Open Data by Descrier licensed via CC BY 2.0. Open data is data that can be freely used, re-used and redistributed by anyone — subject only, at most, to the requirement to attribute and sharealike. — Open Data Handbook The sharing of open data can be incredibly beneficial to society: facilitating enhanced scientific collaboration and reproducibility,…

Open access literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions. There’s an incredible amount of scientific research conducted at universities and institutions around the world. Historically, the findings of this research have been published in scholarly journals. However, access to this research is typically restricted — granted only…

CC Legal’s top priority is to responsibly steward our licenses and public domain tools, ensuring that CC’s existing licenses and legal tools remain relevant, user-friendly, and as effective as possible in service of creators and reusers. Our core activities in support of this priority include: maintaining and updating materials explaining how our legal tools operate,…

1. General Search 1.1 Google Many people start out looking for OER using Google. A general search with Google returns vast amounts of resources, most of which are not openly licensed for reuse. If you want to use Google to search for openly licensed resources we recommend you use Google Advanced Search. Scroll down in…

A border of trees, palms and herbaceous plants from a Roman garden in the 1st century A.D. Coloured photograph.

The power of open culture At Creative Commons, we truly believe in the power of open access to cultural heritage. This type of better sharing helps build and sustain vibrant and thriving societies. Galleries, libraries, archives, and museums (GLAMs) have been the gate openers to the world’s cultural heritage for centuries, and play a fundamental…

Use Creative Commons tools to help share your work. Our free, easy-to-use copyright licenses provide a simple, standardized way to give your permission to share and use your creative work — on conditions of your choice. You can adopt one of our licenses by sharing on a platform, sharing your work with an open license,…

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Prince performing in Brussels during the Hit N Run Tour in 1986, CC-by-2.0 Today at Copyright On!, Britton Payne discussed the unique copyright situation surrounding Prince’s estate. This potentially long and bitter battle could shape the future of music copyright to come. Prince fought a number of legendary copyright battles, which makes this current fight…

On May 22nd, more than four years after his detention and six months after his disappearance, Bassel Khartabil (Arabic: باسل خرطبيل‎) will turn 35 years old. Bassel’s imprisonment by the Assad regime is a brutal human rights violation and the continued lack of answers about his fate is a hindrance to the fight for free…

Unencumbered access to public sector information is central to a well-functioning democratic system.