Creative Commons 4.0 - new guidance reduces uncertainty

Following two years of development, the Creative Commons organisation has released new licences that are more user-friendly and more internationally robust than ever before. Version 4.0 licences have now been launched with changes that "make sharing and reusing CC-licensed materials easier and more dependable than ever before".

Along with the new licences there is updated guidance available that clarifies some uncertainties. The main changes are listed in What's new in 4.0, and the FAQ have been expanded to reference the new licences. Areas such as attribution are explained in detail: as well as confirming that all CC licences require users to acknowledge the creator of licensed material, there is clarification about modifying work:

"You must also indicate if you have modified the work—for example, if you have taken an excerpt, or cropped a photo. (For versions prior to 4.0, this is only required if you have created an adaptation by contributing your own creative material, but it is recommended even when not required.) It is not necessary to note trivial alterations, such as correcting a typo or changing a font size. Finally, you must retain an indication of previous modifications to the work."

The licences themselves have been re-organised with language which is easier to understand across the world, and they now include Sui generis database rights which are recognised in the European Union. The 'human-readable' licence deeds have links to definitions and further guidance, for example what is 'appropriate credit'

Creative Commons 4.0 licences are available now at http://creativecommons.org/choose/

Background to Creative Commons 4.0 development: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Version_4

Information about Creative Commons added to libguide

Are you new to open access or hearing about Creative Commons for the first time? Do you want to know how to find content that has a specific open access licence? Have you had an article accepted for publication and need to know which Creative Commons licence you should apply to your work?

As part of our Open Access Week inititatives, we have added another page to our open access libguide which addresses these questions and points to useful resources where you can find out more.

See the new page of our guide on Creative Commons licences at http://libguides.st-andrews.ac.uk/oalicences

'Explosion of openness' with Creative Commons

There are now more than 400 million works available on the internet under Creative Commons licences - allowing resources such as artworks, literature, films, learning materials and research articles to be shared and reused.

The Creative Commons organisation has released The Power of Open, a new book celebrating the impact of Creative Commons (CC) and highlighting individual stories. These include the adoption of CC for the Open University's OpenLearn website for course materials and the development of the open access publisher Public Library of Science (PLoS). The Power of Open states "The core principle behind open access journals is impact" and PLoS director of publishing Mark Patterson is quoted as saying “We set out to remove all barriers to reusing research and transforming research literature into a resource for further research,”...“CC has provided a strong, consistent signal that you can use openly published research to do with what you want”

The book also gives a useful overview of CC licences and a description of the vision for a growing culture of openness.The Power of Open © 2011 Creative Commons Corporation can be downloaded here.