Friday, March 13, 2009

Creative Commons

The Open Source movement is about freedom and it relies on the willingness of creators to share their work so that others can build upon and improve it. Of course, not all content needs to be shared completely and the creator is and always should be in control of how much of their content is shared. Creative Commons is a way for creators to open up their work to the community under their own terms. On the Creative Commons licensing page we learn:

"The Creative Commons licenses enable people to easily change their copyright terms from the default of 'all rights reserved” to “some rights reserved.'

Creators choose a set of conditions they wish to apply to their work.

Attribution. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.

Noncommercial. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your work — and derivative works based upon it — but for noncommercial purposes only.

No Derivative Works. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform only verbatim copies of your work, not derivative works based upon it.

Share Alike. You allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs your work."

So when you see these symbols, know what they mean.

To learn more visit the Creative Commons Website and watch the video below.

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