Copyright: Creative Commons Licenses

As soon as a work is fixed in a tangible medium, it is protected by copyright law. Creative Commons licenses provide copyright owners a simple way to grant permissions to users of their work so that their work can be copied, distributed, or transformed by others without them having to reach out and ask for permission or weigh the fair use factors to use the work without asking permission.

Every Creative Commons license ensures that the original creator is credited for their work, but allows for whatever level of use the creator wishes. The Creative Commons site has a chooser tool to help the creator decide which license to adopt. Factors you'll consider include:

• whether you want to allow commercial uses of your work (i.e. can others profit from it?)
• whether you want to allow others to adapt or build upon your work (derivative works)
• if you allow others to transform your work, whether you want to require them to assign to their derivative work the same Creative Commons license as you assigned to yours (share and share alike)

If a work is covered by a Creative Commons License (CCL), it's quite easy to determine how you can use that work. Creators who have chosen a CCL have granted you the freedom to use their work in particular ways. 

CCL licenses are typically designated with an icon like this:

The licenses consist of some combination/variation of elements including:

• Credit must be given to the creator (BY)
• Adaptations must be shared under the same terms (SA for Share Alike)
• Noncommercial uses of the work are permitted (NC)
• No derivative or adaptation of the work are permitted (=)

See the Creative Commons site for complete information about the licenses and what permissions they grant.