Stop giving a fuck, the people here are blowing this way out of proportion. If you're worried make sure to credit the artists/licensor at the least. If you receive a cease and desist then be prepared to drop the images. You could always contact the artists and ask for permission to use (a handwritten letter/email is usually more than sufficient). And at worst be ready to find a reputable artist to create some unique artwork for your server. For my company the first thing I did when I branched out on my own was to make sure I owned every resource I used. It's really not worth doing this for a free-to-play, non-profit hobby. So the risk (which is fairly small) is worth it.

Like I mentioned previously it's not worth litigation as there is no damage. A cease and desist is cheap and easy. If you were slandering the company or profiting from their work then yeah be prepared for full wrath of their lawyers.

That's exactly how I feel and why I have done these honestly. I like your idea of crediting the artist and putting that I do not own this picture and it is being used solely for a fun non-profit project. I'll take the time to find the artists and put that up on my posts. I appreciate the feedback. Especially coming from somebody who knows what they are talking about from personal experience. The only reason I didn't credit them before is because it's a forum not a game. But I see how including their name is just the right thing to do in general.

I do alter their pictures considerably with adobe so it fits my theme as well. But I guess if I credit them it doesn't matter.


UPDATED:

This is what I will be putting down for all art I use on my forums. I appreciate people bringing this up because I want for nothing more than to make RuinSpire a fun and stress free place to play.

http://img.prntscr.com/img?url=http:...om/WO4HJ02.png

Don't take this the wrong way, but my suggestion would be to keep all your updates on your own forums. The people that are interested in and support your project will see the updates there and are far less likely to respond negatively. Even then, you are able to moderate your forums and remove any post or user that is negatively affecting the atmosphere or community that you are trying to create.

This thread was put out there to get new people's interests in RuinSpire and show a little bit of what I am doing with the server. Nothing more. Negative feedback on this thread does not affect my attitude or drive for creating this new server. I have actually done my best to understand where people are coming from and stay professional. I have already owned up to my last 3 servers failing because I made some mistakes and it's time to move forward. People posting things like "It's going to happen again, mark my words." just make me want to work harder on RuinSpire and make sure it's one of the best damn servers to ever come to EQemulator.

And history repeats itself once again.

Indicative of the state of mental health "care" in the US. With the advent of the Internet, the neighborhood maniac can lurk in everyone's back yard simultaneously.

This is funny.

To be more than unbias here, we all make mistakes and bad decisions in our lives, then
hope not to make the same mistake again, but rather learn from it, until the next time.
Out of all the negative feedback towards any servers on these forums, the one I see
the most is usually when a server goes down, leaving many disgruntled players. And I
can understand, those players put a lot of time and effort in to the toons they create.
I realize it takes a lot of effort to develop and maintain a server, lots of ups and downs
along the way, but personally, persevering to keep the server alive, I would think is of
the utmost priority. Maybe lots of headaches, trials and tribulations after it's up, but
when it is up, it can do nothing but move forward. Clicking the off switch is a step in
the wrong direction.

And how long did your most recent server last?

April - September.

yes it has