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Dr Busiso Chisala, Technical Advisor to MALICO VSAT on the roof of Chancellor College Library, University of Malawi

Creative Commons

What is Creative Commons?
What sort of stuff does it cover?
How does it work?
CC licences
International Commons - localising CC licences
Interested in adapting a CC licence to your local law?
eIFL countries with national CC licences

What is Creative Commons?

Creative Commons (CC) is a non-profit organisation dedicated to expanding the range of creative works available. Founded in the US in 2001 by Lawrence Lessig, Creative Commons offers an easy way for authors, artists, musicians and educators to choose how to make their works available and under what conditions using easy to understand licences and a recognised logo.

What sort of stuff does it cover?

Creative Commons covers audio e.g. music, sounds, speeches; images e.g. photos, illustrations, designs; video e.g. movies, animations, footage; text e.g. books, blogs, essays; education e.g. lesson plans, coursepacks, textbooks.

Several million pages of web content now use Creative Commons licenses. Some well known CC-licenced content includes Flickr, Internet Archive, Wikimedia Commons, MIT Open Courseware and the Public Library of Science.

How does it work?

Creative Commons offers a set of flexible copyright licences from asserting full copyright "all rights reserved" to the public domain "no rights reserved". CC licences enable creators to keep their copyright while inviting certain uses of their work. This is known as "some rights reserved" copyright.

CC licences

There are six main types of licence, plus a few licences for specialised applications e.g. sampling licences. The Developing Nations licence was retired in June 2007. Each licence has three versions:
  • a "Commons Deed" that explains in simple terms what is permitted under the licence using easy to recognise symbols
  • a lawyer-readable "Legal Code" which is the full text of the licence
  • a machine-readable version containing RDF/XML metadata that describes the licence, making it easier to locate CC-licensed works on the web.

International Commons - localising CC licences

The default CC licences are based on U.S. law. International Commons (iCommons) is dedicated to the drafting and adoption of CC licences in specific jurisdictions. National CC licences have been adopted in thirty-two countries from Argentina to the UK, with another 22 under development.

Interested in adapting a CC licence to your local law?

Adapting or "porting" a CC licence to another legal jurisdiction involves both the literal and legal translation of the licences. There are a number of steps involved from identifying the project lead and institution through to the launch of the licence.  iCommons are there to provide assistance. Read more in this illustrated step-by-step guide (pdf) or click here for an overview.

eIFL countries with national CC licences

Completed
Poland Slovenia South Africa Macedonia
CC porting page
CC Polska		 CC portiing page
CC Slovenija		 CC porting page
CC South Africa		 CC porting page
CC Macedonia

In progress
Jordan Nigeria Ukraine Serbia
CC porting page CC porting page CC porting page CC porting page

Upcoming: Egypt

Program management

The manager of eIFL-IP is Teresa Hackett. If you have questions about eIFL-IP, please feel free to contact teresa.hackett[at]eifl.net

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