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Creative Commons

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FOSS licenses are mostly related to software. People have placed works such as drawings and plans under FOSS licenses, but this was not the intent.

When software has been placed in the public domain, the author has relinquished all rights, including the copyright on the work. In some countries, this is the default when the work is done by a government agency. In some countries, copyrighted work becomes public domain after the author has died and a lengthy waiting period has elapsed.

The Creative Commons (CC) organization has created the Creative Commons Licenses which try to address the intentions behind FOSS licenses for non-software entities. CC licenses can also be used to restrict commercial use if that is the desire of the copyright holder. The CC licenses are made up of the following set of conditions the creator can apply to their work:

  • Attribution (BY) – All CC licenses require that the creator must be given credit, without implying that the creator endorses the use.

  • ShareAlike (SA) – This allows others to copy, distribute, perform, and modify the work, provided they do so under the same terms.

  • NonCommercial (NC) – This allows others to distribute, display, perform, and modify the work for any purpose other than commercially.

  • NoDerivatives (ND) – This allows others to distribute, display, and perform only original copies of the work. They must obtain the creator’s permission to modify it.

These conditions are then combined to create the six main licenses offered by Creative Commons:

  • Attribution (CC BY) – Much like the BSD license, you can use CC BY content for any use but must credit the copyright holder.

  • Attribution ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) – A copyleft version of the Attribution license. Derived works must be shared under the same license, much like in the Free Software ideals.

  • Attribution NoDerivs (CC BY-ND) – You may redistribute the content under the same conditions as CC-BY but may not change it.

  • Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) – Just like CC BY, but you may not use it for commercial purposes.

  • Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA) – Builds on the CC BY-NC license but requires that your changes be shared under the same license.

  • Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND) – You are sharing the content to be used for non-commercial purposes, but people may not change the content.

  • No Rights Reserved (CC0) – This is the Creative Commons version of public domain.

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