Hello, I usually hate to make announcements like this, but due to the recent problems concerning copyright (especially DAZ and the Tailor) I guess I should leak some news... A follow-up to the PCF file format is in progress for a very long time now, but got unfortunately delayed more than once for a variety of reasons. As a matter of fact, I'm working on a good solution for nearly two years by now and the release of a new tool was once planned for late 2001. Because of other responsibilities I had to postpone it one more time then (although it was quite advanced already). I have hope that work finally gets finished this summer, and to release a new tool which will conveniently solve the vast majority of recent problems. Some of the main advantages of the new tool/format will be: - complete PC and Mac compatibility - flexible protection for a wide range of file types - support for multiple files - built-in compression to save download size - customisation features for the model creator - availability for commercial usage - very simple usage for both the creator and users The tool will be available for PC and Mac simultaneously and will be approved by DAZ as an accepted way of protection. I'm terribly sorry that I can't promise a definite deadline (and I actually asked my testers to keep very quiet about it - which they perfectly did...) but in the middle of the recent confusion I though it's a good idea to let people know that the current problems can and will be addressed... Back to work now, I suppose... :-) Cheers, MartinC

God's speed. MC

Sounds very cool Martin, thanks for all your hard work. I have a feeling though that at the moment this won't receive entirely the enthusiasm it deserves because of the recent issues and the need now to go hoop jumping again. A shame for several reasons. Good luck with the coding, I have no doubt it will be an excellent tool. Take care.

That's actually why I decided to post the info - it will provide a simple way to distribute "Tailor-made" files again without pain... :-)

Would it be possible for the coded file to embed the name of the seed file and the output's default destination, relative to Runtime, and to make the decoder register its file type so that it would launch by double-clicking the coded file - that would eliminate the worst newbit-confusions with Mover, especially if DAZ et al could set their installers to launch the decoder automatically. Would it handle a clothing item with both Vic and Steph (or Mike and gorilla) morphs?

Martin, you are a marvel, a genius, an international treasure... Yes - Work, Work, Work! :-)

Martin I hope you allt he best with youre work... but I fear this won't actually solve the problem for many of us.

The problem is a legal one - and it is that Daz has an extremely broad (and in many opinions unsupportable) idea of what their copyright entitles them too - and it looks as if they are becoming more and more agressive in how they use it.

While a utility like yours may well provide a means to keep Daz happy with a product, the underlying issue is that as long as they have this stance on copyrights then a vendor exists at their whim... and that is not going to be acceptable to many.

I understand what you mean, but I don't see it that bad, really... from what I read by DAZ I get the impression that they really want to close a "hole" that people might abuse to redistribute DAZ's own morphs - and that can be solved. However - in theory - they (or anybody else) could one day decide that their models are only available for rendering and nothing else. If this happens, then there will be no solution, but until this happens (if ever) there is no need to panic. DAZ sells models and DAZ sells the Tailor - so they need to (and will) allow to use both of them in a resonable way. If it gets too restricted, both software and models would become less attractive and that would weaken the commercial success as well.

How much will the new tool cost?

Mercy, folks... as said above, I hate to make future announcements and usually prefer to work silently in peace until the whole thing works perfectly fine and then... here it is! :-) I posted this because the current situation is so much out of control that I wanted to tell that one solution is on its way and quite advanced already... I cannot list specific details about every single feature or the program itself right now, simply because it must be completely finished until I can decide about certain things. Details about commercial usage are not fixed yet - of course decoding will be permanently and completely free of charge, and I currently intend to offer the possibility of free encoding for freeware usage as well. However, first I need time (and a little peace of mind...) to finish work - then we'll see everything else.

I'd just like to point out that I am the originator of Mover and the PCF concept, which I invented in order to protect the Intellectual Property Rights of original creators like Daz, and to allow the transfer of figures etc within the Poser community without risk of prosecution. I allowed MartinC access to my source code so that he could develop a Mac version so as to ensure that the Mover benefits were available to all, regardless of their computer type. As the inventor I own the Intellectual Property Rights, not just to the source code but to the basic concept. The fact that I make no charge for the use of Mover does not alter this. It is somewhat ironic that the concept which was developed specifically to protect IPR should now be hijacked by MartinC without my knowledge and without my permission. I have today written to MartinC advising him that this is illegal and that he must cease immediately. Martin has stated to me that DAZ intends to enter into a commercial relationship with him for his development of PCF. I don't know whether this is true but I have today also advised DAZ that I own the IPR to the Mover/PCF concept and that MartinC has no authority to negotiate this with them and that any such agreement would be an infringement of my IPR and therefore illegal.

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12356&Form.ShowMessage=780299

I am terribly sorry that this happened, and I must confess that I don't understand it. I will get in touch with Maz today and try to solve it, however since Maz decided to post this before he tried to reach me I think I have the right to defend myself against the attack. Before I go into details: I did not steal any code or concept from him, I do not and I will never do so. period. dot. 1) Several years ago, I decided to add PCF encoding/decoding to Maconverter. I worked out the encoding scheme by observation myself, but got in touch with Maz about a couple of oddities. For the following months we collaborated in order to improve and bugfix the format. 2) Maz once offered to give his source code for a Mac port, and he offered it to me as well. As a matter of fact, he never gave it to me, because I didn't need it. He is using a PC framework that doesn't exist on Mac, so the source is mostly useless for this purpose, and I decided to code the encoding/decoding myself. I repeat it - I never saw the source code for Mover. 3) I met Maz two times in person and we talked a lot about a follow up to the PCF format, I even made a design suggestion for the format itself. It was designed in a way that Maz could do a PC version and I do the Mac version (which means a lot of compromises). For various reasons it got delayed again and again, and we lost touch for nearly a year. 4) Last year I discovered a new framework which enables me to code a tool for both Mac and PC, and because the need of such a tool is obvious, I started to write a new one. It no longer got the need to compromise the format in order to code it with two different frameworks on two different platforms, so it got a lot of advantages. 5) I just felt a bit sad because it means that I was going to make a new development without Maz (who became a friend for me, and I knew that he was working on his tool as well). I contacted him several times last year, I even sent him an early test version of the tool user interface, but never got a reply about this. However, Maz rarely posted on the boards during this long time as well, so I assumed he was just terribly busy. 6) A few weeks ago, I contacted him again about my recent plans. I know that a couple of commercial users already use PCF in return of the promise to buy the commercial version one day. Because of this, I suggested Maz to share the fee of my tool for the selected list of those artists. Maz has nothing to do with the new tool, but I thought that it is a friendly gesture. I did not get any reply from him. 7) I repeat it one more time: I do not use the PCF format for any commercial purpose. I do not even use the suggested "TCF" format that we once discussed (and which actually was almost entirely created by me). I'm working on a completely new tool with a completely new format which is much advanced over the earlier suggestions. 8) The only thing that I may have done wrong is the fact that I used the term "follow up to the PCF format" in my description. To my knowledge "follow up" means that it is something new, like "DVD" is the "follow up" to "VHS". It was meant this way, I just quoted PCF to give people an idea what the whole thing is about. It did not mean that it uses any code/concept/technology from PCF. If Maz would have contacted me once over the last year, if he would have asked me once about things like this, we could have easily worked it out - I could have sent him this text. However, he decided to attack me straight away here on this board - I am very sorry about this, and I can only hope that he will calm down now.