making a DEMO - best practices

[Sylvia Wasp]

OK, hope this is the right forum, hopefully someone will move it if it isn't ...

I have a store on MP and in SL. I've been here for ages and I know how to do scripting, building, texturing, etc.  What I have never done up until now, is make a DEMO available of anything.  So what I'm after here is kind of everyone's opinion on what makes a *good* DEMO versus a *bad* DEMO.  I want to do it right if I'm going to do it at all. 

(PS - basically talking about clothes here)

It seems to me that there are three basic methods:

- limited time or the thing disappears

- giant prim attached to it to embarrass you

- "DEMO" written all over the texture

I'm not sure any of these are really a 100% way to stop someone stealing your stuff.  For example if you "highlight invisible" at any Linden Hub you can see lots of avatars with the shadows of the giant prims around them that were put there to stop theft, so obvs. that doesn't always work.  I've also seen folks at parties wearing clothes with "DEMO" written on them but I'm not sure if that was a joke.  As a customer myself, the "clothes disappear in five minutes" thing is literally the most annoying thing ever, so even if it works for the seller, your customers are all going to hate you. 

Finally, for some reason I haven't been able to figure out, people seem to hate not having the DEMOS show up in MP, and despise having to go to the in-world store.  Which is initially the direction I was going to go as having DEMOs in MP is a huge hassle from the sellers side of things. 

I have my own thoughts on all of this but I wanted to find out what others think here. 

Any thoughts? 

Anything about the issue I have left out?

Any other ideas about protecting my work while simultaneously letting everyone try it for free? 

[Wulfie Reanimator]

9 minutes ago, Sylvia Wasp said:

For example if you "highlight invisible" at any Linden Hub you can see lots of avatars with the shadows of the giant prims around them that were put there to stop theft, so obvs. that doesn't always work.

Either the creator made a mistake and the demo was left with modify permissions, or they were botted. In the latter case, the original creator's name would be replaced and no amount of extra signage will protect the product.

Writing "demo" over the texture is a pretty good away to prevent botters from using the product as-is, but they they can pretty easily find steal the real textures off of somebody else.

[Kathlen Onyx]

I know for me the 5 minute demo's are terrible.  If I buy a top I want to see what it looks like with different skirts or pants. 5 minutes is not enough time.

Recently the club that I frequent on a daily basis had a theme night. It was to put together an outfit using only demos.  It was all in good fun and MOST of us went back and bought the demo we wore or one we saw at the club.  It was a lot of fun.

As far as having the Demos only in-store I mainly shop in the MP. If I find a store that has a lot of things I like then I will go into the store but I generally hate it.  If when you click "see the item in SL" it brought you directly to the item that would be helpful but going in-store and trying to hunt down the outfit takes more time than if the demo was on the MP.  

***I hope this thread can stop on topic to what is available NOW for you to work with and not speculate of what should be available. 

[SarahKB7 Koskinen]

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Edited June 26, 2023 by SarahKB7 Koskinen

[Frionil Fang]

Anyone who's willing to go through the effort of stealing something isn't going to be going after a demo (they could just steal the full version from someone else, if they have the tools to save meshes and textures they're not allowed to, who's wearing them isn't going to matter), so IMO the only factor is "is this convenient for a legit customer".

I think unsightly prims that don't actually cover important areas is the best way to go, just don't forget to make it -mod. Makes it silly to try to wear instead of the full product, but doesn't actually ruin the textures so you can get a better idea of what it really looks like. The "automatically detaches and/or self destructs" is just frustrating to no end like you said and makes me *less* likely to buy the full product since it went out its way to annoy me while trying to test it, and again won't deter a sneaky person.

The only way to ensure no one pirates a thing is to not upload it or use it anywhere, otherwise it's best to just think about honest people and what's easiest for them.

[Sylvia Wasp]

27 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

I know for me the 5 minute demo's are terrible.  If I buy a top I want to see what it looks like with different skirts or pants. 5 minutes is not enough time.

26 minutes ago, Frionil Fang said:

The "automatically detaches and/or self destructs" is just frustrating to no end like you said and makes me *less* likely to buy the full product since it went out its way to annoy me while trying to test it, and again won't deter a sneaky person.

I'm so glad there are others that think the same way about the "disappearing demo." It's just a rude, ugly way to go AFAICS.  I often can't make up my mind about a demo and want to be able to try it on several times over a period of days before I decide. 

 

29 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

As far as having the Demos only in-store I mainly shop in the MP. If I find a store that has a lot of things I like then I will go into the store but I generally hate it.  If when you click "see the item in SL" it brought you directly to the item that would be helpful but going in-store and trying to hunt down the outfit takes more time than if the demo was on the MP.  

I guess I understand that as I've had the same problem before.  In my case however, it's a small store, basically three or four vendors on a platform in the sky each of which only having 10 items at most.  The reason I'm against having the demos in MP is that it just screws up all the listings with essentially double-listings.  Wouldn't the demos always slide to the top of the sales listings too?  I want to know what people are buying, not how many demos were tried on. 

 

31 minutes ago, Frionil Fang said:

Anyone who's willing to go through the effort of stealing something isn't going to be going after a demo (they could just steal the full version from someone else, if they have the tools to save meshes and textures they're not allowed to, who's wearing them isn't going to matter), so IMO the only factor is "is this convenient for a legit customer".

I think unsightly prims that don't actually cover important areas is the best way to go, just don't forget to make it -mod. Makes it silly to try to wear instead of the full product, but doesn't actually ruin the textures so you can get a better idea of what it really looks like.

This seems like the best advice so far to me.  f*ck the thieves, just get used to the idea of a certain amount of possible theft and think about the *good* customers.  The unsightly prims thing bothers me because "unsightly" usually means fullbright rotating rings in front of the product which is distracting/annoying to say the least.  

How do we feel about having said prims only be above the head?  Like if I use the head as an attachment point for all the demo clothes I should be able to make some kind of rotating, blinking, embarrassing sort of thing above their heads that doesn't interfere with the clothes, no?  Or does it *have* to be interfering or in your face? 

I don't understand why a demo should be "mod" either.  Isn't that the opposite of what we want? 

Sylvia

[Frionil Fang]

6 minutes ago, Sylvia Wasp said:

How do we feel about having said prims only be above the head?  Like if I use the head as an attachment point for all the demo clothes I should be able to make some kind of rotating, blinking, embarrassing sort of thing above their heads that doesn't interfere with the clothes, no?  Or does it *have* to be interfering or in your face? 

I don't understand why a demo should be "mod" either.  Isn't that the opposite of what we want? 

Otherwise -mod is kind of meh (depends on circumstances, prefer +mod) but for demos it seems like the right way to go.

I think the classic big "DEMO" lettering above the head is pretty functional... at least, as long as the person trying it on isn't so big that the text ends up disrupting the product. Of course if the demo sign isn't rigged but the clothing itself is, you *can* still move no-mod objects so the sign could be moved into an invisible position - would need to rig the demo sign too to prevent that. One design for a demo sign could also be an inverted one-sided sphere - it can't get in front of the camera, but is "discouraging" enough to have a bubble spelling out "DEMO" behind you at all times. Also needs to be rigged instead of just using a sphere prim to prevent moving, though. 

Edited June 25, 2023 by Frionil Fang

[Sylvia Wasp]

5 minutes ago, Frionil Fang said:

Otherwise -mod is kind of meh (depends on circumstances, prefer +mod) but for demos it seems like the right way to go.

I think the classic big "DEMO" lettering above the head is pretty functional... at least, as long as the person trying it on isn't so big that the text ends up disrupting the product. Of course if the demo sign isn't rigged but the clothing itself is, you *can* still move no-mod objects so the sign could be moved into an invisible position - would need to rig the demo sign too to prevent that. One design for a demo sign could also be an inverted one-sided sphere - it can't get in front of the camera, but is "discouraging" enough to have a bubble spelling out "DEMO" behind you at all times. Also needs to be rigged instead of just using a sphere prim to prevent moving, though. 

I was leaning towards a rotating "DEMO" sign in silver, maybe with some particles for extra attention, hovering just above the head. 

My experience with rigged mesh is that attached prims (my label for instance), generally stay put relative to the attachment point.  So if the clothes are attached properly (instead of just hanging off of the right hand like most) to the head, that I could expect prims above the head to stay in place (I think). 

Also, possibly not relevant to demos per se ... but I like to put a copyright notice on the texture itself, so the person stealing it can have no silly ideas about whether or not it was actually stolen.  It was! 

[Frionil Fang]

Yes, combining non-rigged and rigged makes it so that the rigged parts will snap to where they should be, but non-rigged parts are positioned in relation to the attachment point and can be moved, even while no-modify. To avoid just hiding the demo sign, it needs rigging too; I'm not good with rigging even if I know the theory somewhat, so I think the correct solution would be to rig every vertex of the demo sign identically to the pelvis bone (or a head bone, etc., depending on where you want it to follow), so the rigged thing just stays put in relation to the bone but doesn't deform and can't be shoved under the ground.

[Sylvia Wasp]

1 minute ago, Frionil Fang said:

Yes, combining non-rigged and rigged makes it so that the rigged parts will snap to where they should be, but non-rigged parts are positioned in relation to the attachment point and can be moved, even while no-modify. To avoid just hiding the demo sign, it needs rigging too; I'm not good with rigging even if I know the theory somewhat, so I think the correct solution would be to rig every vertex of the demo sign identically to the pelvis bone (or a head bone, etc., depending on where you want it to follow), so the rigged thing just stays put in relation to the bone but doesn't deform and can't be shoved under the ground.

Hmmm ... *that* will be a problem since I'm only just now learning blender and that's also waaay too much work for a demo.  Understanding rigging is hard enough already.  I will probably just leave open the option of hiding the demo sign (most folks won't be aware that they can), and again, hope that most people will not be so devious as to try and hide the sign instead of paying the relative pittance for the product. 

Also, if the demo sign was emitting particles, then the particles would be coming from their heads if they tried to hide it inside their head, no?  Or are you saying that the prims can actually be alpha-ed out or re-sized?

[Frionil Fang]

2 minutes ago, Sylvia Wasp said:

Also, if the demo sign was emitting particles, then the particles would be coming from their heads if they tried to hide it inside their head, no?  Or are you saying that the prims can actually be alpha-ed out or re-sized?

No modify blocks everything except moving and rotating, can't make things invisible or remove particles. And yeah, I'd be bound to agree it's not worth worrying about someone who's willing to get illegal or suffer a hassle just to get something cheap for free... they probably were not going to pay in the first place.

[Aglaia]

For an attachment, i think the most efficient way is to add a DEMO sign mesh, rigged to the head. And make the object not modifiable, of course. It doesn't add much work: once the DEMO sign is done, just link it to all your demo objects.

[ValKalAstra]

For me the answer would depend on what kind of product it is. In case of clothing, my main interest in a demo are:

• Texture Quality.
• Ability to mix and match with other clothes.
• Check clipping and if I can tolerate, conceal or fix it.

This automatically disqualifies any Demo that vanishes on me in 5 minutes or that has Demo written all over the texture. Some people go really overboard there too to the point the entire texture is more or less all red. This usually ends with me throwing the Demo out. For clothes, I would say that having floating markers is perfectly okay and reasonable. Although I might just give up if they go overboard. If my attention is constantly drawn to some flickering glowing flopping thing, I tend to get agitated and yeet the demo. Subtle but visible demo markers for me, please.

It's different for anything whose function and purpose is based around a script. Here I feel you can really only do timed demos or no demo at all and that kind of fits with what I am seeing on the marketplace. Most scripts don't have got Demos.

Finally, I'd advice against particle effects. They can really make SL crawl and if I attach an outfit that sees my viewer start chugging, I generally don't go poking around to figure out if it's the particles or the mesh. I detach and move on.

 

[Psyche Starling]

I do the giant dorky prim. What I want to know from a demo is (a) how it fits, (b) whether I can mix and match the textures (bless you, designers who include a Single Hud and a Fatpack Hud so I can tell the difference), and whether it clips with whatever I want to wear it with.

[Thecla]

First thing, I will not buy a clothing product that does not have a demo. Period. Been burned too many times to waste money like that. There are too many clothing creators with lousy rigging skills to bother with.

I prefer demos that have the right textures, and a hud that shows all the available textures. Nothing pisses me off more than a demo that comes in just white, you buy the color you want, and it looks nothing like the advert. So if I get a demo like that, it goes in the trash.

I don't mind the big "ring prim" on demos...provided it does not obscure the product in a way that is super intrusive (like some hair demos, where you can't even see your face, wtf lol).

I've never seen that, people who've figured out how to mod a demo so that the ring is transparent. I'm shocked that someone would go to that trouble.

Some demos, they can stand to have "DEMO" written all over them, some can't. It's better in my mind that demos that don't come with a full texture hud.

[Jennifer Boyle]

A lot of what I have to say has been said by others. First, I despise timed demos. I have not bought clothing that I would have otherwise bought because the sudden disappearance of the timed demo made me so angry. I think the best way to make demos for fitmesh clothing is to attach a large prim, provided that it does not interfere with the user's ability to evaluate the item. For BOM, write "DEMO" on the item or on some part of the avatar other than the item, e.g., the face and/or hands for most clothing, but make sure people can still see what it would look like without the writing.

I very often forego the demo. My preference is to buy clothing from sellers whose products I know from previous experience fit well and look like the pictures. Then, I don't need to spend time trying the demo. This approach does not suffice for determining how well an item will work with another item I already have, but it does work for the other purposes for which I might use a demo. How do I discover the sellers I can confidently buy from without trying a demo? Usually via promos and group gifts. If someone offers a nice outfit that I like that looks good in their pictures for less than L$100, I'll often buy it. Sometimes, I'm disappointed. Then, I've lost $0.40 or less when I delete it, and I've learned not to buy clothes from that seller. Sometimes, I am pleased; then, I have found another seller that I can buy from without trying a demo.

If I were shopping on MP and wanted to try the demo, having to go to the inworld store to get it would definitely be a turn-off, and, if my interest in the item was less than intense, might well result in a lost sale. If you do that, you must be sure to make it easy for customers to find the specific item in the inworld store. Too many times, when I have clicked on the link in MP to see the item inworld, I've landed near the entrance to the store without a clue about where to go to see the specific item I came to see. That does not give me warm feelings for the (would-be) seller.

Finally, I think the concern that many creators have about getting their products stolen, i.e., copybotted, is misplaced because the people who steal and those who acquire stolen products are not the same people who would buy their products. I have only acquired items that were illegitimately copied on a few occasions; none were in the last few years, and it was never intentional. I want good quality merchandise from legitimate sources. I suspect that most people who actually spend much on clothes are like me, so sellers would be wise to worry about providing a good experience for us and not worry about thieves and recipients of stolen items who wouldn't have bought the products anyway.

Edited July 7, 2023 by Jennifer Boyle

[MistressMazikeen]

Hello all! This topic grabbed my attention so here is my very first post.  Why are some so bothered by the 5 minute demo? I've not really seen anything else that works. I find that people have a issue with demos in general. So how can I personally keep shoppers happy?  The big prim is not liked-The hula hoop slow rotation that says demo is not liked. The above head demo is not liked. The 5 minute demo is seemingly to be hated.  So what is a creator to do? I saw several opinions but nothing that answered the question of what will be well received?

I thought timed demos would make people happy. I mean 5 minutes is a very long time *To me personally* to simply add on a outfit and decide if you like it or not.  People seem frustrated at the lack of new things on MP, but those same people aren't actually shopping or at the bare minimum trying on a provided demo.  I think it's discouraging to new creators in general.  If people don't like demos...then complain if the demo is not free ,then still unhappy with placement/disappearance. Then what can be done?  For as many MP shoppers there is inworld shoppers as well.  It's about the experience. People pay good money to have/maintain a store just for residents to enjoy.  

This is how we usually get good sales and group discounts, yet I see some do not like going to a store all because the tp surl is not directly leading to the product? You know how hard that would be? How time consuming?  Already its extra time to even add  a demo. You have to fill out the form/link the demo. Etc etc. Like someone would have to submit product, then tp to store, create a lm, then go back to MP and paste it.  Who want's a million lms in inventory and then on the little form.

Seems really overwhelming to do all this for free. For someone to *not buy*.  When you shop online in rl there are no demos. We still buy it.  In rl you do not take a outfit to the dressing room and stay in it for hours on end pondering. So in closing, what exactly will be beneficial to those of us that are trying to accommodate shoppers and protect ourselves and our time spent in the process.

 

This certainly makes me think twice about having a IW store. Also makes me think whats the use of doing demos.

[Psyche Starling]

I didn't see anyone expressing a dislike for the big prim or the rotating thing?

Yes, in real life, you try it on in the dressing room, but if you want to take a few minutes longer, you aren't automatically ejected from the dressing room naked. Sometimes a store is laggy and some of the 5 minutes is taken up with rezzing.

I agree that the MP doesn't need to give you the direct SLURL to the product. But either have a demo *in MP* or at least keep your store URL updated. Many times I've followed the store link and ended up falling out of the sky into vacant rental property, or in someone's house being ejected by their security orb. It's one thing if the creator is just gone. But sometimes these will be creators who still have the store, just never bothered to update their Inworld Store link.

[Kathlen Onyx]

59 minutes ago, MistressMazikeen said:

I thought timed demos would make people happy. I mean 5 minutes is a very long time *To me personally* to simply add on a outfit and decide if you like it or not. 

Actually it's not. If you buy a dress then sure, 5 minutes might be good but if you are buying a shirt or pants and want to see what they look like with other things in your inventory then it's not nearly enough time.  Who came up with 5 minutes anyhow? I would say that at least 30 minutes for a demo would be an adequate time so you have some time to go through the color HUD , if there is one or try it on with other things.  

I personally prefer the icon about the head. That way it doesn't interfere with the item and you can see all of you and what it looks like.

[Jennifer Boyle]

1 hour ago, MistressMazikeen said:

 Why are some so bothered by the 5 minute demo?

When you shop online in rl there are no demos. We still buy it.  In rl you do not take a outfit to the dressing room and stay in it for hours on end pondering. So in closing, what exactly will be beneficial to those of us that are trying to accommodate shoppers and protect ourselves and our time spent in the process.

 

This certainly makes me think twice about having a IW store. Also makes me think whats the use of doing demos.

The problem with timed demos is that I may need more time than they give me. I often take demos home to try with clothes I already have. For example, I may want to see if a top works with bottoms I already own. I may spend 20 or 30 minutes trying different combinations. In addition, RL often interrupts my SL without warning, so I may start trying a demo and immediately have to go AFK.

When I shop online, or offline, IRL, I can generally return the item, and I would never buy clothing online that I could not return. The clothing itself serves as a demo. I may not spend hours in the dressing room, but I can take clothing home, keep it for days, and still return it.

An idea for solving the demo issue just occurred to me: make clothing returnable in SL like it is IRL. It could be done by offering a trans-no copy version that could be returned for a refund or swapped for a copy-no trans version. The period during which the no-copy version could be returned for a refund could be limited. I expect the process could be automated.

[Frionil Fang]

I've specifically skipped some products because the demo chose to be timed and to be even more annoying, not attachable again without a new copy so all the settings I was trying to check out are now gone. I'm not one to purchase things costing 3-4 digits based on just pictures and reviews (I know the product was good and worth its price, but that doesn't mean it was good for *me*), and a demo that doesn't actually let me decide in peace is not making a sale much more likely than no demo at all.

Yes, 5 minutes might be enough to glance at a thing superficially, but this is SL where things can end up mismatching in many insidious ways (questionable rigging causes lots of clipping that you'd have to be aware of, customization choices are limited, etc.). A plain old silly prim to draw attention to the product being a demo is just superior in almost every situation I can think of, and nothing will protect you against theft -- it's not the demo that will get stolen.

To continue the shopping analogy from above posts, I'm perfectly happy to try a new soda that costs 2€ without a demo, if it sucks, too bad. I'm not perfectly happy to get new jeans for 50€ without getting to try them on in peace, with a clerk looming behind the door ready to yank them off me at any moment and then burn the pair so I'd have to go fetch a new one if I wanted to keep trying.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

9 hours ago, MistressMazikeen said:

I find that people have a issue with demos in general. So how can I personally keep shoppers happy?  The big prim is not liked-The hula hoop slow rotation that says demo is not liked. The above head demo is not liked. The 5 minute demo is seemingly to be hated.

I think it's discouraging to new creators in general.  If people don't like demos...then complain if the demo is not free ,then still unhappy with placement/disappearance. Then what can be done?

As long as the demo isn't obnoxious, it's fine!

1. Don't spam local chat with it.
   More than a couple times, the demos will post advertisements in local chat, so it can be seen by anybody nearby.
    
2. Don't put a time limit on it.
   Unless we're talking about some kind of scripted functionality that you can't add "demo" markings on, the timer prevents us from trying on multiple demos. I'm often buying 10+ demos (multiple tops, multiple bottoms, multiple hairstyles) to try while making a new outfit, and I need to keep the pieces I like on me for a long time. Even 30 minutes wouldn't be enough!
    
3. Don't cover it up.
   We need to be able to look at it, that's why we got it. You can add those "demo rings" around the avatar, just make them wide/thin enough that it's not a chore to cam around. You can write stuff on the textures, but don't add so much text that the whole texture is obscured.

Basically, don't do this:

Instead, do this:

...or this:

You can even do this:

...as long as you don't do this:

 

Edited July 8, 2023 by Wulfie Reanimator

[AmeliaJ08]

My opinion:

Splashing "DEMO" all over the textures is the only way of protecting some of your work. Everything else can (and will) be taken. You can still show off your texture while ensuring it can't be stolen very easily.

Time limited demos? no, pointless and annoys customers.

Big "DEMO" prims? no, pointless. Doesn't protect anything, often obscures customers view of your product. This is acceptable if it's a head floater type thing but you have to accept you are not protecting anything if you use it. In the grand scheme of things (SL sales) you might not even really care about this.

You cannot protect the mesh so don't even try, there's nothing you can do if you want to show an actual version of the product you're selling so give up there. You can protect textures though so do that.

 

Demo should always be available in MP. I know it's annoying, I can count on one hand the number of times I've actually gone to a store to demo something though and it was very special items and even then I found it annoying... you really want to capture the casual market who are just wanting to go shopping, sometimes that does mean browsing MP. Say for example if I'm looking for something of a certain style, I will purchase a whole pile of demos on MP (as many as 10 at a time) and quickly (relatively) try them on in world. I'm not going to search through in world stores if I'm looking for "maitreya capri jeans" for example but I will collect 10 of the nicest looking demos I can find easily on MP, try them on and pick the winner.

If you're going to use MP at all you need to have a demo available as annoying as it is.

 

Edited August 18, 2023 by AmeliaJ08