Anatomy of a CC License
CC licenses are legally enforceable tools, but they were designed to be accessible and understandable to non-lawyers.
CC licenses use a three layer construction:
- The top layer is the "machine-readable" version of the license: a summary of the key freedoms granted and obligations imposed, written into a format that applications, search engines, and other kinds of technology can understand. You can guarantee this machine-readable language is attached to your work by using the Creative Commons License Chooser and copying the code it generates.
- The middle layer is the "common deeds," i.e. the "human-readable" explanations and summarizations of the key license terms laid out on web pages like the one linked here.
- The base layer is the underlying legal code, or "lawyer-readable" terms and conditions that are legally enforceable in court (click here for an example of the CC-BY 4.0 legal code).
CC Permissions Options
All CC licenses have some important features in common:
- Every CC license ensures people get credit for their work.
- This means that all CC licenses include Attribution (BY) as part of their terms, signified by the "person" symbol.
- CC licenses work around the world and last as long as a) applicable copyright lasts (because they are built on copyright) and b) the user follows the terms and conditions of the license.
- At a minimum, every license helps rights holders retain copyright while allowing others to copy and distribute their work in unchanged form for (at least) noncommercial purposes.
The differences between the CC licenses, then, depend on three additional permissions the creator would or would not like to grant:
- Do you want to allow commercial use of the work?
- If not, you can select one of the NonCommercial (NC) licenses, signified by the "crossed out dollar sign" symbol.
- In the CC legal code, a noncommercial purpose is defined as one that is “not primarily intended for or directed towards commercial advantage or monetary compensation.” It’s important to note that CC’s definition of NC depends on the use, not the user. Not even nonprofit entities can sell NC-licensed works, but even for-profit entities can use NC-licensed works for noncommerical purposes.
- Do you want to allow users to publicly share adapted versions (i.e. derivatives) of the work?
- If not, you can select one of the NoDerivatives (ND) licenses, signified by the "equal sign" symbol.
- The question of what constitutes an adaptation of a licensed work depends on applicable copyright law. For more on this gray area, check out this explanation from Creative Commons.
- If you decide to allow derivative works, do you want adapters to apply the same type of CC license to any new derivative works?
- If so, you can select one of the ShareAlike (SA) licenses, symbolized by the "cycling arrow" symbol.
The permissions options combine to provide six possible CC license choices. The six licenses, in order from least to most restrictive in terms of the freedoms granted reusers, are:
- The Attribution license - “CC BY"
- Allows people to use and/or make adapted versions of the work for any purpose (including commercial purposes) as long as they give credit to the creator.
- The Attribution-ShareAlike license - “CC BY-SA”
- Allows people to use and/or make adapted versions of the work for any purpose (including commercial purposes) as long as they a) give credit to the creator and b) make any adaptations they share with others available under the same or a compatible license. This is CC’s version of a software copyleft license.
- The Attribution-NonCommercial license - “CC BY-NC”
- Allows people to use the work, or adapted versions of the work, for noncommercial purposes only, as long as they give credit to the creator.
- The Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license - “CC BY-NC-SA”
- Allows people to use and make adapted versions of the work for noncommercial purposes only, as long as they a) give credit to the creator and b) make any adapted versions they share with others available under the same or a compatible license.
- The Attribution-NoDerivatives license - “CC BY-ND”
- Allows people to use the work for any purpose (including commercial purposes) as long as they give credit to the creator. They may also adapt the work for their own personal use but may not share any adaptations publicly.
- The Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license - “CC BY-NC-ND"
- Allows people to use the work for noncommercial purposes only as long as they give credit to the creator. They may also adapt the work for their own personal use but may not share any adaptations publicly.
Although not considered CC licenses, Creative Commons also has two public domain tools with similar images to CC licenses that help represent the usability of a work in the public domain:
- CC0
- As opposed to CC licenses' "some rights reserved" approach, CC0 allows creators to take a "no rights reserved" approach by dedicating a work to the worldwide public domain to the greatest extent possible. In effect, CC0 is a way for creators to waive all copyright over a work. Some jurisdictions do not allow creators to dedicate their works to the public domain, so CC0 has other legal mechanisms included to help deal with this situation where it applies.
- The Public Domain Mark
- This image is used to mark works known to be free of all copyright restrictions. Unlike CC0, the Public Domain Mark has no legal effect when applied to a work. It serves only as a label to inform the public about the public domain status of a work and is often used by museums, libraries, and archives working with very old works. Unlike CC licenses and CC0, which require the license holder to apply the license, anyone can apply the Public Domain Mark to a work known to be in the public domain.
Limtations and Exceptions
Because CC licenses are types of copyright licenses, these truths about copyright are also true of CC licenses:
- The licenses “operate” or apply to a work only within the scope of copyright-related law and when the restrictions of copyright law apply to the intended use of the work.
- Certain other rights, such as patents, trademarks, privacy and publicity rights, are not covered by the licenses and must be managed separately.
- Users of a CC-licensed work don't need to the follow the terms of the license when:
- They are using the work under fair use/fair dealing/another applicable limitation or exception to copyright, like exceptions for accessibility needs. By design, CC licenses do not reduce, limit, or restrict any rights under exceptions and limitations to copyright. If your use of CC-licensed material would otherwise be allowed because of an applicable exception or limitation, you do not need to rely on the CC license or comply with its terms and conditions. This is a fundamental principle of CC licensing.
- The work is in the public domain. All CC licenses are clear that they do not have the effect of placing restrictions on material that would otherwise be unrestricted, and you cannot remove a work from the public domain by applying a CC license to it.
- You can apply a CC license to anything protected by copyright that you own, with one important exception:
- CC urges creators not to apply CC licenses to software. There are many free and open source software licenses that do that job better, that were built specifically as software licenses.
- A CC license on a given work only covers any copyright held by the person who applied the license.
- This can sometimes be complicated when employers own the copyright to works created by employees through "work-for-hire" doctrine, meaning their employees are unable to give any permission whatsoever to reuse the work. However, faculty at higher educational institutions are usually exempt from work-for-hire doctrine for creative efforts traditionally associated with their positions; this is the case at UNC Wilmington (see section V. A. of the University's Copyright Use and Ownership Policy).
- When a new work contains or includes another work, a CC license applied by the author to the new work does not necessarily apply to the included work.
- For example, if scholarly article that uses a copyrighted photograph to illustrate an idea (after having received the permission of the photograph's copyright holder), a CC-BY license applied to the scholarly article does not apply to the photograph—it only applies the new author's created portion of the work. Separate permission may be needed to reproduce the photograph, but not the rest of the article. This is why using openly licensed pictures is much easier when creating an open educational resource with a CC license.
- Works often have more than one copyright attached to them.
- For example, a filmmaker may own the copyright to a film adaptation of a book, but the book author also holds a copyright to the book on which the film is based. In this example, if the film is CC-licensed, the CC license only applies to the film and not the book.
- You don't need a CC license to give people permission to read/watch/experience your work.
Attribution
In addition to sources linked throughout the text, this guide drew information from "3.1 License Design and Terminology," "3.2 License Scope," and "3.3 License Types" by Creative Commons. CC BY 4.0.