Just a little word of warning, be careful when using smurf clipart as IMPS (the people who license smurfs) are cracking down on people who infringe their copyrights.

Take a look -
smurf city

From personal experience, I have recently had to redo my entire site (about 250 pages) as I had used one piece of clipart. I didn't wait around to see if IMPS were going to start fining me $1000 a day.

There are a lot of smurf websites out there that are using a lot of clipart and don't seem to have been affected yet so if you want to take a chance by all means do so, I really am not trying to scare you off doing a site - the more smurf sites the better, but you should be aware. This is a very recent issue so all I can say is we will have to wait and see.

Basically, my advice is to try and use your own images if possible (the clipart on my website is all made out of my own photos).

I use such a method on my website. It doesn't take up as much screen space, and it gives your website the illusion that it is running in realtime.

While I can't help you with your other problem, I thought that by sharing this neat method of making websites come alive, it can help your website.

Thanks.

Although not directly Smurf-related, the reason why IMPS doesn't want Smurf-related domain names is because the original creator, Peyo, didn't want his characters to be misused (actually, since Peyo passed in 1992, his daughter now handles those duties).

If you remember back in early 2000 when we lost another legend, Charles M. Schulz (I still feel sad when I learned that he too had passed), you can see why United Media is against Snoopy fan-sites (except for licensed ones) for the same reason that IMPS is against non-licensed Smurf sites. At the time Schulz retired, he announced his retirement due to medical reasons, which is why United Media decided to rerun some of the older Peanuts strips, and why United Media doesn't want the Snoopy character misrepresented.

It's the same for the Smurfs. At the request of Peyo's wishes, he agreed to have the characters live on, under the strict supervision of his daughter, who founded IMPS, which should hopefully explain IMPS' point of view.

I know that the contacts from IMPS may seem harsh, but it is for the best. The Smurfs is one of the best creations in the world, and by eliminating domains and websites that IMPS feels may endanger their future, the Smurfs can be just as enjoyable for years to come.