Does anyone here have any experience with testing the strength of the copyright protection of content within their forums? I may publish some content from my site/forum in a book and am trying to anticipate what copyright/ownership issues I may have with people who have posted in the site and who's content may be included in the book. I would love to NOT have to go back and get waivers/authorizations from folks from years back to include their words in the book.

Any thoughts are much appreciated!

Is it spelled out in the Terms of Service that the information may be used by you for other purposes such as advertisements and other stuff? If so it does not seem like there would be any problem since they had to read and agree with it in order to use your community.

this is from the groupee terms of service:

By posting content on this message board, you agree that Groupee can quote from, or reuse the content in promotional materials, newsletters, or other documents. If we intend to use content posted by you in such a manner, we will generally notify you as a courtesy.