secure? theme copyrights

[061]

shouldnt there be any way to make the theme copyright more secure. some thing like smf copyright...atleast it will be harder for novice to remove. present copyright removel is as easy as
search/del.
less secure copyrights will obviously run down free theme developers away to the pay boards.

[bloc]

You can't expect the same level of copyright strictness on a theme as the whole software imo. SMF is tied to a legal entity - Lewis Media, themes are afaik not.

And if there was to be such a thing..how many licences would you need? one for each theme author..? What about those that base their theme upon yours?

From my experience, not being so strict about it, seem to make most pople just leave it there. In fact, the reason i started doing it in the first place, was actually to quickly see how many used it on google.. You know , just searching for the string  I freely give it for people to use, if they don't want the made by Bloc thing, just remove it. I don't expect people to NOT change a thing in them - in fact, most support questions is about changing something..often to the point where its no longer true to the original...

I personally will not make it so little appealing, by stating nothing can be changed.

[DMS_Shaun]

Where is the copyright anyways?  I want to make a little border around it, because my members keep thinking I made the site.  ~.~  idiots...  Yea, or instead of having text links, I could make an image for the links such as the Lewis Media one, or the forum version.  ^_^  I'm good at .gif making. 

[1MileCrash]

you cant change the copyright into an image.

[DMS_Shaun]

No, not the copyright text, the links.  That say SMF 1.0.5 or whatever, and below that, where it links to Lewis Media.  I think it would be unique and classy.  haha

[061]

You can't expect the same level of copyright strictness on a theme as the whole software imo. SMF is tied to a legal entity - Lewis Media, themes are afaik not.

And if there was to be such a thing..how many licences would you need? one for each theme author..? What about those that base their theme upon yours?

From my experience, not being so strict about it, seem to make most pople just leave it there. In fact, the reason i started doing it in the first place, was actually to quickly see how many used it on google.. You know , just searching for the string  I freely give it for people to use, if they don't want the made by Bloc thing, just remove it. I don't expect people to NOT change a thing in them - in fact, most support questions is about changing something..often to the point where its no longer true to the original...

I personally will not make it so little appealing, by stating nothing can be changed.

i think i got that wrong
by copyright i meant the credit thing so i dont think licence is required for that but well then again if its not copyright obviously nothing can be done to stop ppl removing it. ahhh
thats it then

about ppl letting do modifications..i am not againt it rather i will like if some one do it but even that atleast must state that its based on some ppl theme
i ahve seen site using theme like helios where ppl have CLEARLY stated that this theme is made by www.theirsite.com. i dont understand why u dont feel so bad about ppl taking cerdit for ur work...either coz the fact that nothing can be done abt them or you are too good at heart

i have a suggestion.
practicle?...dont know
after the Graphics section is finished here at simplemachines.org
when the theme is being uploaded ask for a small line of credit from the author.
then in files where the smf copyright is encoded, code a small livefeed below it to fetch that credit from this site.
so the ', theme_copyright(), ' will show the theme credit along with smf copyright
this will atleast be hard for most ppl to remove.

[bloc]

I know some are changing the credit line..but as I said, it doesn't bother me too much. if I see it, I will point it out, but I don't just have the time or will to go looking..

I never meant that credit line to be any kind of copyright or copyright-like statement, its not in the same league as the SMF copyright, which have both legal and support reasons to be there. So everyone has to make their mind up on how they feel about it, but for me its enough that people see it at least once. When they install the theme.

I do paid themes too, and in those they have total freedom regarding any credit.

[1MileCrash]

i think, the best and easiest line of defense is to include the file index.english.php in your theme, and add a text string for your copyright, rather than put it plain as day in the template. It would probaballly throw off most php newbs. You could even go a step further by including the text string in another template, such as boardindex.template.php.