MyBB Community Forums

In the footer we have this:

<!-- You may NOT remove, modify or hinder the visibility of the MyBB copyright at any time.
				     It must contain the links to the MyBB website and be formatted appropriately.

					 Failure to comply with the above will result in prosecution to the full extent of the law.
					 This is free software, support us and we'll support you. -->
{$lang->powered_by} <a href="http://www.mybboard.net" target="_blank">MyBB{$mybbversion}</a>, &copy; 2002-{$copy_year} <a href="http://www.mybboard.net" target="_blank">MyBB Group</a>.<br />
				<!-- End copyright -->

What's been happening is I found through some server side checking that spammers joining my sites are using the copyright language as their search criteria to find boards to join for spamming purposes.

From my understanding of the TOS above, The links just need to be there as long as they go to MYBB (as seen in the links now).

What I want to do is remove some of the language used to search for the boards such as "powered by" (that's a big one used!) and "version" etc and make the copyright an image instead and replace the coded wording (from the language files) with this image and link the image here instead.

Am I allowed to do this?
Would I be allowed to do this for all the themes I make to sell or free download?

Just FYI, that copyright is a bit out of date now, isn't quite the same anymore.

Anyway, images are fine. As for doing it on themes to sell etc, I'll double check if that would be OK or if it would need to be the standard text; personally I think it's fine as it would still have the minimum copyright but I'll check and post back here.

Out of date? I took that off my default theme's footer and I'm running the very latest version of the software!

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Oh and thanks a ton for checking into the rest for me.

Yeah, it was updated in the 1.4.4 > 1.4.5 upgrade I think, required the footer template to be reverted to default. I never reverted mine either as I didn't want to lose my footer changes so mine still says the old code too, no big deal really, just letting you know it's changed

OK that's weird because I just checked on a brand new install and it looks the same to me!

<!-- MyBB is free software developed and maintained by a volunteer community. 
					 It would be much appreciated by the MyBB Group if you left the full copyright and "powered by" notice intact, 
					 to show your support for MyBB.  If you choose to remove or modify the copyright below, 
					 you may be refused support on the MyBB Community Forums.
					 
					 This is free software, support us and we'll support you. -->
{$lang->powered_by} <a href="http://www.mybboard.net" target="_blank">MyBB{$mybbversion}</a>, &copy; 2002-{$copy_year} <a href="http://www.mybboard.net" target="_blank">MyBB Group</a>.<br />
				<!-- End powered by -->

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LOL nevermind.... I see the difference now I hit send! It's the commented out wording that's different - I was looking at the code itself.