you have no respect for them apparently, not from the first few remarks of your post. That rather read like an attack and in light of the subject of the post, was really quite irrelevent. tsk, tsk, and up until then you were doing so well. Pendy

TJ, to clarify you do have to be a merchant to see the Best Sellers Last 30 Days sort in the store.

....egads...not again.....total bummer.......sigh

The problem is, the things we wish to make vendors aware of in making their work simply are NOT being checked for in most stores. I know for a fact they are not. I have been a store tester here. Let me show you what I mean. Look at the attached illustration. Both models in this render would be accepted into the store of Renderosity. However the one on the left bears a rendering artefact outlined in red. Both models however would not be accepted into the store at Daz. Only the one on the right, with the blue outline would be accepted, since it has co-planered edges along the bottom that are not showing a false shadow. Now granted, this is only one example of quality. There are many other examples we hope to give in time, but someone has to start somewhere, so I am starting with this one ;)

This link is only visible to the vendors? Sorry I dont want to logout to test it. And if it is why ?...seems the shoppers would be at an advantage to use it.

Um... it was in my market window, now its gone lol.

er nm... its not the same.. regular people only see best-sellers, which rotates, as it should. =)

Mine only says "Best Sellers" and it shows me what I assume is the best sellers of all time... okay I'm shutting up again.

<<The problem is, the things we wish to make vendors aware of in making their work simply are NOT being checked for in most stores. I know for a fact they are not.>> So you are basically speaking about the store testers at this store and not any other. How do you know that Daz would not accept this? A model of yours perhaps that was rejected or someone you know? Just wondering unless you are one of their testers that you would know this for a fact. So, all of this is aimed at this store and not any other, because obviously you can't speak about any other store since you have no experience with them as a tester. So you really have no idea if vendors are already being made aware of things like this, you are just assuming that you and the other people that want to form this guild (read here --> save the community because the stores sure aren't concerned about quality.. because the testers don't know what they are doing and they aren't good enough, and we as the best of the best need to save the community and weed out the bad vendors; the forums that are up now have no one qualified enough to help the vendors or new modelers or whatever take you pick and anyway they are doing NOTHING) apparently are the only ones qualified to inform them. Whether or not you mean to Mehndi this is really how you are beginning to come across..the more you talk the worse it sounds, I'm sorry. And this isn't elite thinking on your part? Ummm...okay.

I know for a fact Pendarian because I build models for Daz, and before they will accept any models we must co-planer the edges to remove any of those false shadow artefacts you see in the above. The above model by the way is a small part of a much larger model being build by Mehndi Studios for Daz, but it is not yet complete, and has not yet been submitted anywhere, except by proof of concept renders, which was enough to make it provisionally accepted at Daz in advance. The two stores I have experience with are Daz and Renderosity. On the one I tested. I was forced to release things that I could not in good conscious recommend to others to purchase, with many flaws in them. The above illustration was a type of flaw that frequently cropped up. My models may bear the flaw in the beginning just as does many others, but the difference is, before I finalize the model, it will be cleaned of all such artefacts. I know how Daz tests from working closely with Daz, and managing to "make the grade" time after time now :) How many here can say that? So, how many major stores are there? 4? I have first hand experience with 50 percent of them. Dmentia has first hand experience with even more, since she submits items to your store :) Thorne with 100% of the "major" stores ;) I would say together we are at 225% ;p Is that enough experience yet? There are differences in 3d Commune and Renderosity, Pendarian. You guys are well known for turning away things that Renderosity accepts. That is a recognized fact. No one is attacking you, so in my best happy smiling friendly face, I say down boy! (or girl sorry not sure which you are). :) Oh, one more thing, there is a hole in the texture map of a hair product that is currently for sale in your store, if I recall correctly where the "template uv mapping" underneath shows through ;) Caught that on testing here, but could not reject. Did you?

Well, as an admin of that store I would sure appreciate it if you would email me with the name of that product so I can check it out myself. A "professional" favor so to speak.

Word has it your are conferring with JDK about this guild. Some may like Jack, some may not, I'm indifferent, BUT, Jack is a shrewd businessman with a great talent in making money. He's also the top drama queen for nasty site splits.<< ::Chuckles:: That's a pretty indifferent opinion there, Karl. As for the word that you've been hearing... uh, you should clean out your ears or recheck the source of the info that you've been getting, cause it is wrong. As for me being the top drama queen, I think you are only jealous because I look better in heels than you do Karl :o) LOL Jack

That would be girl :) Or rather woman. Whichever. Down girl? ummm I think not. I just want what is right for the community as a whole and I'm just getting creepy feelings right now, so I will state my opinion just as everyone else here has a right to state their opinion. If my opinions change and the creepy feeling goes away I'll state that also, I'm an equal opportunity type poster so not to worry. I realize that you are not attacking the 3Dcommune site, but at the same time when you say "stores" "sites" it kind of all gets lost in the shuffle you know? Questor so far I think has said it best in more then one of his posts..the possiblity of it creating an atmosphere of elitism and cliques..(which is already here) the decision not to use that which is already in place,I'm just not getting it either. Well Dmentia has had little experience with 3dCommune since JED split, and the store has changed quite a bit since then. Thorne, yes he has experience also but again, nothing new from him for quite a while either. So experience yes, but definately not recent. So much for percentages... Your last question, tough to answer I don't know which hair product you are speaking of. It reall is in bad taste and a breach of trust to our vendors, to reveal problems we might have found with someone's products,(especially in a public forum) however, whatever problems we find are fixed before its added to the store, and if the vendor doesn't know how to fix it - we show them how it's done. We are not afraid to say no, or fix this. That is our rep that is on the line just as much as the vendor and we are earning and deserve a stellar rep for the store there. We are also working with In Depth to have our products reviewed, so again, we are very quality minded. IF they find things that we did not catch, we will request from our vendors that the problems be fixed and then the new product file be uploaded to the store. They are all aware of this and happy about it because they know we have their best interests and their customers/members best interest at heart. I believe wholeheartedly that things need to change in the store here, I cannot fathom why you would not want to stay and help that happen with all of your talent and knowledge. The same with Dmentia and Thorne; It is just simply beyond my simple comprehension I guess. I'm not privy to everything that has happened so that is probably why I can't understand it. I don't want to fight or argue..I just want to understand..and right now I just simply don't. I have too many questions about this..I'll just have to wait and see like everyone else and reserve judgement until then.

ROFL Jack...yes if I remember correctly, you do look pretty darn good in heels :) He's got legs! Pendy

Heya Pendarian ;) Good morning Vietnam! But my friend, we ARE staying and helping change that, as you say :) Do you see us going anywhere yet? Even when being flamed to death? No, we just girded up into our flame proof underoos and trudge onward into "battle" to change all that ;) We do know that you all do have a fine rep for rejecting things that have problems. No one has ever said you did not ;) But we are also here to not call names of the places we feel are releasing poopie, since that is not our goal, anymore than calling the names of actual real live "this is who did it" names of the vendors themselves is our goal. I mean, once we thought about that, doing just that. "This is the poopie art!!! beware beware beware... and here is something free that is better than it." but would that really help anyone to get better? No, it would not :( It would be hateful, and it would not help any community, no matter how much that community or its store needs helping. We are not hateful people. We are not snobbish. We want to instead turn the frustration we felt into a good thing, a thing where we are able to do independent testing just like In Depth Arts (since more hands = more testing done) for those who wish that, and to mentor anyone who wishes to learn how to do better, via training and teaching. ALL are welcome in our effort. Anyone of any site and any store. Everyone from the Master level craftsmen with lessons to teach and a good heart with which to teach them, on down to the newbie who just bought Poser yesterday. Not a soul who wants to learn would be turned away. And we are not leaving or going anywhere to do this. We are not opening a store to do this. We are not forming a new community to do this. We are just going to do this, right here, in the middle of every community. A No Mans Land Truly Neutral Quality Movement that we chose to call Guild. We chose to call it guild because so many here have wished they could be in the Renderosity Merchants Guild, but found that "honor" or whatever it was, was closed to them. Our "Guild" is open to all, and all are welcome :) We hope you will be a part of it too Pendarian, since items tested by In Depth Arts, and by us too, will get you twice as many tested and certified items on your store shelves :)

OOOOooo Pendy, you always did know how to make a grown boy blush :o) Jack

I wasn't aware you were prone to over-exageration Mehndi. Flamed to death? What part of this thread is flaming you? I see some questions, a few complaints and some observations, certainly nothing that qualifies as a "flame". A bit melodramatic don't you think? Now, you want to see what a flame is like, please have a look around in C&D, there's some nice warm bar-b-cues in there. :( I'm getting confused again. You're not here to call the names of the poopie places, so you generalise and tar ALL the stores with the same brush which by default must include the DAZ store too seeing as they too are profit oriented and reliant on getting stuff "up there". If you are not generalising, then may I respectfully request, unless you are prepared to point your finger, you drop the "store poopie" nonsense and concentrate on the mysteries of your guild. It's so easy for people to generalise and tar everything with the same accusation and then play innocent. Please, if you are not accusing Daz or 3DCommune, then that only leaves a few others. If you're not careful you'll start getting into the realms of slander because a lot of vendors have their own stores. Perhaps if you were to say that "there is poopie available somewhere on the planet for people to buy" it might be better than by saying "in the stores", and then saying you aren't pointing a finger because "in the stores" IS pointing a finger. A hard sharp finger that says "these places are selling crap"... You say they are, then say certain ones aren't, or might be but might not be, but... Hrrm. I'm sorry if I was a different person I would suggest that you are thrashing around trying to make accusations without actually saying anything. But I'm not like that, so I won't say it. It's nice to see that your Guild is going to be an active and resident part of ALL the existing communities, from PFO to Renderotica and all stops in between. That is excellent news. Really excellent. That means I suppose that all the artists and vendors and people of excellence who will be gathering under the guild banner will be helping everybody everywhere. :) I think that's admirable. It will be so nice to see the really good artists climb down here in the trenches and guide people towards the goal of excellence you hold so highly. Great news Mehndi. That's absolutely wonderful. I'm going to go off and crack a bottle of wine and celebrate. I was so worried that you were going to take people and leave and not use the existing forums and tutorial sections and there you've said it. You're staying. You're all staying. You're going to use these places to achieve your goal of a level playing field and quality. I am truly relieved. I look forward to the guild members posting their tricks, tips, secrets and guiding us (lesser) mortals in the arts of creating stuff. :)

Questor, when people speak to us as we have been spoken to, yes, I would call much of that flames. And you are not privy to all of it, unless you can reach closed forums, and see our instant messages, and read our personal emails. We have never said we are leaving, at any time done anything to imply that. So where some of these fears come from, I have no idea. We are already in the process of teaching in the merchants forum, where a discussion on "quality checklist" has now evolved into a "how to do this thread", with concrete examples given. We hope to soon have a site where we can post threads that are specifically geared to how to do certain hard to do tasks specifically. Even if I started one here in Poser forum in this current climate right now, someone would try to derail it by again throwing around fears and accusations, so till folks calm down a bit, all we can do is try to reassure folks in the Poser forum area. I cannot name names nor will I let myself be tempted to, since frankly, at this time, till you all get used to our ideas and presence, and we are not the topic of the week, ALL my words are being twisted to the intent of those who seek to thwart this effort. If I named names to clear the reps of some stores, the stores not cleared would yell. If I refuse to name names, people yell. No matter what we do, all are yelling. So I will stick with my gut instinct that I at least, no matter who else does, am not here to give concrete examples by naming names. Many of the same artists sell in all stores anyway. So it hardly is an absolute that one store is necessarily better than another, or worse. Some stores reject more, when it has problems. That IS an absolute that can be stated :) Now, the sooner everyone settles down and lets us actually get in some working time, the sooner real concrete proof of the pudding will be out there in time for dinner ;)

No, we just girded up into our flame proof underoos and trudge onward into "battle" to change all that ;) They make Linda Blair underoos? (eg) =)

Not unless you know where to find them, Pariah.

If people are speaking to you in a manner that constitutes a flame, then report it to the site administrators as it is against the site TOS to do this and it is the DUTY of the site admin to put a stop to it - regardless of their personal feelings on any subject they are bound by their own TOS. I see some worried people in this thread but I don't see a flame, coupla sparks maybe. :) What is happening privately, as I said before I am not privvy to nor am I interested. That does not concern me. I am part of this thread and other than one warm moment above I have not flamed you, neither have many others. A generalisation again and I misread it to mean "here" not "in private". Sorry. You have not stated you were leaving, but you gave a strong indication you were. A place to go, a place where... and similar phrases used by you and Dmentia (who seems to speak with some authority so is presumably involved in forming this guild). You mention "controlled, operated and managed" and "that no fees are planned yet", surely you can see how these phrases and the overall tone of your posts about being fired for your ideas, unhappy with certain people would indicate you are leaving and taking as many with you as will follow your banner. That's what started me worrying. We've seen enough silly politics and site splits over the last couple of years without watching another one occur without trying to stop it. Sheesh, some people just can't step away from those splits and they keep on cropping up in comments and conversations all over the place. So the arguments, bitterness and spite is still very fresh in the minds of some people who can't let go of it yet. I for one don't want to see it start again, I'm heartily, thoroughly sick of it, so sick that I will probably hunt down and personally exterminate anyone that tries to do it again. :) I appreciate that you can't name names. That would start a whole string of insults, condemnations and provoke the very thing I want so desperately to avoid - a site split. I also appreciate that you can't voice any favouritism, for the same reasons. No, honestly I do understand that. But the generalisation of "poopie in the stores" is just as harmful and likely to get certain backs up in defence of those stores. It's probably safer to drop the "poopie in the stores" bit to be honest and actually focus on the guild purpose. You have elucidated that part of the reason for the guild's creation is to prevent the growth and spread of low-quality (does that sound better than poopie?) items through the community (see you don't need to mention stores or freestuff) This will be achieved through reviews, testing, tutorials and knowledge sharing. That's a good aim and it's being done now by many people in the existing forums. Your guild could continue to do that in a much more focused manner, again, that's good. No need for a "guild" though, not for that. Quality control. A group independant of the stores and the sites. Now this is where my ears perk up. There are already in place, people who work very hard to make sure quality goes in the stores. There is a matter of personal pride, which quite obviously you and Thorne have in abundance, that you would think would make people do the "best they possibly can" for their customers. It is my opinion that there are such artists who do that, and some who perhaps have a more vested interest in dollar return than value or quality. This comes down to a more personal thing than the store. As has already been mentioned, you can go into K-Mart, 7-11, Woolworths etc etc and browse around pretty much knowing quality from poopie. The quality items don't appear overnight at the say so of a group of marketing executives, they are established over years of hard work and customer evaluation. People recognise quality by brand name. Mercedes or Rolls Royce compared to Ford or Subaru, Jeep and Land Rover compared to Suzuki and Isuzu. And so on. Some vendors in the stores have built up a reputation over time for quality and excellence. People like PhilC, Steve Shanks, Renapd etc are known for the quality of their work, a stamp on their goods would make no difference whatsoever. None. You could turn round tomorrow and say "PhilC poser stuff sucks donkey breath" and nobody would believe it, because they know better. How is that achieved? I've known Phil, Steve and Rena to be extremely conscientious, unbelievable helpful and generous, and regularly see them helping people in the forums, I see copious amounts of free stuff from them too, so there's a base to judge their work from. They put as much hard work into their free files as they do their pay to get files. I use those three as an example because they're almost universally known, but there are many others who also fit that bill. There are also people who, 10 minutes after joining the community, asking a couple of "how do I" questions, hit the store bandwagon to make bucks. This doesn't mean their goodies are any less viable, they might have been working with other applications for years and only recently discovered poser and it's marketplace. There are many who need help, who desperately want to produce stuff they can give back or sell back to the community, but aren't getting that help except from a few people who are thinly stretched and hard pressed. Now, to be rude. All of a sudden you are going to form a guild of people who are going to change this situation. That's wonderful. Where were these people before? If they're already out there doing it, what are the benefits for them to joining a guild? Why would they need to? Why not just carry on as is? Why... Oh wait, I'm sorry, I said I wouldn't ask anymore questions yet. Ignore that lot. :) Again, I will state for the record. (and this is in reference to the guild "quality approved" thing and your references to "a place") Quality good, splitting of community into elitist sections bad. There's that word that Thorne has such a problem with. Yet "the best of the best" = elite. A panel (guild) of judges will determine what is worthy of a seal of approval and what is below standard (really amazingly great gets badge, other stuff doesn't) Granted that's a gross oversimplification but in essence it's like "Good Housekeeping" or the British "Kite" mark. It means "this is a quality approved product". But it also means - "that stuff that doesn't have this mark is utter crap, it's cheap, nasty and horrible." This could be messy in a place where there are so many fragile egos. Double blind is good, but what happens when a "top" artist is rejected? Have you seen Radarts scathing rant on elitism when he was told "you're not good enough" by a panel of self elected "best of the best"? Or the comments from artists when someone questions the quality of their goods? Some threads in the archives are still smoking from the heat. :) Quality is good. EVERY SINGLE CUSTOMER DESERVES IT. Ever vendor should do their best to provide it. But who is to make the judgement? And are the judges worthy? I'm glad I'm not you Mehndi. I really am, I can say that with all honesty. Because you are exploring a can of worms that has a nuclear device on the bottom controlled by a mercury trembler switch. One error, just one error and it could all blow up in your face. I sure as heck don't envy you that responsibility. Well, as to settling down and letting you get on with things. I get the drift. I've been told to politely "shut the heck up" before. :) I'll try. No really, I will. Look ---> shutting up now. G

Questor, we MUST have a site devoted to this, for these practical reasons: Any postings on quality, be it general commentary or how to do stuff specifically will soon be lost and buried when posted here. We do not have a forum devoted here to "Quality", let alone to "How to do this". Nor on any other forum. So this is why for, for the very ease of which one may find the information, eventually a site is going to have to be made. This is not a splitting of a site, nor us leaving this site. It is in fact, no different than the vast number of other artists who host their tutorials on their own site, then link them at other places if they can find a place to link them, etc.

Well....this post is now so far back and "buried" it hardly has the "presence" it "should" have for such a signifigant thread...yet...it should have been moved to C&D long ago. Hmmm? I think I know why it was not but I will stay mum on that. I really didn't want to be here...not at all, I wanted nothing at all to do with this and I wouldn't even know if someone...some folks hadn't directed me to this thread yesterday already. I don't even want to add my two cents cause I know I will either get flamed, roasted or ignored totally....but remember this...I WAS "directed" here...there ARE plenty of folks VERY concerned!!! Why?? For good reason.... Let's talk...please....I wish to do this as "peacefully as possibly" cause I know this is like a small insignifigant gnat approaching a gang of hand holding spiders....but sometimes those with the least to lose are the best sacrifices....with all due respect I now leap into your webs...to accomplish what...I really don't know..?? Let me be frank here..... Ya know...this would actually be a fine thing...if it were about quality...about the community....about EVERYONE...if it weren't just a disguised form of getting rid of the little folks and making this surefire "money making" community something ONLY for certain self appointed big shots...attempting to create a monopoly for themselves... THIS is NOT about quality...it's about WHO will make the money...and you folks KNOW who the BIG wigs are and you BIG wigs have decided to "hold hands" for a "common cause" so you can all "reap the benefits" of the "wealth" here and NO one else or very FEW will benefit except those that REALLY COUNT!!!!! I don't really get this at all....the "cocky, ferocious attitude" alone overall here is enough to turn anyone off from this guild thing unless your an elitist egomaniac who already has a SURE foot in the door of this "castle of highbrows"....and this post should have been "moved" to the C&D long ago...and it hasn't...and I don't get it...I don't....or do I..?? Someone "directed" me here ya know....some did do that...there is much concern about...and me...I wouldn't even know or care cause I have no bounds on any store...but my gut feeling..."my gut feeling" is this is a lovely LOT for all those that "count" in this "club" and no one else....and that is what I see and others see and that partly comes from just the unfeeling, uncaring cockyness hereabouts in this thread....this will really help those self appointed ones here that wish to have a "monopoly" of "making MONEY" and only "them" making the "money"...(oh yeah)....not the community!!! And if "I"...who has very little to do with this charade can SEE this....you betcha that there is something very FISHY here! I thought a lot of you folks had changed...I even felt friendship towards some of you, (again),...I was fooled it seems, (again),...I was....dopy me...I thought folks were different...man...I was sooo wrong..it just got way WORSE!! Your all holding hands...and for money! I don't believe this!!! Can I call you greedy bastards without getting myself banned??! Probably not...so I will withold on that. Not that I don't reckon I will most likely be banned already or in big shit here for speaking MY opinion.... And you folks try to make it "for the community"...bah!...sure...always "for the community"...poppicock!! You's just want to get the most BUCKEROO'S out of this poser treasury here and all over as much as possible....nice plan...and you's just managed to find a new sure way to do it and make it sound so "caring" and sweet....but you forgot to leave out that egotistical arrogance! Poser has become a very LUCRATIVE business all around and this is just another very crafty take over scheme of the moneymaking kind....like there's not enough to go around...or what?? Like wtf?? Give the little folks a chance?? No way...too much at stake, a dollar here, a dollar there...this way you's can even pick and choose who counts and who don't...like some big grubby outfit of sharks...give me a break...wake up people, you don't have a light year!! I don't get it...you would think that at least you's wouldn't be so damn ARROGANT about it...how many folks like cocky attitudes...like c'mon....is it that sure a thing?? You folks sure think your all the cat's meow and everyone hasn't a prayer in hell without you's, that's what I see....so tell me...even if those that do COUNT for something...if they don't join...are they gonna be scum..?? That's what I see. I also see how eventually in time a few folks here will get bitten in the ass AGAIN...only who will suffer AGAIN...none of you big shots...nonono...of course not...it will just be the community having to pick up the pieces left behind, crumbs....to grow again and again and again.... Shame....now you's can take your pot shots at me....or just IGNORE me like crazy...just remember...I held back...someone else pointed me here so I am NOT alone in my thoughts here...NOT AT ALL....kill me off and there's others.....I just couldn't keep my mouth shut no more....this stinks....and I am outta this thread now....quality my ass...it's ALL about MONEY...and "who's" gonna be making it!!! I'll pat your back if you'll pat mine...very common phrase....eh...?? Whatever works for you's...... sigh Sorry there wasn't any nicer way to say all this....I really hate even being here on this thread......it reeks of arrogance, elitism, and subtle threats all through it,...read "between" the lines people's!!! Take care....be well....

We do not have a forum devoted here to "Quality", let alone to "How to do this". Nor on any other forum. By "every other forum" do you every forum on every site? Because I know of a Poser 101 and Bryce 101 forum on 3D commune which are there for "newbies" to ask questions without fear of mockery or of being ignored. Just trying to help you keep up on your facts so you don't look sillier err I mean silly.

As you can see, you folks think you are explaining yourself plainly, and I may see your posts as aggressive and acromonious. I think I am explaining plainly, and you see another thing. So we are all in the same boat. As to being fired, no, let me again attempt to clarify that matter. I was fired for the fact that when a rumour of the very very grassroots beginnings of this effort got leaked to the administration of this site, JeffH took issue with it up to and including a threat made by himself, repeatedly, to ban anyone he could locate who was involved. He then settled down to watch for anything that would look like this, so when I then made a post quite some time later that some folks were in the process of creating what at first was maybe a joke, called the Free Market, but now is very serious and could change the world so to speak we hope... he then pounced on that like a duck on a junebug and again began repeatedly threatening to ban, and who knows what else, since he said he had his "finger on the trigger". This to me is VERY alarming. That a person of such animosity in general and such abuse of power is in administration. I have complained repeatedly for months, as have others, of abuse of power by JeffH in the privacy of the "correct way" to do it, but nothing was ever done, except to try to silence me and to act as if it is me or others with the problem for doing the complaining, despite the fact his abuses of power have been perpetrated for months in front of all in the administrators forum. So, knowing full well that it would result in me being fired, I can no longer stand by and watch someone with that much power acting like that, and "blew the whistle" on him in public, and quoted what he has said, and the threats he has made. So the "official" reasons that tammymc gave for firing me seemed to be twofold in her letter she sent. That I had revealed to all the fact that JeffH is acting out. And that I was involved in this movement, which she feels is me making trouble for her store. Pity that. If it makes trouble for her store, then her store was in trouble already perhaps. Which brings me to another issue. People have asked over and over why this is not being done inside Renderosity, all this checking, testing, making sure everything is done right, etc etc etc, why we are not trying to "help" or whatever in some way Renderosity to get it right. The facts are that we have. And our quality concerns have been shoved under the table, over and over and over, and I have even been literally told, "worry about teaching someone how to do better later, this needs to be released now..." by one of the administrators. We were even forbade for ages and ages to make any commentary, tell anyone what might be wrong with their model or submission at all, unless it fell within that narrow list of things Renderosity checks for. Only after fighting to the point I was black and blue all over did I manage to even so much as gain the "right" for testers to make any comments in such a way as to help folks to make a better model, and that took a knock down dragout. So seeings as the battle has been lost, we move on to the war, so to speak, in a TOTALLY metaphorical way. This is not a site war, just to remind you. This is however going directly to the root of the problem, and trying to gather the artists themselves into a high quality initiative, and get them behind it, since it has proven to be impossible while I was a store tester to get anything done internally about it.

One other note, a large number of the people speaking so harshly against this idea have an agenda, as most of you are probably aware. They either work for Renderosity as testers, or somewhere else. So this must seem to them to be a personal attack on their testing abilities. It is NOT. It is though asking the artists to submit better material to those testers, since sometimes the testers would love to be able to reject things, but the guidelines of the store they work for refuse to let them.

Radart, though I know you mean well with your worries that this is some scam some of us are pulling to try to pull all the sales to ourselves or something, honey, it simply is not. Look at the quantity of merchandise Thorne, Dmentia and I have up for sale at any and all stores :) We do NOT produce all that much. We take weeks on each project we work on, sometimes months. So it is not like we have the ability to flood a store with things we have passed for ourselves and steal everyones money. It is not our intent even if we were flood market creators who whip things out a mile a minute. What this is, really and truly, is an OPEN invitation for all who wish to, newbie, novice, old pro, anyone, everyone, to join in a committed movement towards good quality, that bears a "seal" and a "name" since sometimes till movements bear a seal and a name, they are not movements. We want a revolution here, on quality alone, not on sites, not on folks sales, not to hurt folks sales. We want to HELP folks make things that will sell better, so they will make more money. We want to give others a chance to shine, be known for their high quality standards, even if they only arrived yesterday, and are totally unknown, but just happen to be producing excellence. I talk to anyone here, and everyone. There is no one I am a snob to Peter, you know that. Hardly an hour passes that I do not get instant messages, many from total strangers, asking me for help, or how to do something, or if they can learn from me, if I will help teach them as an apprentice, etc. I respond to everyone. You know that for a fact. You know you do. And I will help any and all who accept help and ask for it. So please stop thinking this is about hand holding spiders trying to make it so no one can sell 'cept their own selves :) It simply and plainly is not. If you need a metaphor, it is if anything, more us trying to form up a choir of everyone who will join in to sing with us, from those who cannot yet carry a tune, to our Opera Singers and Diva's to sing "Give Me That Old Time Religion" ;P

I don't get it. what's new I was going to read the whole thread, but I think I'll wait for the movie. EXCERPT FROM SECRET MERCHANT FORUM (NOT REALLY) "We need to do something about..." "Complaining?" "Fighting?" "Bunny slippers! Someone took my..." "um, no. Swords. There ARE a lot." "Huh. Have a sale?" "Put them on a CD?" "..I mean I just took them off for a minute..." "Who's fighting?" "We'd have to ask everyone who made them..." "...I'm gonna be, if someone doesn't give them back..." CONTINUED IN OUR NEXT THRILLING INSTALLMENT (NOT REALLY)

"One other note, a large number of the people speaking so harshly against this idea have an agenda, as most of you are probably aware. They either work for Renderosity as testers, or somewhere else. So this must seem to them to be a personal attack on their testing abilities. It is NOT." I have no agenda, other then to make sure to my satisfaction that what is being proposed is not yet another attempt by someone to split the community or make yet more money off of the users. If you want to call that an agenda, then done and done. So your assertion is that a large number of the posters have an agenda..that's pretty arrogant isn't it? Assuming that just because people are questioning, not attacking, but questioning and possibly disagreeing with you that they have an agenda? Maybe they just don't like what they hear, for no other reason then they just don't like the way it sounds, period. But stating that they have an agenda makes it so much easier to dismiss them and try to discredit them then answer their questions honestly...or just agree to disagree. I have full and complete confidence in my testing abilities, I don't need someone to pick on or to bash to know that I'm good at testing, because sweetie, trust me I am THAT good. So no agenda there either. Arrogance is such a fun thing, isn't it? Or is that confidence? I'm not sure :) You say you are staying, yet in the next breath you explain why you must not do it here. Okay...I thought that if someone started another site that meant they were leaving this site and doing what they could do here over there...I've been taking way too many drugs I guess. I have no clue why you place so much stock on the word "guild" or "seal" they are just words and have no real meaning if there is no substance behind them. It's as if by you using those words, it will automatically give those that are running it consumer confidence or the right to judge what is worthy of this "seal" by the "guild". In the end, all it is is just another bunch of humans that have rendered a decision, that's all, call it for what it is. It will not make me buy anything or think less of anyone. It will not give me more confidence, because in the end, unless you do have a store, it won't be you providing customer service or handling complaints, it will still be the store, the vendors that they are associated with. So for me and I'm sure others, the "guild seal of approval" will be nothing more then just another bunch of testers testing a product and telling me what they think of it. The fact that you and others are vendors themselves and can model or texture will really not make an iota of difference to me...UNLESS...I as a consumer already have confidence in you or whomever is testing that product. Then and only then will I think that you might actually know what you are talking about. It might at that point carry a bit of weight..but you will NOT make it or break it when it comes to my decision about buying a product...so..down girl with the ego, okay? About you being relieved of your duties here. From what I understand in your postings is that you did in fact reveal private information into a public forum. Even after you gave your word that you would not do so (the old it's a private forum and what is here stays here kinda thing) so you in a way, abused the power that you were given while privy to those forums. Unless of course everything that you say that he said was in emails, site mails or messages, then all bets are off of course. This is one reason why I have to look at what you say with some cynicism, you have already broken a trust. I wonder why you needed to do so, when you could have very well talked privately about it to your myriad of friends, aquaintences etc...I just don't understand that. Just like this whole guild thing. Why didn't you just go do it? Why did you feel the need to holler it from the rooftops so to speak as if you were riding in to be a saviour on a white horse to save the community from the sub-quality merchandise etc....and oh of course gone are the days that people have to prove their worth to the community..it's okay if you are a vendor and want to sell even if you have never given anything in freestuff etc..an apprenticeship so to speak, guilds are familiar with that sort of thing....I see no word of encouragement there, no building of integrity and honor and the need to build the community back up to what it was even a year ago, people coming in and building their reputation via freestuff and then honing their skills and then going into a store. Instead what I am reading it's all about money, "help them sell more" "get them make more money"....nothing at all about what a guild truely is. An exchanging of information and knowledge for no other reason other then a job well done...heck no, let's do it for the money.....because that is what matters, it's okay if we do it for the money as long as we say the stuff is quality. What is going to save the 3dcommunity is the installation of values, credit where credit is due, do not steal other people's stuff just so you can get into the store and sell sooner...that is the cancer that is eating away at the 3d community on the whole. If the only reason that you and whomever want to start this guild is to help others just so they can make more money then yes, I'm sorry I have to question the honor and the integrity of the people behind it. Your guild should be to help and foster where you can; not only to instill quality but also integrity and honesty and the meaning of doing a good job, being true mentors that show not only how to make a living from what you love, but to love the community that you make a living from. Not everyone that does good work sells everything that they make, some still give away for free. They remember what it was like when they first started out...what they took from others that gave freely, and the advice that they received. They remember what it was like to pay their dues and earn respect. Some will still make you a model if you ask and ask for nothing in return, no dollar signs flash in their eyes. You also teach these things to those you want to help, then yes, I will call you a Guildmember and have some respect for you. Deb

I've been reading all the threads dealing with this "guild" for a couple of days now. The whole thing gives me the heebie jeebies. Sorry, but that's how I feel. How benificent you all seem to be...looking after us poor people who seem not to know what we are doing because we are not Best Sellers. I was led to believe that I would never have an item accepted at Daz until I had the "Help" of a more well known artist. So we started working on a project together. Let me tell you this project was like pulling teeth. I had to keep reminding this artist that I needed help. Anyway, that is all academic now. I submitted my OWN project to Daz...and surprise, surprise...it was accepted. All on my own. So I guess I just proved to myself that I didn't need this particular artist to get a "foot in the door". Granted, my product isn't nearly as fancy as her's...but I guess it was good enough for them :) I have never been a big seller here at Rosity...never could figure that out as I think my ladies are lovely...but don't we all think our products are great. Too bad they get burried under so much JUNK. I know for a fact that there is an item for sale in the store that has NO right being there as it was when I tested it. But you all seem to be of the "Buyer Beware" School of Thought. Shame on YOU!!! Simple as my ladies are, I have yet to have any kind of complaint about any one of them. I do the job right...everything works right. Files unzip correctly...and everything works as promised. So now you want to tell me that I need YOUR help?? I don't think so. Sorry folks, but I feel we are being led to believe things that just aren't true. This whole "Guild" thing is a total joke in my eyes. Just another bid for a takeover. As for the project this artist and I were working on...I consider it a dead deal. All I have to say on that matter is that I had better NEVER see it at Daz under HER name...cuz little as I contributed, I DID contribute...and I will not see my work bastardized.

Pendarian, when you all assume we have an agenda, do you not see where sooner or later in time, we turn and begin to look for your agenda?

Pendarian, on the latter part of your message, the part about teaching, giving, helping others, making things for others without cost, all of this, I already do. I have since my first week here, always to the best of my ability.

Destiny, shame on you.

No Liz...SHAME ON YOU...you led me to believe I would never get into Daz without your help....well I did...My poor simple work MADE it....without any help from YOU. YOU are the one who should feel shame. See...I never mentioned any names...you took that upon yourself. I may be simple...but I am NOT stupid.

Karen, since you make these accusations, I assume then it is ok for me to put out into the public all of the emails and instant messages ever exchanged between us, so that you can show me where I ever said this to you or led you to believe this in any way? You know what I see here? A lady who was willing to suck up to me, appeal to my generosity and sense of pity to work with her, so that she would get into Daz by riding my coat-tails when you thought that was the way in. Instead, I told you that YOU are good enough by yourself to get there, over and over and over. And told you to not give up. To submit and keep submitting. Told you to keep working on getting in, to believe in yourself. And lo and behold, I was right. You did get in. Now suddenly, you do not need me. The sad thing is Destiny, you never did need me. Nor anyone. You only feared you did, and so you have used me. Shame on you Destiny.

Screw you Liz.... you are real good at twisting things to make you look like the poor forsaken one. I know better. I NEVER sucked up to you sweetie....so get that straight. And your coat tails seem quite tarnished to me as of late. You want to make people think they need YOUR seal of approval to get in to any store...well they DON'T...all they need is guts and the feeling that they believe in what they created. I thought you were a friend...HA!!! You are just a user. I've read many things about you in the past few days..NOT pleasant things. I always felt like my work was worth less than nothing. Finally I am feeling that maybe it's worth a little something...sure, it's simple, but it is ALL mine. How DARE you make it look like I rode your coattails to get it where it is now. Is this how you will treat anyone who comes to your new guild seeking help? If so..God help them. The Shame isn't on me Liz...I am but a simple texture maker..the shame is on YOU for making people like me feel like they are not worthy. This will be my last post on the subject, and just take TigerLilly and delete any remnants of her...for that is what I am going to do.

No Destiny, no one ever made you feel like you needed me. You felt that way your own self. You were always grateful seeming, always so careful to put on such a show of gratitude for the project we were working on together. You know the real irony here, is that you admit that you feel the store is full of crap burying your good work. Well, actually it is. That is our whole point. The same thing is happening to alot of good artists Destiny, not just you. You are a large part of why this battle is being waged. How badly I have felt to watch you feel the way you do day in day out. I believe you have let your acceptance to Daz suddenly go to your head, and now suddenly recall how you did think you needed others, and confuse that with thinking they led you to believe it. You are a confused woman Destiny, we all know that, but no one here would ever abuse you for it.

All? I hope you dont pretend to speak for anyone but yourself.

Definately you are not speaking for me Mehndi, my opinion of Destiny is quite different then yours. And I think everyone else is also quite capable for speaking for themselves. Cheap shot Mehndi, very cheap shot.

And here I thought two guys arguing was entertaining... whew... I can feel the heat from here... One thing though... like TJ says, please don't include me in "we all" part... I happen to like Karen :o) Jack

Pendy, not to detract you from this at all, how about we exchange shoes for a bit, these heels are killing my feet and I do so much enjoy seeing you in them more... wow, talk about gorgeous calves and thighs!!! Opps sorry... got distracted a bit there :o) Jack

You know what Destiny, you win. I have no fight left in me for this battle anymore dear. I will do as all say I do anyway, and just go right back to what I do best, developing and selling things, for my own profit and my own gain, and forget trying to ever help anyone here. No one needs help, you have all said so very plainly. Thank you for your time in letting me know :)

Oh Jack honey...I thought you'd never ask!!!

Would you like for me to break out the strawberries -n- cream, you know how I like that :o)

Can we have chocolate tonight too? You know that's my favorite ;)

MMmmmm... anything you want, darling, anything you want!!! You know me, I am flexiable.... very, flexiable... :o)

I was so touched by the number of personal emails that I received (1) because of the cheapshots taken at the Amish Faith by, well you know who. Actually, I have to tell you that Im NOT really Amish. I was born, raised and still live in rural Lancaster County in Pennsylvania. Yes, the Amish Country. I am a 30 something male who likes to dress in black. I get so many tourists asking me if Im Amish that I eventaully started saying yes and charging them for pictures. =) When it comes to Faith, I'm not much of anything. I was a Hare Krishna once for about three blocks. But it was raining and cold. I have my beliefs, I keep them dear to me, and I sure don't fling scripture around loosely just to try to make a point. Anyway, I'll be back more often, but not too much. It'll save me from getting banned. =) See ya! Karl

::almost choked on his Mt. Dew:: Whoa boy... Jack

Would this qualify for political satire? Just wondering :)

I just call it funny. omigod... imagine what our family reunions are like...

Oh please, come back often, Karl. I haven't laughed this hard in ages. And if they ban you from here, come over to Renderotica. We'll always welcome anyone with a rapier wit like yours.

I....can't.....stop......laughing......HELP!!!!!!!!!!

I've got's me a new wallpaper!:)

LOL....quite funny indeed.....really....I just hope someone don't come on here and start up a bitching about how you altered someone else's work.....and then carries this on for another month or so further.....careful...I think it's a riot but you too can be razzed I'm sure..... ....things are not reserved just for certain members on the forums....no way...uh uh..... Sunshine and happiness all around......

Thank you for your concern, Mr RadArt - I could honestly see where certain individuals might hop on the chance to start some trouble about changing someone else's work. That's why I used an image that was included on a cd collection of royalty free images purchased at CompUsa a few months back. I always plan anything I do to make sure that I don't bend any laws or offend anyone else ((accidently)). I make sure to think out my responses so I don't wind up looking like a fool. ((Please don't think Im talking about you, RadArt, because I am not)) I try to respect everyone unless that person is disrespecting others in a cruel fashion. All in all, I'm a really nice guy. Maybe I should start a Guild or something :)

And maybe you should do that....we can have many Guilds and then folks will have a choice of pickings....cool idea....I see you do indeed plan out your thoughts quite well....I may even vote for you some day.....(may)...... A pleasant day to you....

Ok, Ive been reading and reading..and reading.and wanted to comment, but at this stage there was just so much info laid out that I decided to pick things to respond toso please excuse the format. It just made things easier. Mehndi: Funny you should mention posting there Virus, since the very forum by its nature is an elite group, and most here cannot enter it, nor read what is posted there, nor post there ;) Vendors, Admin, Moderators, Forums are not by nature inhabited by Elite groups. They were/are created to allow specific groups of people to discuss things that directly pertain to that group, whether its a Marketing issue, A TOS issue, or whatever. These forums were not created to hide some bizarre covert operations. Just like so many have saidThere is an Employees only signno biggie. Get over it. Vette: Please understand there is no intention of limiting store items to a certain group of people. The Marketplace was established for the community and helps keep it going from day to day. And because it serves the community will be open to all members whose products meet the submission guidelines As it should beand it is with all storesproducts must meet the submission guidelines. Mehndi: But with this guild, if you so wished it, even if not a member, you could send a copy of your product, identifying information as to who made it would be temporarily removed Why would that info need to be removed? Who cares who made it? If its good its goodif it needs work, it needs work. No one is out here alone.There are already help forums, WIP forums, etcPeople already have the option to post their needs. There are plenty decent, unbiased, friendly, helpful people out there willing to look over items for others. Thorne: I have before and will continue to post ABSOLUTELY FREE a higher quality version of some poopie that I find cluttering up store pages, wherever that might be. Thorne.who are YOU to decide what is poopie and what is not? If you consider an item in the store to be poopie wouldnt you be better serving the community if you offered suggestions for improvement rather than undercutting people? Thats just rude. Mehndi: .. the guild is open to anyone who makes good quality things, be it stuff for sale, stuff for free, etc. So out of that pool of people, would come testers. Shouldnt it be open to everyone? Who decides what is Good Quality? Is there a written set of standards recognized by the communities in general?(ISO9001 the 3D Vendors edition?? LOL) Define Good Quality for me please. Carefully, I do Quality for a living. ;) LisaB: .I would LOVE to have my work technically rejected with constructive comments, ideas and help for improvement. Yes, it's an ego buster at first but that doesn't last long when accompanied by help or resources for improvement. That's what a guild is! LisaB, You have just taken the first step! And you did it without the Guild! Im sure there are many people who are reading your words who would love to help you. If not here.then ask at Commune. Guild: Federation, league, society, club, union, company, association. Gild: To cover with Gold, make golden Faeriegurl: It's when I see things like this that I really think this new guild is a must. I hate it when I click a link and the item in question has been deleted! :P Katetheshrew:Personally, I would consider the guild seal as something along the lines of an underwriter's laboratory sticker or a good housekeeping seal of approval. Both are indications that a product has been thoroughly tested and has passed the stringent requirements for quality held by the testing agencies. .Quality is not only the responsibility of the STORE, it is the responsibility of the vendor, and suppliers. A seal of approval ie. a UL sticker, is no indication of quality. It is an Indication that all of the components of the product meet the requirements of UL. For exampleThe wire used must be 18 gage, and supplied by a UL approved supplier ..This is no guarantee that the product will work.that depends on the manufacturer, and his quality requirements..in the endif the person who assembles that product screws upyou get a bad productregardless of the UL sticker. Mehndi: Our aim is to give consumers more confidence in what they purchase. Not less. But..if the guild is formed, and items begin being released with the Guilds seal of approval..it would in fact promote the idea that anything NOT carrying this seal was of lesser quality. Thereby hurting the Vendors not affiliated with The Guild. Mehndi: I hope it doesnt cause customers to loose faith in artist who are already established and choose not to have thier products tested, that is not the intent...Instead FMG will be geared more towards the developement of "universal" standards which may be above or below some "personal" standards...So artists who already set high standards for themselves shouldnt loose business other than in the respect that there will be more "qualified" competition... Sometimes all it takes it that little logo..they Shouldnt but they will.. Mehndi: You are a confused woman Destiny, we all know that, but no one here would ever abuse you for it. WE? I think not. I guess thats it Jackie

It would be nice to see the opinions of other vendors as well, especially some of those who have been observing and reading this thread nervous of posting to it for fear of creating the very thing that was suggested early on and that I have been questioning through this thread - the fracturing of the community. After all, this does directly affect them. What about it guys and gals of the store, what are your feelings about this? Hrrm, Mehndi... Having talked to Destiny many times in the past, looked at her work, read her reports on items that she's tested or helped another artist on I have to say that she's not a particularly confused person at all. I do hope I'm not included in that ALL too, that would be upsetting because I happen to like Destiny. Legs Akinbo: That image was exceptionally unkind. I'm very disappointed in you. Initially you seemed a normal forum person but I can see that my judgement was impaired. That is the third time in the last 18 hours that I have damn near choked on my coffee because of an image someone posted. I am NOT a happy camper. Coffee is not a nice thing to have spraying all over one's desk. :)

Okay, I just want to add another two cents... I'm running out of change... I don't know anyone here personally... I know a few people a little better than others, but I don't know anyone well... so my oppinion of everyone here is based solely on what interaction I've had with them, if any... I try not to form oppinions of people based on what they say or do to other people, because I wasn't involved so I don't know all the details... Speaking from my own personal experience here, and I'm sure people will want to "warn" me, or share their experiences, but Mehndi's been nothing but helpful to me, and I think it will be a loss to this community, and even if no one else cares, I do, if she does as she said and stops trying to ever help anyone here, becuase of the comments that have been made. I'm sure a lot of things were said out of frustration and/or anger, and maybe if tempers hadn't gotten as inflamed as they had then maybe the whole thing could've been seen in a more positive light. I understand why some people did see it in a negative light, but again, speaking only from my own personal experience, and emails that I had sent to Mehndi asking specific questions, it seemed to me that this was a positive thing... I still think that it is, but sadly I also think that now it probably won't come to fruition, and maybe in the grand scheme of things that's for the best. I could be wrong, I've been wrong before, but I think a lot of people could've benefited from it... I know I would've wanted to learn how the "big names" do certain things, and not necesarily so that I could make money, but so that I could make things for myself, for something I enjoy doing... I don't make any money from Poser... if anything, I should stop using it, because I just keep spending more and more money on it that I really can't afford to spend... my credit card people LOVE me. :) But making poser images is something I really enjoy doing, it's a goal of mine to be "as good" as some of the other artists in the galleries, though I'm no where near as talented, I'm getting better at faking it. :) As far as "everyone" knowing that Destiny is "confused", I don't know that... personal note to Destiny (if you even read this) - I think you're a talented person, and I've had several of your textures on my "must buy eventually" list for a while now... but like I said, I think a lot of things were said in frustration and anger, and maybe wouldn't have been said if things weren't as heated... I dunno, this wasn't a very constructive post I know, but I just wanted to add my thoughts... K-

hrmmm..well, I certainly wasn't inflamed or even angry or even slightly miffed....until the personal attack on Destiny, which was uncalled for and very unprofessional...and a lie, cheap shot...whatever you want to call it. You get the idea. Cin, if Mehndi stops helping people because of what has happened in this thread (and this appeared to be relatively mild to what I have seen around) then so be it. By her stopping to help and blaming it on everyone else then she will have just proven everyone's point (whoever everyone is, still trying to figure that one out) Helping comes from being unselfish and from the heart, and no post nor opinion should stop someone from doing what they proclaim to enjoy doing so much. It sure wouldn't stop me. :) So we shall see.

There are a LOT of folks on this thread that have been "insulted" and been given reason to just "throw up their hands and give up" besides Mehndi....some, like Destiny, because of the very replies she recieves from Mehndi here....with all due respect, to Mehndi here, if Mehndi decides to stop helping folks or just goes into a sulk, (I am sorry but that is how it sounds), as this last post I read by Cin- suggests, then that is a problem Mehndi then has.....and though I feel bad for her....I don't think many things that have been said here by Mehndi herself were very commendable to some folks, especially in light of what has been proposed here. Again...I say this with all due respect cause I do not want a confrontation and I don't wish to be biased here. I would actually be very unpleasantly surprised if Mehndi was to do that.....just cause of all this. Debating over marketing and business is one thing....creativity is another...many of us have been hurt or disappointed in the past by various things and although we have every right to feel bad about them that should not stop our creativity and also not make us hold grudges against others to the point of denying our talents just because....especially if it is all around "two" sided....debates are debates and heated confrontations are bound to take place in as sensitive a topic such as this is. Besides, this is the time Mehndi should show her openess as someone that is more impartial rather than takes offense so easily....she is supposed to be an example of the good will behind an idea set forth by her and others here. Not a good idea to get pissy...... Not at all....I am sorry to say that....but in a nutshell that's the bottom line of it.... Take care.....all.....

....good words....I cross posted......take care....

ZZZZZZzzzzZZZZZzzzzz....oh! sorry. my turn? don't the online stores already do testing for quality and workability? Shouldn't the vendors be making every effort to make sure that thier salable items are of the highest quality? Don't the testers already keep a copy of the item tested for "payment"? Almost sounds like the "guild" is an unnecessary duplication of services. If you want to do it, more power to you. But I don't need it nor will I assume it assures quality when each person's definition of 'Quality" is slightly different(even with guidelines). If a tester/buyer has a problem with one of my items (free or salable), I find out what the problem is and correct it. I will not put my name on or release any product that I feel uncomfortable with, unless I am looking for comments - but I will state that. I stand behind what I do and I don't really need a "guild" stamp of approval to do that. for the rest of you worrying about what is going on behind a forum that you don't have access to - Come on, you mean to tell me that you don't have better things to worry about. Some one please wake me up when this is over

Who can join this guild? Only established merchants or everyone? 2) What sort of knowledge is going to be exchanged that can not be put on current forums? Why not put it in the current forums? 3) Who can be part of the product approval process? Only established merchants or everyone? This late in the post, it may seem silly to jump in, but I really haven't seen any information on this. Certain posts make it seem like only already established merchants can participate. Gee, I can only learn to get better once I actually sell stuff? I'd rather learn first, then sell the absolute best stuff that I can. Only allowing established merchants to participate seems like they will get an additional boost while those of us who are considering selling in the future will be farther behind. I fully admit I may be misunderstanding this. There are some aspects of the review that I like, but other parts that I don't. Everyone slings around the "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval." Bear in mind, you must advertise in Good Housekeeping magazine to even qualify to be tested by them, so you're paying money to get the seal. Overall, I agree with Questor's assessment of the idea. It has potential, but he outlines my reservations succinctly. Feel free to prove me wrong. I'm all for improving things!

Jackie: you said:".Quality is not only the responsibility of the STORE, it is the responsibility of the vendor, and suppliers. A seal of approval ie. a UL sticker, is no indication of quality. It is an Indication that all of the components of the product meet the requirements of UL. For exampleThe wire used must be 18 gage, and supplied by a UL approved supplier ..This is no guarantee that the product will work.that depends on the manufacturer, and his quality requirements..in the endif the person who assembles that product screws upyou get a bad productregardless of the UL sticker." True. My point however, was that UL and Good Housekeeping have spent years building a reputation for endorsing products that have passed through their testing agencies and most people have come to see those stamps of approval as an indication of good quality in both merchandise and customer service on the part of the manufacturer. With any product line, you are going to have the occasional items slip through with flaws, it doesn't mean that the entire product line is defective, just that one particular item. An independent tester's guild/union/agency could be a good thing if properly managed and kept out of the inter-site politics, particularly for those who are new vendors with no previous track record. For them to receive a "quality stamp" from an accepted testing agency would be a benefit. It would let the customers know that this supplier, while new to the market, is supplying goods that have passed certain requirements beyond those maintained by whatever store(s) is brokering those goods. Whether or not the Guild being discussed here will manage that remains to be seen. Simply coming in and saying "Ok, we are suchandso guild and we are the authority on quality" is not going to cut it. But, once upon a time, UL, GH and Consumer Reports were beginners, too. They all had to start at the bottom and build up to where they are in today's marketplace. Therefore, I will not condemn the idea of this guild but I also will not jump blindly onto the bandwagon. I suggest we wait and see what happens. Base our judgements on actual performance. Kate (who still thinks the independent testing agency is theoritically sound even if it may not turn out to be practical)

Forum: Complaint & Debate

Subject: To All Merchants!!!!

$542.64