Please don't steal other people's art and pass them off as your own. Doing so could get you into a serious legal situation.

We have said in our disclaimer we are not responsible for the content in our member's posts, but posting stolen art which has "Psypoke" branded all over it will get us involved. Don't push it to the point of a ban, please.

Furthermore, using these forums as a means of distributing stolen art will also be counted as an offense, so don't do it. I know of a site's member that's distributing our Emerald animations as his own, so I know how it feels to have your hard work stolen.

ohhhh!

that someone is in trouble

*sings*

Bad boy, bad boy/ bad girl, bad girl
watch gonna do, watcha gonna do
when it comes for you....

*cant help dancing*

Why do people want to steal things? It's pointless, it's cheating, it's stupid. If you cant draw, Learn to draw. It's not rocket Science.

Or just ask permission from an artist to use their picture. A lot of artists are fine with people using their art on websites, as long as they're given credit, and a link back to their site is provided.

Yeah if you ask it isnt theft thats right.

So, would doing this: ("Borrowing" rubypoke's trainer card) Be theft?

Sort of iffy, Myuu, but in my opinion when it's on this forum it's pretty clear who the card belongs to, and the cards are designed to be shared on the forum (at least in sigs.) I don't think anyone would object to someone posting someone else's card as an example or something- for ome thing, that falls under the fair use clause of most countries' copyright laws. If you claimed that it was yours, though, or if you used it somewhere else without asking and crediting the maker, where people wouldn't automatically know who it belonged to, then that would definately be theft.

But especially on a site like this, where it only takes two minutes to find someone and PM them, why not just ask?

If you give credit, is it technicly "Art Theft"? See sig and avatar.

As I said in my PM, you still have to have permission. A lot of artists okay taking their work if you give credit in their T.O.S., but some don't, and if they don't specifically state that you can, you have to ask. I mean, if someone stole your car and said afterwards "oh, it's fine, I told everyone it was your car" it'd still be theft

But the site you got your sprite from has this in their T.O.S.

"You may use them in avatars, banners, fake screenshots, etc. that you make, however you MUST put a disclaimer about the sprites ON the banner/screenshot/whatever itself or directly below it in text. If you made it as a request for somebody else and put the credit below, you must tell that person to place the credit near every place where they are displayed."

So you're free to use it with the credit in your sig

I posted this to make sure other people approved, because I'm all nervous now. I don't know why.

Last I knew, you can use anything as long as you credit the maker. If they didn't want it used, then why would they make it Public?

It's like plagarisim (sp?), you have to credit the original writer. So really, as long as you credit them, you can't loose in any legal situations.

Psypoke could simply make the statement, "One, credit was given, and two, if they didn't want it publicized, why would they risk putting it online?"

So just give the darned credit, nothing will happen. Dragonfree I know, is fine with that. And I believe she would agree.

Dragonfree is the webmaster of Dragonfly Caves...

Posting something online is not the same as putting it into the public domain. The artist still retains copyright, and if they don't want it used it's still illegal to use it.

The exception to this is fair use. To quote the famous Ten Big Myths About Copyright Explained page, "The "fair use" exemption to (U.S.) copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author."

Of course, if you were to go to court and sue someone for copying a picture you'd drawn for fun, you wouldn't get much in the way of damages, and it's impractical to try, but it's common courtesy to ask an artist before you take.

A Note: Yes, I am very vocal about art theft, and sometimes maybe I seem obsessive over the tiniest things, but I've seen a lot of amazing artists stop posting their art online because of art theft, and I hate how people tend pass it off as unimportant.

Oh dear. I think I am guilty. Very guilty. So sorry to whoever it may concern.

And those Ten Big Myhts are 11.

It's happened to me before. Four years ago I did a picture of Lugia. A few months later I find that someone else has used my picture as the background of there's. So yes, I was a little ticked.

the 4 gen pokemon sprites on the dex is stolen ecept Munchlax,
Proof:
http://www.serebiiforums.com/showthread.php?t=52743

This is called Necromancy big time, Flygon. Don't do it again.

its an announcement, you cant really bump it...