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32 minutes ago, Rick Daylight said:

Ignorance about why something should be no-mod. 

Ignorance, well everybody learns in steps because we have a real life too.  

But, me just writing some stuff about this issue not directed at Rick Daylight....

I think there is a lot of arrogance associated with this it must be original mesh thing to be any good.  It's all original mesh somewhere at some time, and the fact is there are many mesh modelers who do not put textures with their kits.  It's just a gray model and the maps.  Why?  Probably because they are not good at both, or prefer to only model or don't have time to do both.  This is where your texture artists come in.  I want to make something artful and I love Photoshop and other texture creating programs but I don't care for modeling.  So, I am useful to many modelers.

One texture took me 20 hours one time.   And, many textures take nearly as long.  People don't realize the layering that can go into making a good texture.   But, again, many are only mesh modelers, they don't do both.   And, so?  Let it be.  Let some modelers model and sell to those who want to texture without putting it down.   Again, this is not directed at Rick Daylight.  

I feel I opened  a can of worms here bringing this up in the other thread, and I had no idea so many people wanted mod nor did I know there were so many copy/mod clothing sellers in SL.  I thought all clothes were pretty much across the board copy only.

As far as so many people wanting mod and wanting to put their own texture on it, that doesn't sound like it will go well with PBR and ALM on at all times.  ALM going thru a texture that doesn't correlate to the other maps for PBR sounds like it would look horrid.   

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@EliseAnne85(and anyone else) I have no issue at all with people reselling 'stock' mesh that they've textured. I'm not bad at mesh making... good at geometric stuff, less so at 'arty' mesh and rigging but I manage when I have to. Texturing takes me many times longer (your 20 hours would likely take me a week, if I could even do it) than making the mesh because I have the artistic talent of a stone. Again, I get there well enough with copious photoshopping and layering to be content with what I've made. My point is that yes, we all have our own strengths and play to them. No issue. I think the thrust of this thread is more that the sellers are worried about being 'caught out' for that, than most buyers actually care.

The only time I've bothered is when I happen to know a particular mesh is bad and so I'll want to avoid that. But then, so should the resellers. Conversely I've actively sought out products based on a good stock mesh.

Yeah, fully retexturing a mesh isn't something most people could do (I actually design my UVs to make them easier for people to do so - but that brings limitations too). Thus (re)sellers who actually make different textures have nothing to worry about from making their products mod. Those who just tint it and sell it as a different product (and I have seen lots!) perhaps more so, lol.

The bottom line is that many of us do feel very strongly about the lack of mod perms, and it most certainly limits what we will buy and who from. Yet, there is vanishingly little actual risk to the vast majority of sellers from giving their products mod perms. I for one would spend a lot more! No-mod can only hurt sellers. Mod perms in general can only help them.

Edit to add another thought: A 'creator' locking something down with no-mod is preventing others from exercising their own creative desires, even if that is as simple as slightly tinting a tie to better match a shirt. For me and a lot of us, creativity is part of SL that we enjoy (for me it's most of it) so taking that away is a significant detriment to us, themselves and potentially to SL as a whole if we don't buy stuff and maybe even leave SL. Every little helps... or hurts.

 

Edited by Rick Daylight
My brain can spell, my fingers can't
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6 minutes ago, Rick Daylight said:

Those who just tint it and sell it as a different product (and I have seen lots!) perhaps more so, lol.

Yes, SL has those kinds of resellers, too.  

But, I think many people don't know that many mesh modelers are not good at texturing and don't want to give texturing the time of day, but they love to model.   And, vice versa with texture artists. I also think many people in SL don't realize much of what is created in even the most popular stores is team work of many people.  I know this for a fact because I consulted with one very popular store here in SL to work in the making of the items.  Many large stores are many people working together.  

One can see with their eyes if something is textured or took time or is a very original design in the texture.  People go for those tinted items because they are cheaper and it's a market for alts.  

But, with PBR and ALM on at all times I'm just not seeing how mod could be so important when the texture has to correlate to three other maps to work with the lighting.   So, people just basically want to tint items darker or what if a clothing item is copy/mod?  They want to match the top to the shoes, so to speak?  That's what I thought when I made those items I did copy/mod that they have a basic texture but they could tint them darker into shades that they like or a shade that would match to other items they are wearing.  

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There are other reasons to mod clothing than texture and materials effects. I have programmed many (mod) clothing items to do things like:

  • Sequenced undressing and dressing controlled by a HUD. One of my wife's favourite outfits has a HUD that 'undresses' her in multiple stages at the press of a few buttons... she uses it a lot when shopping in stores to try on demos without having to mess with the outfits window. Done in conjunction with RLV but much more flexible if the clothing itself can carry a script.
  • Removal of (often problematic, or just not as desired) auto-alpha or other scripts.
  • Detect sitting down and either remove a garment not suitable (like a cloak) or switch the texture on it to one that alphas out the bottom when told to.
  • A long, split dress that had its own AO with different walks to prevent the legs clipping. It turned off Firestorm's AO when the dress was attached and used its own, turning firestorm's back on when removed.

 

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3 hours ago, Rick Daylight said:

Edit to add another thought: A 'creator' locking something down with no-mod is preventing others from exercising their own creative desires, even if that is as simple as slightly tinting a tie to better match a shirt. For me and a lot of us, creativity is part of SL that we enjoy (for me it's most of it) so taking that away is a significant detriment to us, themselves and potentially to SL as a whole if we don't buy stuff and maybe even leave SL. Every little helps... or hurts.

 

I get why some people want mod rights, but saying creators are preventing us from being creative is, in my opinion, a bit of a stretch. Nothing but our own time and inclination is preventing us from making whatever we desire in SL. Some creators may like to follow creative commons use and remix approach, but some may not. Hasn't hurt their sales judging by the crowds in shops offering no mod stuff. 

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13 hours ago, Cali Souther said:

If you buy full perm mesh,  you are not allowed to sell it as mod.  

 

I have yet to come across any template seller with this stipulation. (Ones I commonly use, which do allow resale with mod perms - Meli Imako, Crash, Absen, Statura, Flecha)

You are never allowed to sell with Copy and Transfer together. Almost never allowed to include the maps or textures. You are frequently not allowed to sell below a certain price, and almost always prohibited from using it as a group gift or any other kind of freebie. 

If I did encounter any full-perm seller which stipulates no-mod in their EULA, I would not buy.,

Edited by Lewis Luminos
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6 hours ago, Akane Nacht said:

And consider, if we start getting strict about quality control and standards and purchase contracts, what effect will that have on small time, hobbyist creators who just throw stuff together for fun and put it up for sale? We have gotten used to higher quality goods in SL, but I think it would be a shame to squeeze out all other levels of creators. Or would such rules only apply to big name mesh makers? 

Why are they doing it, "for fun" or "for sale"?

 

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13 minutes ago, Akane Nacht said:

why not both? 

I do it for both.

In fact I mainly do it for my alts to wear. The stuff I make is what they want. Then I thought, well, I've made this, I may as well sell it too. It's a bit of extra work to set up all the other body sizes, to make the hud (which I wouldn't bother with for my own sole use) and setting up the Markeplace listings. Which is why I'm selling, not giving everything away for free.

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7 hours ago, EliseAnne85 said:

But, with PBR and ALM on at all times I'm just not seeing how mod could be so important when the texture has to correlate to three other maps to work with the lighting.

"Correlation" is subjective, you can very well combine handmade texture channels and have them work, instead of requiring something that comes out of a bake in a separate program.

If you just have a plain old diffuse texture with everything baked in, that's it, but if your surface details come from a normal map and shininess from a specular, changing the diffuse has more freedom without losing all detail. More channels = more freedom to fiddle... unless blocked by no mod.

Edited by Frionil Fang
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29 minutes ago, Theresa Tennyson said:

Because when you make something "for fun" that implies that you don't have a responsibility to anyone else for its quality. When you start selling it, you do.

Well, guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I've said my piece. 🙂

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5 hours ago, Akane Nacht said:

I get why some people want mod rights, but saying creators are preventing us from being creative is, in my opinion, a bit of a stretch. Nothing but our own time and inclination is preventing us from making whatever we desire in SL. Some creators may like to follow creative commons use and remix approach, but some may not. Hasn't hurt their sales judging by the crowds in shops offering no mod stuff. 

Imagine you find a nice, wooden cabinet in a RL shop and want to change the colour to fit in better with your house's décor, and decide to paint it. Or as we did, saw the feet off a cabinet so it would fit into an inset in the wall. Great - easy - shop gets a sale and you get what you want with a little effort. Now imagine that cabinet was sold under license with a 'do not modify' stipulation. Well, first you wouldn't buy it (many others might). Second, you could go home and make your own cabinet instead... really??? While your statement is partially (what about skill, ability and availability of tools?) technically correct, it is unrealistic.

As to 'hasn't hurt their sales' - yes it has in many cases. You don't see the people in there who are not buying things. Can't name brands of course but I would buy a lot more from several makers if their clothing (or other items... wings, other add-ons, furniture) could be modified. I messaged one just asking if their fatpack was mod; from experience, some of theirs are, some aren't. No answer... assume the answer is 'no'... don't buy. It hurt their sales. The hair place I mentioned previously has almost entirely lost our custom since they went no-mod, losing perhaps a sale or two a month.

A week ago in a well-known store someone wanted to make their hair shiny/sparkly after seeing one of my avatars with such hair (easy to do with the right hair). Couldn't be done because their hair was no-mod. The person was fairly new to SL and hadn't figured out this aspect of mod/no-mod - when they did, they were not impressed! I've seen a few discussions on store groups recently, with people asking how to mod something (the main group in question is a store that sells everything mod!). Again, they were disappointed because the other product they wanted to change was no-mod.

No-mod hurts (many) customers and sellers. Mod perms hurts no-one and benefits many. It's thus a stupid situation to be in when no-mod is so prolific.

Edited by Rick Daylight
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Of course no-one is making anyone buy stuff. That's not the point. The point is to try to 'educate'* sellers with regards to permissions to make things better! If we didn't have these discussions (because no-one is forcing us to buy no-mod things) we wouldn't get anywhere.

*Don't mean that to sound condescending.

Edited by Rick Daylight
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4 minutes ago, Rick Daylight said:

Of course no-one is making anyone buy stuff. That's not the point. The point is to try to 'educate' sellers with regards to permissions to make things better! If we didn't have these discussions (because no-one is forcing us to buy no-mod things) we wouldn't get anywhere.

Creators (or at least those who sell their creations) are usually influenced by consumer demand.  If the collective buying power of those who insist upon modifiable content is great enough then eventually creators will stop making no-mod content.  Since threads on this subject are still a regular occurence, and have been for years, it would suggest that the majority of consumers aren't all that bothered and no-mod content is still selling well enough for creators to make a profit.

Just to play devils advocate on behalf of no-mod content for a moment, at one time I sold vendors and would get plenty of IMs from other creators customers asking for support or complaining about products which I had nothing to do with simply because they inspected the vendor and IM'd the creator instead of the owner. 

Similarly I can imagine it would be equally frustrating as a clothing creator to release an item and then have someone retexture it and post a photo on flickr only to be inundated with IMs from people who can't find that particular variant in your store or angrily complaining about how they bought the fatpack but that particular texture isn't included.  That may not be enough of a valid justification for those arguing in favour of modifiable content, but they aren't the ones who're going to have to answer all those IM's.

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1 hour ago, Rick Daylight said:

Imagine you find a nice, wooden cabinet in a RL shop and want to change the colour to fit in better with your house's décor, and decide to paint it. Or as we did, saw the feet off a cabinet so it would fit into an inset in the wall. Great - easy - shop gets a sale and you get what you want with a little effort. Now imagine that cabinet was sold under license with a 'do not modify' stipulation. Well, first you wouldn't buy it (many others might). Second, you could go home and make your own cabinet instead... really??? While your statement is partially (what about skill, ability and availability of tools?) technically correct, it is unrealistic.

As to 'hasn't hurt their sales' - yes it has in many cases. You don't see the people in there who are not buying things. Can't name brands of course but I would buy a lot more from several makers if their clothing (or other items... wings, other add-ons, furniture) could be modified. I messaged one just asking if their fatpack was mod; from experience, some of theirs are, some aren't. No answer... assume the answer is 'no'... don't buy. It hurt their sales. The hair place I mentioned previously has almost entirely lost our custom since they went no-mod, losing perhaps a sale or two a month.

A week ago in a well-known store someone wanted to make their hair shiny/sparkly after seeing one of my avatars with such hair (easy to do with the right hair). Couldn't be done because their hair was no-mod. The person was fairly new to SL and hadn't figured out this aspect of mod/no-mod - when they did, they were not impressed! I've seen a few discussions on store groups recently, with people asking how to mod something (the main group in question is a store that sells everything mod!). Again, they were disappointed because the other product they wanted to change was no-mod.

No-mod hurts (many) customers and sellers. Mod perms hurts no-one and benefits many. It's thus a stupid situation to be in when no-mod is so prolific.

I agree, Rick.  But, wasn't sure what to do about that stupid root prim.  Or if I leave it off, it could cause a confusion that the mesh model is stolen.  

But, we buy things in real life and they are our property.  We can change them a million different ways and even re-sell them.   But, in SL we under a kind of user license, I think, but each user license is allowed to be set by each creator.

Now, with full perm items, the user license is set by the mesh modeler and each one is different.  And, I just wanted to say that yes some mesh modelers allow giving it out for free as long as it's not full perm and as long as it doesn't include maps.  User license is unique to each.   However, the free give away may have stipulations too such as you can give it away to a few friends, give away in a hunt, but may not be used as a store gift and never full perm to anyone.

I'm bringing up user license because even though we buy stuff in SL, it's not just that we are user licensed here, ultimately LL owns everything.  This is why other virtual worlds have started where we can own the property - like Decentraland.  Not that I like the looks of Decentraland nor do I want to own personal virtual property myself.  I'm just sayin' some things.  SL is user licensed through LL to us, I believe.  

Edited by EliseAnne85
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I despise the comparison between RL and SL when it comes to goods. Yes you can do anything you want to your brand new kitchen cabinets. Paint them 25 colors, take a chain saw to them and rearrange them. Install them upside down so they fall off the wall randomly and break. 

Oh look, my SL kitchen is mod so i can do all that in SL as well. 

The big difference is that you can get a new copy of your items in SL. Home Depot will laugh you out of the store if you tried in RL. 

Stop comparing the two. 

 

This complaint keeps popping up. How about you try talking directly to the merchants in question? Most of them aren't here. 

Blueberry sells their clothing NO Mod. One of the biggest stores in SL. They dont seem to have any issues. 

 

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19 minutes ago, Drake1 Nightfire said:

I despise the comparison between RL and SL when it comes to goods. Yes you can do anything you want to your brand new kitchen cabinets. Paint them 25 colors, take a chain saw to them and rearrange them. Install them upside down so they fall off the wall randomly and break. 

Oh look, my SL kitchen is mod so i can do all that in SL as well. 

The big difference is that you can get a new copy of your items in SL. Home Depot will laugh you out of the store if you tried in RL. 

Stop comparing the two. 

 

Theresa Tennyson scratches her head.

Would you mind explaining what this has to do with mod/no mod permissions?

(Not to mention that the permission system makes it possible to have a situation that you can't get a new copy as well, mind you.)

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41 minutes ago, Drake1 Nightfire said:

I despise the comparison between RL and SL when it comes to goods...

Stop comparing the two.

Well pardon me for trying to make an analogy to illustrate my point about skill level and the ability of most people to (not) be able to just create their own item because they want a mod version. Still, it gave people something to argue about other than the real point - mod perms, didn't it? 🤣

Edited by Rick Daylight
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So many think property rights of the items we have in real life compare to the property rights we have or should have in SL.  SL doesn't work that way though.  I think Gacha may have been started partly because it gave the purchaser some property rights like in real life.  However, I don't want to go off topic on Gacha.  Just sayin'.  Plus, I think the vast majority of people in SL want copy/mod not mod/transfer.  However, mod/transfer is more like a real life good but it's still ultimately user licensed and still ultimately owned by LL.

Virtual goods are wanting to become realized assets.  Wonder if that will ever change in SL?

Edited by EliseAnne85
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8 hours ago, Lewis Luminos said:

I have yet to come across any template seller with this stipulation. (Ones I commonly use, which do allow resale with mod perms - Meli Imako, Crash, Absen, Statura, Flecha)

You are never allowed to sell with Copy and Transfer together. Almost never allowed to include the maps or textures. You are frequently not allowed to sell below a certain price, and almost always prohibited from using it as a group gift or any other kind of freebie. 

If I did encounter any full-perm seller which stipulates no-mod in their EULA, I would not buy.,

You are correct,  I was mistaken.

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3 hours ago, Theresa Tennyson said:

Theresa Tennyson scratches her head.

Would you mind explaining what this has to do with mod/no mod permissions?

(Not to mention that the permission system makes it possible to have a situation that you can't get a new copy as well, mind you.)

Would you mind explaining why you single me out when others made the SL vs RL comparison as well?

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12 minutes ago, Drake1 Nightfire said:

Would you mind explaining why you single me out when others made the SL vs RL comparison as well?

I'm having trouble drawing the connection between modification and the fact that real-world items are single-instance, especially if used for an argument against making things in SL modifiable. That would seem to take away one of the arguments against mod permissions where "buyers will screw things up and complain."

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