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Distinguish the different types of Creative Commons licenses.
Add Creative Commons license to your work.
Combine the different types of Creative Commons licenses.
Estimated time to complete: 30 minutes
Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools.
The free, easy-to-use Creative Commons (CC) copyright licenses provide a simple, standardized way to give the public permission to share and use creative work — on conditions of the creator's choice. CC licenses let you easily change your copyright terms from the default of “all rights reserved” to “some rights reserved.”
Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright and enable you to modify your copyright terms to best suit your needs.
This module introduces Creative Commons licensing. All creative works are copyrighted to the fullest extent of the law the instant they are created. If you want to share your lecture notes, videos, textbooks, and other educational materials in a way that allows others to reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute them, you have to apply an open license to your work. Creative Commons provides freely available open licenses that are currently used by over 500 million online resources. Let's view this video for an introduction to the Creative Commons licenses.
As introduced in the video, there are 4 key license elements:
As introduced in the video, there are 4 key license elements:
Attribution: Others can copy, distribute, perform and remix your work if they credit your name as specified by you.
No Derivatives: Others can only copy, distribute, or perform verbatim copies of your work.
Share Alike: Others can distribute your work only under a license identical to the one you have chosen for your work.
Non-Commercial: Others can copy, distribute, display, perform or remix your work but for non-commercial purposes only.
Creative Commons licenses are combination of these elements. The graphic below shows the six licenses.
Add Creative Commons License to My Work
Add Creative Commons License to My Work
1. Go to http://creativecommons.org/. Click on Licenses> Choose a License.
2. Under License Features, answer the questions about adaptations and commercial use of your work. As you make your selections on the left, you will notice the license adjusts on the right.
Clicking on the question mark icon next to each choice brings up a pop-up window giving details about the selections.
3. For print material, copy the license button and the "This work is licensed..." statement including the hyperlinks. For online material, copy the HTML code. The code will automatically generate a license button and statement.
Optional: You may include more more detailed information by filling out the fields to the left.
Before applying a Creative Commons license, be sure
Before applying a Creative Commons license, be sure
Applying a Creative Commons license to your material is a serious decision. When you apply a CC license, you give permission to anyone to use your material for the full duration of applicable copyright and similar rights.
Some things that you should consider before you apply a CC license, some of which relate to your ability to apply a CC license at all. Here are some highlights:
Is the material copyrightable?
Do you own the material you want to license? If not, are you otherwise authorized to license it under the specific CC license you are interested in using? You should not apply a license to material that you do not own or that you are not authorized to license.
Are you aware that CC licenses are not revocable? You are free to stop offering material under a CC license at any time, but this will not affect the rights associated with any copies of your work already in circulation. (Any particular licensee may lose his or her rights after violating the license, but this does not affect continual use of the work by other licensees.)
Are you a member of a collecting society? If you are, you should make sure that you are able to use CC licenses for your materials.
Always read the terms and conditions of the specific license you plan to apply. Additionally, there are several terms that may differ in the earlier versions of the license, both unported and ported. If you choose to use a pre-4.0 version or any ported version, clauses such as choice of law may affect your desired choice of license.
Combining different types of Creative Commons licenses
All Creative Commons licenses are not compatible with each other. You may only remix works released under different CC licenses if the terms of the licenses involved permit it.
The first question to ask is whether doing so constitutes an adaptation. If the combination does not create an adaptation, then you may combine any CC-licensed content so long as you provide attribution and comply with the NonCommercial restriction if it applies. If you want to combine material in a way that results in the creation of an adaptation (i.e. a “remix”), then you must pay attention to the particular license that applies to the content you want to combine.
The NoDerivatives licenses do not permit remixing at all. All the other CC licenses allow remixes, but may impose conditions on how the remix may be used. For example, if you create a remix with material licensed under a ShareAlike license, you need to make sure that all of the material contributed to the remix is licensed under the same license conditions. Similarly, if you want to use a remix for commercial purposes, you cannot incorporate material released under a NonCommercial license.
The chart below shows which CC-licensed material can be remixed. To use the chart, find a license on the left column and on the top right row. If there is a check mark in the box where that row and column intersect, then the works can be remixed. If there is an “X” in the box, then the works may not be remixed unless an exception or limitation applies. See below for details on how remixes may be licensed.
Check Your Understanding
Check Your Understanding
In the last in-class session, you completed an evaluation of an OER resource using OER Review Criteria, then downloaded it as a Word document. Now, using that document and what you learned in this lesson:
Select a Creative Commons license for your OER Resource Review.
Add the Creative Commons license to your OER Resource Review.
5.1 Creative Commons
5.1 Creative Commons
Due before class on Tues. 3/1
Grading Rubric
Points: 5
Submit: Post your OER Resource Review with a Creative Commons License to Laulima > Forums
5 points for adding a Creative Commons license image and statement with working hyperlinks.
3 points for a Creative Commons license, but missing either the image or statement.
0 points for a blank or no Creative Commons license.
The OER Evaluation with a Creative Commons license is one of your deliverables for this workshop series.
The content of this page includes:
Original content from "About Creative Commons" by Creative Commons is licensed under CC BY 4.0
Original content from "How to Use Open Educational Resources (OER)" by Boyoung Chae and Christie Fierro,SBCTC is licensed under CC BY 4.0
Original content from "Frequently Asked Questions" by Creative Commons is licensed under CC BY 4.0
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