“Creativity does not happen in a vacuum” is how Eric Luth introduces his take on Open Culture in the GLAM sector. Our creativity is inspired by others which is why being able to enjoy our shared cultural heritage is so important. Platforms like Wiki-commons and others work to support these efforts and encourage sharing. Open…

From 13 to 17 March 2023, Creative Commons (CC) participated in the 43rd session of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) in Geneva, Switzerland. In this blog post, we look back on the highlights of the SCCR/43 week. Excited to be @WIPO in Geneva to attend the…

In my last blog post, I looked at whether copyright protects artistic style, particularly in the context of generative AI (GAI) art tools like Stable Diffusion and Midjourney. However, in the class action litigation against Stable Diffusion and Midjourney, the plaintiffs are not only concerned that people can use the GAI tools to produce works…

“Grunge Heroes” by Stephen Wolfson for Creative Commons was generated by the Midjourney AI platform with the text prompt “a grunge band from the 1990s made up of superheroes.” CC dedicates any rights it holds to the image to the public domain via CC0.

In my previous posts on generative AI, I discussed fair use and AI training data, copyright over AI outputs, and a recent U.S. Copyright Office decision on registration for a work produced by generative AI. In the next posts in our series, I will look at claims (exemplified in a recent case against Stable Diffusion…

“Open Culture creates a level playing field by making knowledge accessible to everyone regardless of geography.”  In this episode we get more insight into the role technology can play for Open Culture and how society benefits from the curation of open access collections. Our media often keeps information siloed but Open Access and Open Culture…

"Catherine Stihler" by Martin Shields is licensed under CC BY 4.0

My name is Catherine Stihler, and I’m the CEO of Creative Commons. As a nonprofit dedicated to supporting the sharing and reuse of creativity and knowledge, we strongly support the Internet Archive in its defense of Controlled Digital Lending. Free, equitable, and open access to all knowledge stimulates creativity, is essential for research and learning,…

Brigitte Vézina, the Director of Policy and Open Culture, has facilitated the CC Copyright Platform for the past three years since the Platform’s relaunch in 2020. This year, the CC legal team—Kat Walsh and Yuanxiao Xu—is taking over the facilitator role for the Copyright Platform.  The Creative Commons Copyright Platform is a collaborative space for…

“Open Culture gives joy!” What a great message from Siobhan. In this episode we learn about Open Culture in public institutions in New Zealand, how public works are reused in a variety of ways, and what governments can do to promote open policies and copyright laws around the world. Open Culture VOICES is a series…

Open Education Week offers a global festival of open education efforts. As we take stock of the offerings, it’s heartening to look at how individual efforts can feed into larger system’s change. In our Open Education Week 2023 blog post, we highlight community members’ approaches and tools, opening access to education and knowledge. Below, we…

“Input” by jputman, here slightly cropped, is licensed via CC BY-SA 2.0.

Over the last year, innovation and use of generative artificial intelligence (AI) has proliferated, providing new ways for people to create content from art to zines, and everything in between. At CC, we’ve been watching these experiments in creativity while considering what it all means for what we call better sharing: sharing that is contextual,…