legit question, how does giving a head away for no tc or having it used freely bring its value down? i thought the price at which the head was originally sold was attributed taking in consideration the quality of the art, so unless the art is changed the quality and value is still there, it just seems to me like the dude who gave it away made a bad deal for the sake of making it a free head. the only drop in value is the fact that people don't feel like that other people are wearing their head, it seems. i understand how it would be completely shitty for people who put hours into heads, but i don't understand how it could possibly be disallowed.
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just to clarify, i am not completely familiar with how art works in this community which is why that might be a stupid question

Just for you to know:
The value of a texture comes from the name of the artist and mostly it's quality.
It's value is as much as a guy is willing to pay.
Once a value is set, it's value is normaly always around the first price paid for it.
But if you give the art for free to everybody Noone is ever again allowed to sell the texture anymore since it is now a free texture.
So it's value is set to 0

how does the value come from the name of the artist and quality and is also the amount a guy is willing to pay if those are not inherently related? its possible to sell a good texture for a low price or a poor texture for a high price, the art remains the same regardless of the offer :/ the art also remains the same after the texture has been given away for free. from my understanding the only way i see this being arguable is if "rarity" is a thing in the world of textures.

Art's value is not static to the piece itself, it's worth is intrinsic to the buyer. What a set is worth to you may not be worth that much to me. I run into this all the time - I'll buy a 128x128 original hanz0 texture set, and feel it's worth 250k. I love the artist, I love his style, and I appreciate his rarity. Meanwhile I see threads in the market trying to sell FlyingMonk full 512x512 body and joint texture sets that I wouldn't spend 20k while they are asking for 300k. FlyingMonk sets have zero value to me, but they could be highly coveted by someone else.

Don't say making these heads free makes them worthless, that's asinine. As someone who's spent well over 3 million TC on art within his TB history, I still opt to wear free heads from time to time. That's how much I value them.

Hobo's right and no policy should ever be implemented to change it. If you're an artist and you want to protect the "sanctity" of your piece, only sell your art to close friends or simply keep it on display in forum galleries. Because as soon as you get paid to give it away, your right to qq is over.

In my opinion, giving away art for free that was bought prior can also be an act of wanting more people to recognize the skill of an artist. As an artist, is really all you care about the amount your texture gets sold for in the future? I mean, just as long as it isn't clearly "Fuck this guy, lets give out all is textures for free" type of case, I think you should actually feel happy, seeing so many people flocking to great textures and wearing them because they like them.

gargon i kinda agree with you but as mentioned before, i think that an artist should give his permission.
everyone knows the skill of the high artists, everyone who wanted a set knew what the sets of verm or aveance or who ever look.
everyone would be proud to have such a texture... but for me it loses its special when i didnt afford it but just took one that someone made free.
if i wanted that i would look in wancornes free art thread or something like that. i think every artist has some free stuff, but taking the textures he didnt want to make free because he was or is proud of his work or whatever, and making them free makes me sick

I'd rather someones artwork become free, instead of just eventually dying on someones PC because they went inactive, quit, etc. I see this as just pretty much artists misunderstanding the intent have when they make their textures free. It's pretty fucking stupid how some of you guys think they are making it free to just be a dick / bring down the value of the art on purpose (Which they aren't lolol) or even trying to insult the artists work. I see it as someone giving praise to the artist, I mean they did just make sure your art will never meet the fate of rotting in someones pc, instead now it can be used/enjoyed by everyone.

I mean, it's pretty much just what hobo said

By selling it you are giving permission. By selling artwork, you (the artist) are giving up any and all rights to that artwork, which are then transferred to the buyer, who can then do whatever he likes with it. Andy Warhol could walk into the Guggenheim and stand next to his art and tell people he made it, but he would not have the right to pull it off the wall and walk out, nor would Leonardo Davinci or Vincent Van Gogh (although given the strange circumstances of all three being brought back to life, there may be exceptions made).

The only solution that may appease both parties is to allow the buyer to do with the art as he pleases, but also allow the artist to buy back the art from the first buyer if they are upset with what he is doing with it. However the original buyer can set any price he wants because again, he is the new owner and can do whatever he wants.

I've made an entire set for people to use on their uke to make it look cool. Obviously people use it for personal use, but i don't really care unless they are claiming it as their own.
It's a pretty crappy set, too, but it ended up giving me some publicity, and getting people like Xydra to ask for sets.

Besides, if someone buys a set, and then gives it out for free, they just wasted their money. It's their problem. The person who gave them the head gets their money.

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Seriously though, why in the world does this thread still exist? When you purchase something, it is now your property. As the owner, you have the right to do whatever you want with said item (well most stuff anyway). It is your prerogative whether you want to stick the famous mini sculpture up your butt or donate it to a museum.

The thing about ruining an artists reputation is bs; in fact, giving away awesome art for free does nothing but give the artists publicity. Would that not help their reputation? And it's not like they didn't get paid for it.

Everyone here is saying the exact same thing. There is nothing to talk about.