These graphics are trademarked and/or copyrighted material owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders.
Despite not hosting nor having control over the vast majority of such packs shared by community members, we do not want to risk getting into trouble.
We are sincerely sorry for this unfortunate development, but our love for the Football Manager game series is not above the laws of Intellectual Property.
I am sure the community will find a way to produce graphic packs in a lawful way in the near future, and FM Scout shall be a pioneer in doing so.
Until the dust settles, we will prepare the next day in safety.
Discussion: The Future of FM Graphic Packs
238 comments have been posted so far.
This sucks, hard, because the logos and face packs make a big difference in-game, but such is intellectual property law.
I realize this is an extreme measure, and if there's a safe way to allow community members to keep sharing graphic packs, we might reconsider. But honestly, this doesn't look promising at all. The best we can do is work on copyright-free packs.
Example -
"So you head to the manufacturer’s website and right-click that image and save it to upload to your site. A photo will not substitute for the actual product, so the owner’s rights should be very minimally affected. Therefore, your right to use the copyrighted image would likely be permitted under fair use."
Where if people creating these graphic pack etc and selling/profiting would be infringing on the owners copyright.