Board Thread:Support Requests - Getting Started/@comment-163.117.155.107-20140131141840/@comment-1038387-20140131154450

This happens on a lot of wikis. Most of the time, it's just that they don't know about the rules. Or don't care. Let's assume the former.

Basically, the owner has to defend the intellectual property. I asked staff about it a time ago, they said the majority of the DCMA takedown notices concerned photographers (you can't just take any real world photo off the web) and ripped DeviantArt pictures. So it's mainly about elements on a wiki not owned by the franchise owners.

Some would argue that image use for maintenance templates, blogs, badges, user pages and avatars isn't fair use in the strictest sense, but generally, companies don't care. You don't really hurt their bottom line unless you sell some forms of self-made merchandise, or arguably if you actively endorse piracy and host pirated content.

Still, it reflects better on your wiki if you do include full licensing, sourcing and artist info.