This is the kind of advice that gets people in trouble; you are factually and seriously incorrect.There is no mechanism for copyrights being abandoned or otherwise forced into public domain other than either the artist explicitly stating that it is public domain (and no, silence does not give consent), or death of the artist plus seventy years. Lacking that, or an explicit assignment of rights, this would indeed be copyright infringement.Copyright law in the US (which is based upon the Berne Convention of 1971) is in Title 17 of the US Code. See it at https://www.copyright.gov/title17/title17.pdf … you will find no mechanism for "no defense, no copyright". What you WILL find is 17.302(a) (duration: creator's life + 70 years, or 17.302© anonymous creations 95 years to 120 years). You will find 17.106(1)(2)(3)(5) that says the copyright owner hasrights to publish/distribute/prepare derivative works/publicly display the work. You will find 172.201(a) states that the owner of the copyright is the original artist until it is explicitly transferred elsewhere by the original copyright holder… the original artist.So no, you cannot publish a derivative work of a DNP artist. That fails on several levels.And those are the facts. Whatever your opinion may be (or mine), those are the facts.Trademarks do have a mechanism for abandonment, but this isn't about trademark (which is entirely different from copyright). And in any event, someone sneaking in use of a trademark and getting away with it would never trigger loss of trademark; that requiresinfringement in trade AND that the trademark holder be aware of it AND that they do nothing about it for many such incidents (assuming they could do something about it at all).In any event, if the original artist says "Do not post", it's a douche move to do it anyway, regardless of whatever else (legal or otherwise) may be in play.