Creative Commons Basics for Scholars and Students: CC Licenses

There are six core Creative Commons licenses to choose from, each each allowing for different kinds of permitted uses for the work in question.  A Creative Commons license can be applied to anything covered by copyright law, but are not to be used with computer software.

A brief overview of these six core licenses is presented below; for more information, please watch this video on Creative Commons licensing [https://vimeo.com/25684782]:

Video source

This tool allows you to create your own embeddable license image like the ones you see on the page here.  By entering additional information like your name, the name of the work, and a source URL, you can help others properly attribute your work to its original author - You!

Creative Commons provides six standard licenses built on four basic conditions, which can be searched by web search engines, and which automatically grant certain permissions without requiring correspondence with the creator.

   Attribution (CC BY): This license allows others to copy, distribute, display, and/or perform a work, as long as the author/creator is credited.  All CC licenses require attribution.

 Share Alike (CC BY SA): This license requires others who use the work to share their new creations under the same license terms.  This license was based on open source software licenses, and is intended to build the "creative commons."

 No Derivative Works (CC BY ND):  Under this license, others who reuse a work may not modify, adapt, translate, or remix the original, but must copy it exactly.

 Non Commercial (CC BY NC):  Under this license, an original work may be reused, modified, altered, etc, but not used for any commercial purpose.

Two additional licenses combine terms:

 Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike: The original work may be used for non-commercial purposes, as long as it is properly credited, and the new work is licensed under the identical terms as the original.

 Attribution Non-commercial No Derivative Works:  The most restrictive license, otherwise known as the "free advertising" license, provides that an original work may be reused for non-commercial purposes, as long as it is credited properly, and copied exactly.

[Source: Dingley, Brenda. UMKC University Libraries http://libguides.library.umkc.edu/creativecommons ]

Attribution - CC BY

The most basic CC license is also the most accommodating; others are allowed to redistribute, tweak, or build upon a work (even commercially) as long as they credit the original author for the original creation.

Attribution, ShareAlike - CC BY-SA

Others are allowed to redistribute, tweak, or build upon a work (even commercially) as long as they credit the original author for the original creation and as long as their new creations are licensed under identical terms.  Note that any new works created from a work with this license will also be open for use commercially.

Attribution, NonCommercial - CC BY-NC

Others are allowed to redistribute, tweak, or build upon a work as long as they credit the original author for the original creation and as long as their new works are not being used commercially.

Attribution, NonCommercial, ShareAlike - CC BY-NC-SA

Others are allowed to redistribute, tweak, or build upon a work non-commercially, as long as they credit the original author for the original creation and license their new work under identical terms.

Attribution NoDerivatives - CC BY-ND

Others are allowed to redistribute the work both commercially and non-commercially as long as the work is unchanged an whole, and the original author is given credit.

Attribution NonCommercial NoDerivatives - CC BY-NC-ND

Others are allowed to redistribute the work non-commercially as long as the work is unchanged and whole, and the original author is given credit.

[Source: Dingley, Brenda. UMKC University Libraries http://libguides.library.umkc.edu/creativecommons ]