The CC license suite was foundational to the creation of Creative Commons. To this day, the stewardship of CC licenses and public domain tools remains one of the core functions of the organization.

At this milestone of the 20th anniversary of Creative Commons, we are embarking on a public consultation around CC’s stewardship. Specifically, we seek to collectively define the principles and responsibilities that CC should and will uphold in its role as stewards of the CC legal tools. And we want you to participate.

The public consultation draft is open to all for written comment. (This is hosted on Google Docs; there is also a copy on our site for comments by email.)

You may also answer a few specific questions in a short survey.

This effort will assist with: 

• Resource allocation 
• Prioritization 
• Accountability 
• Transparency
• Making space for others to fill gaps that CC cannot 
• Resiliency of the licenses and public domain tools 
• Rebuilding an active community of people around the world invested in the licenses and public domain tools

Our initial draft is an attempt to make explicit the values and the practices CC has followed over the years, and to identify where CC should continue investing its efforts, where it needs to improve, and what it should no longer continue. As we consider the work of Creative Commons in the next decade and look to new endeavors and projects, we want to ensure we effectively sustain and nurture our existing tools. We can’t do this effectively without the CC community. Please help us define what good stewardship looks like by contributing to this consultation. 

More information about the process and timeline as well as call details are available on the License Stewardship landing page. We aim to publish this renewed Stewardship Commitment in December 2021.