Creative Commons
Many open resources are licensed through Creative Commons - an organization devoted to sharing and promoting them for free. CC offers six licensing options with varying usage permissions and restrictions. When you locate a work that you want to use in the classroom, look through the website for a "Licensing" or "Terms of Use" section. Here are the types of licenses available through Creative Commons and what they mean:
1: Attribution (BY)
- Permissions: Allows others to use, adjust, share, and add to the original work for commercial and non-commercial purposes.
- Restrictions: Must give credit to author/creator of original work in derivatives.
- Example: Open Michigan (Licensing agreement at bottom of every page)
2: Attribution Share Alike (BY-SA)
- Permissions: Allows others to use, adjust, share, and add to the original work for commercial and non-commercial purposes.
- Restrictions: Must give credit to author/creator of original work in derivatives. All derivatives must be licensed under the same terms as original.
- Example: Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU) (bottom of "Terms of Use" page)
3: Attribution No Derivatives (BY-ND) -
- Permissions: Allows users to redistribute works commercially and non-commercially.
- Restrictions: No derivatives (Must be unchanged and "whole"). Must give credit to author/creator.
- Example: Free Software Foundation (FSF) (Licensing agreement at bottom of every page)
4: Attribution Noncommercial (BY-NC) -
- Permissions: Allows others to use, adjust, share, and add to the original work for non-commercial purposes. Not required to follow the same licensing restrictions as original.
- Restrictions: Must acknowledge author and be non-commercial.
- Example: Brooklyn Museum
5: Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike (BY-NC-SA)
- Permissions: Allows others to use, adjust, share, and add to the original work for non-commercial purposes. Users can also download, redistribute, translate, remix, and create derivatives based on original.
- Restrictions: Must credit author of original work and license derivatives under the same terms. Must be non-commercial.
- Example: MIT Open Courseware
6: Attribution Non-commerical No Derivatives (BY-NC-ND)
- Permissions: Allows others to download and share works.
- Restrictions: No changes to originals allowed. Users must mention and link to the original author.
- Example: TED Talks
"About The Licenses" by Creative Commons is licensed under CC BY 4.0
