Isn’t that what this guy is doing? (Unless I am very mistaken) - http://illusionmage.com/index3.htm
He’s doing it under the name of Illusionmage. It’s not illegal, I suppose, since Blender is open source. There are also 6 hours of training videos. But I swear some of the screenshots there are from this forum.
Comments?
it’s been known for quite a lot of time…
i don’t see anything illegal, you can sell blender too as an open source, read blenders license to make sure maybe i’m blind, 
I hate to say it, this guy makes Blender look more appealing than the foundation does. Compare his website to, blender.org.
If he can make Blender appealing to people, then more power to him. I wouldn’t “buy” Blender to just get 6 hours worth of training materials.
You can find training materials and tutorials for Blender on the Internet for free. Why pay for something I can get off the net for a few minutes of my time.
Considering he just spends his time working on (and google bombing) his multiple websites instead of dealing with industry people, making movies, coding features, fixing bugs, hiring & managing devs, organizing conferences, attending trade shows, and whatever else Ton (and his merry band of blender developers) do instead of marketing blender then that isn’t too hard to accomplish.
Legal, ok. Ethical, no.
Would have been better if he didn’t change the name.
Actually, you should look at the images on the website. I’m pretty sure that he didn’t create some of them, and the artists weren’t notified/ gave permission.
This type of pitch is so common on the net today. Yea, legal but I feel sorry for the poor saps that fall for this.
This web page layout jumps out and screams, “All suckers please bend…”. It’s a standard scam layout, fonts, colors and all the publisher clearing house looks.
Gotta Love the free enterprise system. Someone always feeding off the backs of others.
If the artwork on the site it is not with aproval from the artist then the whole site it is illegal until proved contrary. So in legal terms that site it is not LEGAL.
And the artists that made the artwork and get stolen can report to the ISP of the owner of the site or the domain dealer.
Copyright infrigement and global scam it is something that law punish with prison time and or fines bigger than the profit that site made.
I bet lot’s of the artwork in that site is not made with Blender at all 
I hope not too many people think so because selling training material is where most of the money for the Blender Foundation comes from:
Actually, I thought the Blender Foundation made most of its money from selling the movies like Elephant’s Dream, Big Buck Bunny, and Sintel and getting sponsors for the projects… Buying the movies is the best way of supporting the Blender Foundation.
I have bought a couple Blender books to work through and I would tell someone to do the same.
Those movies are done by the Blender Institute and even the movies are partly sponsored from Foundation money which mostly comes from the e-Shop (On Sintel iirc 30% presale, xx% sponsors, yy% film funds, zz% Foundation).
Edit: Of course buying the movies or becoming sponsor is also a very good way to support Blender
I sent them this message in the screenshot. If they don’t supply the source code, I’ll notify the FSF.
my god i hope you’re being sarcastic…
…my feeling is that anyone who finds themselves tempted by that type of marketing pretty much deserves to be parted with their money. after all, if its not going to that guy, it’ll just go to some 3am infomercial for a new set of knives.
Two small problems with that…
First, they have no obligation to supply the source to any random person who requests it on the interwebs but only if they distribute blender to you personally.
Secondly, the FSF has nothing to do with blender or enforcing of the copyright (copyleft) on blender’s code base.
If you really want to be productive go and find all the sites where illusionmage is ‘reviewed’ and add in the comments how it is only a knock-off of blender which you can download for free at www.blender.org. That’s how this yahoo got 3DMagix as one of the top searches for ‘3d software’ (or some similar search term) and the only way to defeat him is by reverse google bombing his site.
The source code is there on the site, you have to scroll waaaaaaaaay down.
And I think they are obligated to provide it actually.
There’s some sarcasm, there.
Looks like a lot of the images are taken from DeviantART and done in Max and Maya.
The one with the rowing boat.
Some architecture.
The quad bike thing
The female warrior is from a different site.
