In theory, publishing publicly funded television content under open licenses should be a no-brainer. As with publicly funded research, open licenses improve distribution, allow for remix creativity, and unlock access to popular free knowledge platforms such as Wikipedia. In practice, however, advocates of open licenses in the realm of public-service media face several hurdles, such…

La Donna Della Finestra, 1881 by Dante Gabriel Rossetti via Birmingham Museums Trust (CC0)

The following is a summary of “GLAM Collections on Social Media: Navigating Copyright Questions—a conversation with Aleksandra Strzelichowska, Mikka Gee Conway and Anne Young” published on 31 May 2020 by Scann (licensed CC BY).  How often do you debate whether to share an openly licensed work on social media? If you do share a work,…

Creative Commons offers solidarity and joins the millions around the world who are mourning the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Nina Pop, Ahmaud Arbery, and others. We recognize that they are the latest victims of systemic racism and institutionalized violence not only in the United States but globally, prompting anti-racism and anti-police…

Credit: "33962822768_a6f5d169b8_o" Sebastiaan ter Burg (CC BY)

COVID-19 has changed many things about how we all learn, work, and play. In fact, it has drastically changed how we lead our lives. But in these exceptionally distressing times, one thing that hasn’t changed is the dynamism and resilience of the Creative Commons (CC) community. In this blog post, we’re thrilled to share some…

At the end of April, CC Search officially celebrated its first birthday! After releasing the search tool last year on April 30, we eagerly watched as it was put to use. Now, with a year behind us and over 2.8 million users across 230 countries and territories, we’re gathering and examining search data to better…

Astronaut Edwin Aldrin walks on lunar surface near leg of Lunar Module. Credit: Neil Armstrong/NASA, (1969) in the public domain.

It’s July 20, 1969.  Along with 600 million people, nine-year-old Chris Hadfield is glued to his television—watching intently as American astronaut Neil Armstrong glides down the ladder of the Lunar Module, and in one swift pounce, touches the dust of a familiar yet alien world. His words forever immortalized, “That’s one small step for man,…

Creative Commons licenses give everyone from individual creators to large institutions a standardized way to grant the public permission to use their creative work under copyright law. From the reuser’s perspective, the presence of a Creative Commons license on a copyrighted work answers the question, What can I do with this work? The CC License…

We were incredibly saddened to learn recently that our friend and Creative Commons community member Muid Latif had passed away. Muid was the Project Lead of CC Malaysia and was an extremely talented digital artist and designer who released his work openly. He believed passionately in the ideals of the CC community—openness, access, and collaboration.…

Grant for the Web, the $100 million fund for efforts that utilize and build upon the Web Monetization standard, today announced $250,000 in funding for a small group of projects: Free Music Archive, Coronavirus Tech Handbook, DEV, and Grant for the Web Ambassadors. These “early grantees” represent the wide array of endeavors that this project…

We’re pleased to announce that Alexis Muscat returns to Creative Commons (CC) as our Legal and Policy Intern this summer. Over the next 10 weeks, Alexis will work closely with our Open Policy Manager, Brigitte Vézina on law and policy research projects that support our mission and community. We can’t wait to get started!  Meet…