LibGuides: Copyright: Creative Commons

Creative Commons

Holders of the copyright on creative works have the absolute power to license others to make specific uses of their work. A copyright holder may, for example, declare the work to be in the public domain, and relinquish copyright altogether Or, the copyright holder can grant specific rights to specific individuals, groups or corporations.

Creative Commons (https://creativecommons.org/) is an international non-profit organization that has created legal language to allow authors/creators to grant selected rights to users automatically, while retaining your copyright.

The Creative Commons website lets you select the nation in which you have copyright, then the permissions you want to grant, and generates a license you can attach to your copyrighted work.

Numerous sites support the use of Creative Commons licenses for content on their sites, including Wikipedia and YouTube.

Many open access publishers allow authors to apply a Creative Commons license to their articles. The Directory of Open access Journals (DOAJ) currently only lists journals which use a Creative Commons license.

Creative Commons options

Creative Commons "BY" symbol BY - Credit must be given to the creator

Crative Commons "NC" symbol NC - Only non-commercial uses permitted

Creative Commons "SA" symbol SA - Adaptations must be shared under the same terms

Creative Commons "ND" symbol ND - No derivatives or adaptations permitted

There is also a CC 0, or public domain declaration option.

Note Once a CC license is applied to a work, it cannot be changed or revoked.

CC licenses can only be applied by the owner or controller of the copyright.

The license must be displayed in the work, along with a link to the text of the license. This may be either done in text, with a link to the Creative Commons full license.