Skip to Main Content

Mohave Community College Libraries

Creative Commons Licensing

A Creative Commons (CC) license is a standard form license agreement issued by a copyright owner that allows others to use their copyrighted work (consistent with the type of CC license) without the need to ask permission.

Works licensed under CC are often done so because creators want to share their work as broadly as possible and as long as your use of a CC work is consistent with the terms of its license, you are free make use of any CC work without fear of violating copyright.

Types of Creative Commons Licenses

Attribution  

(CC BY)                                                                                                                            

This license lets others distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation.

This is the most accommodating of licenses offered. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials.

Attribution - Share Alike

(CC BY-SA)

This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms.

This license is often compared to “copyleft” free and open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use.

Attribution - No Derivs

(CC BY-ND)

 This license lets others reuse the work for any purpose, including commercially; however, it cannot be shared with others in adapted form, and credit must be provided to you.

Attribution - Non Commercial

(CC BY-NC)

 This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Attribution - Non Commercial - Share Alike

(CC BY-NC-SA)

 This license lets others remix, adapt, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms.

Attribution - Non Commercial - No Derivs

(CC BY-NC-ND)

 This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, only allowing others to download your works and share them with others as long as they credit you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.
   
No Rights Reserved
(CC0)

CC0 enables scientists, educators, artists and other creators and owners of copyright- or database-protected content to waive those interests in their works and thereby place them as completely as possible in the public domain.

In contrast to CC’s licenses that allow copyright holders to choose from a range of permissions while retaining their copyright, CC0 empowers yet another choice altogether – the choice to opt out of copyright and database protection, and the exclusive rights automatically granted to creators – the “no rights reserved” alternative to our licenses.

 

You are free to use Creative Commons licensed material (without asking permission) as long as you abide by the terms of the license. One term common to all CC licenses is that attribution must be given when any CC work is used.

There is no one correct way to provide attribution, you only need to do so in a "reasonable manner," but generally you should include the following

  • Title. Sometimes there is no title, in that case you do not need to worry about it.
  • Author/creator. This can be a person (including a username), company, or other organization.You should hyperlink to their profile or website if possible.
  • Source. Provide the name of the source and hyperlink to it.
  • License. List the type of CC license and hyperlink to the license deed. Do not just say "Creative Commons"

Example of CC work with attribution:

Furggelen afterglow