Guide to Creative

Commons for Scholarly

Publications and
Educational Resources

Photo by: Martin Adams on Unsplash

2 BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 3

1
Contents
1. About this guide 3
2. About copyright and Creative Commons 5
3. About Creative Commons licences 7
4. Questions about process 11
5. Questions about open access books

6. Questions about repercussions for scholarship

13
15
About this guide
7. Questions about derivatives and reuse (CC BY) 17
8. Questions about commercial use (CC BY-NC) 19
9. Open Educational Resources and Creative 21 This guide wants to inform researchers about the This guide is adapted from a guide that was written a
Commons licences Creative Commons (CC) licence system. What licence few years ago for researchers based in the UK. We
to choose when publishing a paper or book or sharing have updated it such that we hope it will be useful for
Glossary 23
an article through a repository? And what licence to researchers in the Netherlands. Whenever useful we
Acknowledgements 24  apply when sharing your teaching materials? The guide refer specifically to the Dutch context.
wants to help choose the right licence by addressing
several frequently asked questions and common
concerns expressed by about the use of CC licences.
Creative Commons
Ever since the first definitions of open access were
Creative Commons (CC) is an international
drafted, back in the early 2000s, Open Access was not
not-for-profit organisation publicly launched
only about the free availability of publications to read.
in December 2002 that aims to improve clarity
It was also about reusing. The Budapest Open Access
about what people can do with published
Initiative (2002) stated:
content. For researchers, this generally means
academic books or journal articles, but CC
“by ‘open access’ [...] we mean its free availability on the
licences are used by all kinds of content
public internet, permitting any users to read, download,
creators – photographers, musicians, artists,
copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts
Wikipedia contributors and people collecting
of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them
data, to give just a few examples. The CC licences
as data to software, or use them for any other lawful
are in constant development – the licences are
purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers
now on version 4.0 which was launched in 2013.
other than those inseparable from gaining access to the
internet itself.”

CC licences have been developed to provide a clear More information about open access in the
legal framework to underpin the open online sharing Netherlands and funder requirements can be found
and reuse of creative works. For researchers this often on www.openaccess.nl and the websites of NWO,
means scholarly papers, books or chapters. When you ZonMw or the European Commission.
publish ‘open access’ most publishers will ask you to
choose a CC licence for your work. Increasingly, also
funders have requirements as to which CC licence has
to be applied, because they want to make sure that the
research they fund is reused as widely as possible.
4 BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 5

2
About copyright
and Creative Commons
licences
CC licences are not an alternative to copyright. In fact, With a CC licence on a work the creator can – without
they are built on copyright and similar rights and last transferring copyright – grant certain permissions to use
for the same length of term as these rights. The licences a work, whether or not under specific conditions,
enable rights holders to specify a standard set of terms directly to a third party. This is on top of the rights, e.g.
and conditions regarding sharing and reuse that will quotation and educational use, that already exist in the
best suit their needs, while ensuring that the authors Dutch Copyright Act. It is often very difficult for a third
are credited for their work. party to understand copyright exceptions, to find out
who the current copyright holder is and how to contact
2.1
them to ask for permissions.
What is copyright?
2.2
Copyright is the exclusive right, held by the creator
(author) of a work, to reproduce, publish, modify and
Copyright and publishers
distribute or sell copies of that work. Without the contracts
creator’s permission, third parties are not allowed to do
this; except for some specific and limited uses provided When you want to publish your work with a publisher,
by statutory exemptions in the Dutch Copyright Act the publisher has to get your permission to reproduce,
(Auteurswet). Copyright arises automatically as publish, distribute and archive the work in print and
soon as a work is created. For academic work (academic electronic form. To be able to do so the publisher may
output), this usually means as soon as it is written. No ask you to transfer your copyrights or to grant a licence
application or registration is necessary. Throughout the to publish.
European Union, copyright will remain with the creators
during their life and for at least 70 years after their death. With a Transfer of Copyright Agreement, the author
transfers (all) their rights of the work to the publisher,
Copyright can be transferred to a third party (a private including those pertaining to electronic forms and
Photo by: Annie Spratt on Unsplash individual or a legal person like a publishing company) transmissions, and can no longer exercise control over
by the creator in a written contract or an assignment. how the publisher uses those rights. On the other hand
6 2. About copyright and Creative Commons licences BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 7

3
2.3
in a Licence to Publish, the author retains copyright and
licences specific rights to the publisher, thus maintaining Rights usually reserved to
control over their rights that have not been granted.
the author after signing a
A Licence to Publish can be exclusive or non-exclusive. publishing contract
For the author (licensor) granting an exclusive licence
will in most cases have the same result as a transfer Usually, certain rights remain reserved to authors or are
of copyright: the specific rights have been exclusively granted by publishers in a standard contract, whether
granted to the publisher (licensee); the licensor can no
longer exercise them. That is why it is important to grant
a non-exclusive licence. With a non-exclusive licence,
based on a Transfer of Copyright Agreement or an
exclusive Licence to Publish. These are:
• the right to make further copies of all or part of
About Creative
Commons licences
such as a CC licence, you can grant all licensees specific the work for private use and classroom teaching.
rights with a standard contract. • the right to reuse all or part of the work in a
compilation of a work or text book of which you
Please note that some publishers ask you to transfer are the author.
your copyrights or assign exclusive rights to be able • the right to make copies of the published work
for them to grant a CC licence. If you have a choice for internal distribution within the institution that
we recommend not to do so. By transferring copyright employs you. CC licences provide everyone from individual • your funder might require you to choose a specific
or granting an exclusive licence, you will no longer be If a publisher does not expressly allow the author to creators to large institutions a standardized way to CC licence (e.g. cOAlition S funders require the use
in the position to exercise specific rights yourself. For exercise those rights as standard in the contract, the grant the public permission to use their creative work of CC BY or, exceptionally, CC BY-ND).
instance, if the publisher owns your commercial rights, author will have to seek permission. under copyright law. From the reuser’s perspective, a
you would have to ask the publisher permission, CC licence on a copyrighted work answers the ques- Unless your choice of a licence is predetermined by
and in most cases pay the publisher, to be able to By law, some copyrights cannot be transferred. E.g. tion, “What can I do with this work?”.1 The licence is your funder’s requirements, the best way to choose
add your publication to a printed course reader and you will always keep the right based on article 25fa expressed in three forms: the legal code (the licence which licence is most suitable for your work is to think
charge for it. Dutch Copyright Act to make short scientific works itself); a human-readable deed summarising the of how you want your work to be distributed and used
freely available to the public after a reasonable period principal terms and conditions of the licence, and a by others, which types of reuses you want to encourage
of time, if they are the result of research funded with machine-readable form that computers can parse to and which ones you would like to prevent. Need help
Dutch public money. See for more information the identify the key licence features. choosing a licence? Try this Licence Chooser.
initiative You share, we take care! by the Dutch
university libraries. There are six CC licences, as shown in the table below.
These licences consist of different combinations of four
elements: Attribution (BY), Share Alike (SA), Non-Com-
mercial (NC) and No Derivatives (ND). All CC licences
require Attribution, i.e. crediting the original author. All
CC licences should be used unamended. One of the six
can be chosen, after which they are irrevocable.

Retaining your rights 3.1

Authors can always try to retain more rights over the work through negotiation with the publisher. For
that purpose SPARC has developed an Author Addendum that can be added to your paper at submission.
Choosing a Licence
Things to consider and check in advance when
In addition, cOAlition S has announced its Rights Retention Strategy, that aims is to empower researchers
publishing academic works:
funded by cOAlition S to retain control over their work. This strategy will allow authors to publish in their
• usually publishers, preprint servers and repositories
journal of choice, including subscription journals, while retaining the right to self-archive the author’s
present a limited number of CC licences (e.g. you Book is a treasure of knowledge...
accepted manuscript of their papers immediately upon publication under a CC BY licence.
could be given a choice between CC BY and CC by Rupa Panda is licensed under CC BY 2.0
BY-NC-ND),

1 This paragraph is reproduced from About CC Licenses. Licensed

under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.
https://creativecommons.org/about/cclicenses/
8 3. About Creative Commons licences BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 9

CREATIVE COMMONS LICENCES 2

Examples of reuse allowed
Licence designation Licence name What does this mean for you as an author? under a CC BY licence 4
CC BY Attribution The most liberal of the CC licences apart from CC0 Public Domain • Distribute the full-text of a publication freely
Dedication. This licence allows others to distribute, remix, tweak, to students or colleagues.
and build upon a work – also commercially – provided they • Copy a text for indexing or text mining
credit the author for the original creation and clearly indicate that purposes for commercial and non-commercial
changes were made to the work, if any. purposes.
• Include the full-text of a publication in a
repository (e.g. institutional repository) or
CC BY-SA Attribution Similar to CC BY; however, others must licence new creations
upload it on academic social networks.
ShareAlike under identical terms. Therefore, all new works reusing (parts of)
• Combine parts of a work, along with other
such work will need to carry the same licence and any derivatives
openly licensed resources, into a collection
will also allow commercial use.3
(e.g. a student handbook or textbook).
• Translate a work into another language.
CC BY-ND Attribution This licence allows for redistribution, commercial and non-com- • Modify tables and charts contained in a
NoDerivatives mercial, provided it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with journal article and reproduce them in a
Tablet use 2 by ebayink
credit to the author. new publication.
is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

CC BY-NC Attribution With this licence others must not remix, tweak, or build upon the
Non-Commercial original work for commercial purposes. Although new works must
also acknowledge the author and be non-commercial, reusers do NB: Crediting the original work, indicating whether 3.2
not have to licence their derivative works on the same terms. changes have been made, stating the licence under
which the work is licensed and linking to it is
Why is CC BY encouraged by
CC BY-NC-SA Attribution This licence lets others remix, tweak, and build upon the author’s
mandatory for all types of reuse described in the open access proponents?
box above.
Non-Commercial work non-commercially, provided they credit the author and
Open access publishing aims to make research
ShareAlike licence their new creations under the identical terms.
In addition to the licences above Creative Commons publications available for anyone to read and reuse.
has also developed a tool (CC0 Public Domain Dedica- The Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002) – a key
CC BY-NC-ND Attribution This is the most restrictive of the six licences, only allowing others tion) by which you can dedicate creations to the public driver of open access developments in Europe – has
Non-Commercial to download works and share them with others as long as they domain. The dedication is done through legal code recommended CC BY as the preferred licence for open
NoDerivatives credit the author, but they cannot change them in any way or use hosted by Creative Commons (just as the licences are) access publication. CC licences are used because they
them commercially. in which you waive all copyright and related rights, such offer an internationally established legal structure that is
as your moral rights – to the extent they are waivable aligned with the aims of open access. As shown in the
– that you have over your work. Once this has been table, CC BY is the most permissive CC licence, allowing
done, anybody who reuses or builds on your work does sharing, commercial reuse and modification as long as
not have to credit you, although citation is encouraged. the original author is credited and it is clearly indicated if
The tool may be of use in certain situations, particularly changes were made to the original work. Its proponents
pertaining to research data such as raw data sets. Before argue that this gives users the greatest possible degree
using CC0, you will need to ensure that all rights holders of flexibility, allowing published research to be used
of the work give consent, as the dedication to the public for commercial purposes and, by doing so, potentially
domain is irrevocable. For further information on CC0 encouraging innovation and economic growth.
please visit http://creativecommons.org/about/cc0

2 This table is reproduced with small alterations from Martin Paul Eve, 3 The ShareAlike condition applies only to derivative works, not to 4 This list of examples is adapted from Open Textbooks, OER & Other
Open Access and the Humanities: Contexts, Controversies and the collections. Including a CC BY-SA licensed work in a collection does Open or Free Resources for Faculty. Licensed under a Creative
Future (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014) http://dx.doi. not produce an adaptation, so the collection does not have to be Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Portions
org/10.1017/CBO9781316161012. Licensed under a CC BY license. We licensed via a CC BY-SA. of the original text have been cut, edited and mixed with original
have merged two columns and changed the text slightly. content.
10 BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 11

4
Questions
about process
4.1 or:
© year of publication, name of author(s), CC BY 4.0.
How do I publish under a To view a copy of this licence, visit
Creative Commons licence? https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0

If you publish your work open access with a publisher, Note that all copyright holders e.g. co-authors of a work,
preprint server or repository, usually you need to or holders of similar rights, should agree on the used CC
choose a specific CC licence when signing the licence.
publishing contract. The publisher, preprint server or
repository will add the selected licence to the final Some publishers demand that you add a specific CC
published work according to the mandatory format. licence to the Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) of
your work when self archiving it, e.g. in the institutional
If you want to make your work public with a CC licence repository. The text example given above is sufficient
yourself, you can simply mark your work with the to comply with this. You can find out what copyright
specific CC licence that you want to use. You can do this and self-archiving policies different publishers have on
by stating the licence in a copyright notice, or by adding SHERPA/ RoMEO
the logo of the licence, with a link to the licence infor-
mation on the Creative Commons website. Logos and 4.2
links can be found on the Creative Commons website.
The Licence Chooser by Creative Commons helps you
How do I attribute Creative
generate a ready to use text or html code to copy onto Commons licensed work?
your work.
To give credit to the creator of CC-licensed work you
For example: can refer to this best practices guide. Alternatively
This work is licensed under CC BY 4.0. To view a copy of you can use this Open Attribution Builder which auto-
this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ matically generates the attribution for you based on the
by/4.0. information you provide.

Flipboard by thms.nl or:

is licensed under CC BY 2.0 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution 4.0 International License.
12 4. Questions about process BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 13

5
4.3 4.5

Who holds the copyright for Can I change my mind about

a publication published under a Creative Commons licence
a Creative Commons licence? after the work is published?
Under a CC licence, the copyright remains with the No, CC licences are irrevocable. Once a work is
licensor. The licensor can only be the current copyright published under a CC licence, licensees may continue
holder or rights holder (usually the author unless the
author has transferred copyright to the publisher,
see also 2.2.).
using the work according to the licence terms for as
long as the material is protected by copyright, even if
you later stop distributing it.
Questions about
4.4 Creative Commons and
Who is responsible for
enforcing the Creative
Commons licence?
open access books
The licensor is always the copyright holder, the author
or e.g. a publisher. In the event that the publisher owns Open access monographs are establishing themselves 5.2
copyright, the publisher is responsible for enforcement. as a publication model in the humanities and social
In the event that the author is the licensor and licences sciences and researchers are increasingly aware of this
Will my book still be made
the work to the public, it will be the author. In short, option. In addition, funders are beginning to introduce available in print if it is
it depends upon the contract or agreement between open access requirements for books in their policies. CC
the author and the publisher – if there is one.5 Creative licences are also used in the domain of books. This sec-
published under a Creative
Commons strongly encourages amicable resolution tion answers some of the common questions regarding Commons licence?
when attribution disputes arise – this is seen as an books and Creative Commons.
important value within the Creative Commons This will depend upon your publisher and what you
community.6 agree to in the publishing contract. Some publishers will
5.1
rely upon selling print versions of the open access book
Can my book still be sold if it to support their business model. Some are moving to a
print-on-demand option for open access content, but
is published under a Creative this should not affect the availability of your print book.
Commons licence?
5.3
Yes. Often, a PDF will be made available for free, and the
publisher will continue to charge for print and possibly Will I still get royalties from a
other e-book versions. Others may publish and sell your
book, too. However, if you licence your work under a CC
book with a Creative Commons
NC licence which permits only non-commercial reuse, licence?
Photo by Amador Loureiro on Unsplash you will need to grant your publisher permission to sell
the book commercially. That will depend upon the agreement between you
and your publisher, but in principle there is no reason
why you should not receive royalties on any sales of a
book published under a CC licence. If you think your
book is likely to produce significant royalties, you should
consider this in negotiations with your publisher.

5 The author remains the copyright holder if no copyright transfer 6 https://creativecommons.org/2020/01/15/thoughts-on-non-

contract was concluded. The same is true if a licence contract was amicable-enforcement-of-cc-licenses/
concluded. However, in a licence contract the author can agree that
the publisher will enforce the CC licence in their place.
14 5. Questions about Creative Commons and open access books BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 15

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5.4
If I publish my book under a
CC BY licence can the book
be translated without my
permission?
Yes, the use of a CC BY licence permits derivative works
to be made, including translations, without seeking the
licensor’s permission. Note that derivatives have
Questions about
repercussions for
to give appropriate credit to the original work, provide a
link to the licence, and indicate if changes were made.
Granting a CC BY licence does not imply that the
original creator endorses any derivatives. If you include
the ND element to your licence, users will have to ask
the licensor (be it the publisher or the author) for
permission before making any derivatives.
scholarship
It is important to understand that a Creative Commons
licence only covers a new piece of scholarship, as an Marking third party content 7
author can only license their own work, not that of
Here’s how you may want to consider marking
others. Third party content is therefore excluded from
third party content that is offered under a
the scope of the Creative Commons licence. Even if an
different CC licence than the one you are using.
author includes in their work a piece of third party
Examples of marking your own work:
content, such as an image, that has been licensed
• Except otherwise noted, this blog is © 2009
under CC BY, the image is excluded from the Creative
Greg Grossmeier, under a Creative Commons
Commons licence that the author applies to their work.
Attribution-ShareAlike licence: http://
This is because the image has been licensed under a
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/.
separate Creative Commons licence, granted by the
image creator. Therefore all third party content,
Example of marking the differently licensed
including content which the author has permission
item:
to use in a publication published with a Creative
• The photo X is © 2009 Jane Park, used under
Commons licence, must be clearly marked in a similar
a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncom-
way to a traditional publication, which would also
mercial licence: http://creativecommons.org/
recognise third party content.
licenses/by-nc/3.0/.

Marking by the author ensures that users understand

In general, when using works offered under CC
the different licence conditions which apply to the third
licences you should consider adhering to best
party content. An example from the Creative Commons
practices for marking that content.
wiki illustrates this (see box).

Clearly marking the excluded elements and stating the

terms under which third party content has been made
available, means that anybody who reuses that content
Steal Like An Artist – “Do good work and share it with people” without permission from the original rights holder may
by Austin Kleon is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 be violating the third party’s copyright, even if they
found the content in an open access publication.

7 https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Best_practices_for_
attribution.
16 6. Questions about repercussions for scholarship BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 17

7
6.2
using the material and may be liable for copyright
Can/should I apply a Creative infringement. The licence is terminated for the user who
violated the licence. However, all other users still need
Commons licence to my to comply with the terms of use of the CC-licensed
research data? material in question. In case of violation of a CC licence,
the licensor can contact the reuser directly to ask to
The application of CC licences to research data is not rectify the situation or begin legal proceedings for
as straightforward as to scholarly papers and books copyright infringement.
because there are many situations in which data is
not protected by copyright. Data like names, numbers
are things that are considered ‘non-original’, part of
6.5
Questions about
derivatives and reuse
the public domain and thus not subject to copyright Are there special circumstances
protection. If your research data qualifies as an original
work then a CC BY licence should be considered. If your
in some disciplines leading to
research data is a database or a dataset (unstructured specific licence demands?
data that do not meet the database definition) usually
7.1 7.2
the best option is a CC0, which waives all your rights in Although CC licences have been used extensively
the database. in scientific open access publishing, they have been Does a CC BY licence mean How can I avoid the
developed to cover a much broader area including data,
6.3 databases, arts, music, photography and the written
that anyone can reuse my work misrepresentation of my
Will Creative Commons word, regardless of discipline. CC licences can therefore however they want to? work in derivatives?
be of use in all disciplines.
licences encourage plagiarism? A CC BY licence allows users to share (copy and As with plagiarism (§6.3), misuse of academic research
It is true though that there is more sensitivity towards redistribute the material in any medium or format) and is a longstanding and recognised problem. Nothing in a
Plagiarism may affect all forms of publishing rather than more liberal forms of reuse in the humanities. adapt (remix, transform, and build upon the material) CC licence makes it acceptable for a user to misrepresent
specifically CC-licensed works. All CC licences require The possibility to translate scholarly works without the for any purposes, also commercially. However, users or misuse an author’s work (see also §6.5). If your work
that the original author is attributed, meaning that any copyright holder’s permission, which is possible under must attribute you (unless you have specifically said that is adapted or used in a way that you do not agree with,
plagiaristic use is unacceptable; failure to attribute some CC licences, tends not to be viewed favorably by you do not want to be attributed) and clearly indicate if for example, because it is incorrect, or because you do
constitutes copyright infringement. It is important to humanities scholars. The ability to control the quality changes have been made to your original work. Additio- not support the stance of the users, you have the option
stress that plagiarism is primarily an issue of academic of the translation is deemed important because of the nally, users must not imply that you endorse or support to request removal of attribution.8
ethics rather than the law. It has some crossover with linguistic nature of much humanities research. The CC the changes that they have made or the new work that
copyright, but content can be plagiarised regardless of BY-ND licence can accommodate these concerns, while they have produced. CC licences also contain a ‘no endorsement, no
how it is licensed, even after it is out of copyright. still allowing the work to be distributed and reused sponsorship’ clause, which explicitly says that users may
Plagiarism is considered an instance of serious widely. not imply that the original author supports or endorses
academic misconduct by ‘The Netherlands Code of their reuse of the work. If they violate this clause, they
Conduct for Scientific Integrity’ and is sanctioned Regardless of any licence, authors can always have are in breach of the CC licence and must stop using the
accordingly. to deal with the issue of wilful misrepresentation. work. In such cases of violation, the violator becomes
These can also happen with citations. That cannot be liable to action under copyright law.
prevented by choosing a specific licence.
6.4
What can I do if somebody
is using my work without
complying with the conditions
of the applied Creative
Commons licence? Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash

For example, if a reuser of CC-licensed material does

not provide the attribution required when sharing the
work, then the user no longer has the right to continue 8 https://creativecommons.org/faq/#what-can-i-do-if-i-offer-my-
material-under-a-creative-commons-license-and-i-do-not-like-
the-way-someone-uses-it
18 7. Questions about derivatives and reuse BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 19

8
7.3
Can I specifically ask not to be Examples of reuse not
attributed for a certain piece of compatible with a ND licence
work? • Modify images – change the colors, edit
someone in or out, crop the image.
Yes, you can. If you do not want to be associated with
• Edit (parts of) a text and reproduce them in a
a certain piece of work, you can ask for your attribution

Questions about
new publication.
to be removed and the user must comply if reasonably
• Customize content to a specific location/
practical.
discipline/focus – change examples, add
different scenarios, change terms to reflect a
7.4
Creative Commons licences
different discipline.
• Translate a work into another language.
• Reuse for open educational resources (9.1)
commercial use
and text and data mining and
why is it relevant to me?
8.1 worrying about whether they may (unintentionally)
Text and data mining (TDM) are algorithmic techniques make money from it.
for processing bodies of texts or other types of data in
Why is the use of a non-
ways, and at scales, that would not be viable manually. commercial Creative Apart from the mentioned interpretation issue – and for
A researcher may wish to examine the ways in which a some more importantly – is the principle that ‘research
specific issue has been represented in the past fifty years
Commons licence that is publicly financed should be available for reuse for
in a corpus of academic works (e.g. academic journal discouraged? all purposes’ because it may help generate products and
articles) through text and data mining. With works that services that benefit society and because organisations
are still in copyright, this may not be possible. Under That is because the definition of ‘non-commercial’ involved in commercial endeavours also pay taxes that
the CC BY licence, however, this type of work can be in Creative Commons is open to interpretation. It is the research is funded by.
undertaken. difficult to know what exactly constitutes commercial
reuse. For example, if someone posted a copy of a 8.2
paper on an educational website that generates even a
small amount of revenue from advertising, it could be
Why should I allow another
considered as commercial reuse. As such, the use of NC party to make money out of
licences could have unwanted consequences on the
possibilities of distribution of your content.
my publications, which is my
intellectual property?
There is considerable debate about whether ‘non-
commercial’ coincides with ‘not-for-profit’. A study The term ‘commercial use’ refers to the fact that an
commissioned by Creative Commons into the inter- organisation intends to obtain a commercial advantage
pretation of ‘commercial’ and ‘non-commercial’ by and possibly aims for financial remuneration. It is
creators and users indicated that uses for charitable tempting to immediately think about large multina-
purposes are considered ‘less commercial’ but not tionals like Shell, Google, Amazon, but actually a non
‘decidedly non-commercial’.10 Therefore, applying a NC commercial licence prevents all revenue-generating
licence to your work could prohibit all types of organi- organisations from reusing your work. This can even
sations that generate revenue from redistributing your include cultural or educational institutions like schools,
work. Permitting all commercial reuse removes this museums or universities. Even those nowadays cannot
problem, and allows people to reuse the work without rely exclusively on public funding and have to rely in

Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash

10 Further information on the study and the work of Creative

Commons on the definition of non-commercial for version 4.0
of the licences is available at: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/
Defining_Noncommercial.
20 8. Questions about commercial use BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 21

9
part on their own revenues. As such, the use of a NC
licence precludes a large pool of organizations and Examples of reuse not
institutions from reusing your work, thus possibly
reducing its impact and visibility.
compatible with a NC licence
• Distribute a work in the context of a
No matter who the commercial party reusing the
commercial summer school course.
material is, the intended reuse may not necessarily
• Copy a text for indexing or text mining for
be a bad thing. Think about pharmaceutical companies

Open educational
commercial purposes.
using text and data mining techniques to develop new
• Reproduce a work in magazines, newspapers
drugs or vaccines; or bringing together papers from
or websites that produce revenues.
prestigious journals and selling them as printed text-
• Reuse parts of a work (e.g. tables or figures)

resources and Creative

books in less-developed countries with limited internet
for advertising or marketing purposes.
access.

One of the reasons why open access is supported in

the Netherlands and globally, is its potential to foster
and accelerate innovation and economic development.
Funders like NWO and ZonMw want to maximize the
Commons licences
social and economic impact of their publicly funded
research and are held accountable to that. The use
of restrictive NC licences could seriously hamper Belonging to the umbrella of Open Science, Open 9.1
economic and social growth. For this reason, NWO, Educational Resources (OER) are “learning, teaching
ZonMw and all COAlition S funders will not accept and research materials in any format and medium that
How do OER differ from
licences that include the NC condition. reside in the public domain or are under copyright that open access publications?
have been released under an open licence, that permit
no-cost access, reuse, re-purpose, adaptation and Both OER and open access (OA) publications – scholarly
redistribution by others” (2019 UNESCO Recommen- books and journal articles – are openly licensed mate-
dation on OER). OER include textbooks, syllabi, articles, rials that imply free unrestricted access. Unlike OA
lecture notes, videos, images, simulations, exercises, publications that may encompass the whole range of
whole courses and many other types of educational CC licences, OER are always available under a licence
contents. that allows adaptations (CC BY, SA, NC or their com-
binations). Thus, CC ND-licensed materials fall out of
CC licences are essential to understanding and using the scope of OER. Generally speaking, OER are usually
the abovementioned five permissions of OER, or the associated with teaching, while OA publications belong
‘5R activities’,11 namely the right to retain, revise, remix, to research practices. However, OA publications can be
reuse and redistribute specific materials. These rights used for teaching purposes and may also qualify as OER,
are granted to the user by the copyright holder through if released under an appropriate CC licence.12
licensing the original content with a combination of
different CC licences – BY, SA, NC – or through
dedicating the material to the public domain (CC0).
Thus, CC-licensing conditions provide a clear indication
of what is and is not allowed when creating, reusing or
revising OER content.

Photo by DESIGNECOLOGIST on Unsplash

11 The concept is derived from Defining the “Open” in Open 12 This paragraph is adapted from Open Access & Education,
Content and Open Educational Resources by David Wiley, Expanded by Abbey Elder, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
licensed under CC BY 4.0.
22 9. Open educational resources and Creative Commons licences BACK TO CONTENTS Guide to Creative Commons for Scholarly Publications and Educational Resources 23

9.2 9.3
Glossary
How do Creative Commons How will Creative Commons
licences allow me to incor- content affect my teaching? Attribution (BY): the original author lets others Original author: in the case of a literary or artistic
porate OER in my teaching? One of the biggest hurdles to those wishing to use OER
use their work if they give credit the way the author work, the individual, individuals, entity or entities who
requests. created the work.
is the content from third parties and the lack of agreed
Using CC licences is an easy way to keep your
pricing structure from publishers of such content to use
copyright and at the same time enable legal sharing Collection: the work in its entirety in unmodified form Work: the literary and/or artistic work offered under the
the material for open access purposes.
of educational resources with teachers and learners along with one or more other separate and independent terms of the licence including without limitation any
worldwide. Due to the permissive nature of CC licences works, assembled into a collective whole. production in the literary, scientific, and artistic domain,
By licensing your work under CC licences, you ensure
used for the creation and publication of OER, such whatever may be the mode or form of its expression
that you and others can teach using your scholarly
materials can be integrated into most courses and Derivative (works): material in any form that is including digital form, such as a book, pamphlet, and
outputs. As previously indicated, certain forms of
enable educators to use or develop innovative and created by editing, modifying or adapting the work, other writing.
existing copyright transfer can interfere with this
learner-centered resources. a substantial part of the work, or the work and other
practice.
pre-existing works. Derivative (works) may, for example, Remix: mixing material from different sources or
CC licences allow a teacher to be both a user and a include a translation, adaptation, musical arrangement, multiple works to create a wholly new creation or work.
Licensing academic content under CC licences implies
creator of OER at the same time. Teachers can (re)use dramatisation, motion picture version, sound recor- One often cannot tell where one open work ends and
awareness that the web facilitates sharing and reuse.
CC-licensed presentations, books, simulations, mind ding, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or another one begins. All remixes are derivative works, but
Books and other materials made available online and
maps and images and embed them into their courses as any other form in which the work may be transformed, not all derivative works are remixes, e.g. a translation.
licensed with CC licences pose fewer restrictions for
part of the core or auxiliary materials. Teachers can also recast, remixed, tweaked or adapted.
their distribution and access, therefore potentially
become co-creators of OER by revising and remixing Reproduce: to make copies of the work by any means,
increasing the likelihood of an impact outside higher
contents and adapting them to specific educational Distribute: to make the original and copies of the work e.g. digitally, including without limitation by sound or
education.
needs: translating them, enriching them with locally or derivative available to the public by means, including visual recordings, by fixation and reproducing fixations
relevant examples or updating them according to recent publication, electronic communication, of the work and storage of a protected performance or
developments in the field. For instance, openly licensed storage in digital form or broadcast. phonogram in digital form or other medium.
works can be used to create open textbooks, which help
reduce the daunting cost of textbooks and therefore Licensor: the individual, individuals, entity or entities Share Alike (SA): the rights holder allows others to
make educational material more accessible. that own(s) copyright in the work and are authorised to make derivatives from the author’s original work, but
offer the work under the terms of a CC licence. they should distribute these derivative works only under
a licence which is similar or recognized compatible to
Licensee: the parties gaining access to the work the licence that governs the original work.
offered under the terms of a CC licence (publisher,
the public). Share: copy and redistribute the material in any
medium or format.
Non-Commercial (NC): the rights holder lets others
use the work but for non-commercial purposes only. Third-party content: material created by others.
It does not mean that works may never be used for
commercial purposes, but this requires a separate
permission from the rights holder.

No Derivatives (ND): the rights holder authorizes

others to copy, distribute, display, and perform only
verbatim copies of the work, but does not grant the
permission to make derivative works based upon it.
The right to make adaptations is subject to separate
permission.

Photo by Umberto on Unsplash

24

Attribution and
acknowledgements

This work is a derivative of Ellen Collins, Caren Milloy This guide has been written by:
and Graham Stone, Guide to Creative Commons for • Pascal Braak (University of Amsterdam)
Humanities and Social Science Monograph Authors, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0491-3558
ed. James Baker, Martin Paul Eve and Ernesto Priego
(London: Jisc Collections, 2013). Available at: • Hans de Jonge (NWO)
http://oapen-uk.jiscebooks.org/ccguide/. Licensed under https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1189-9133
a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
The original text has been cut, edited and mixed with • Giulia Trentacosti (University of Groningen)
original content. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4871-477X

In addition, this work reused material from the • Irene Verhagen (Wageningen University & Research)
following CC-licensed sources: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5588-1333
• About CC Licences. Licensed under a Creative
Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. • Saskia Woutersen (Leiden University)
https://creativecommons.org/about/cclicenses/ https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0120-266X
• Martin Paul Eve, Open Access and the Humanities:
Contexts, Controversies and the Future (Cambridge: The authors would like to thank Myroslava Zhuk
Cambridge University Press, 2014). (University of Groningen) for contributing the section
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316161012. about Open Educational Resources. The authors would
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution also like to extend their gratitude to Annemarie Beunen
license. (National Library of the Netherlands), Jeroen Bosman
• Open Textbooks, OER & Other Open or Free (Utrecht University), Martin Paul Eve (Birkbeck College,
Resources for Faculty. Licensed under a University of London) for reviewing this guide.
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0
International License. https://guides.kirkwood.edu/c. October 2020
php?g=435826&p=3926923
• Paul Klimpel, Free Knowledge based on Creative DOI
Commons Licenses Consequences, risks and https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4090923
side-effects of the license module „non-commercial
use only – NC (Berlijn 2012) https://vlaamse-erf- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons
goedbibliotheken.be/en/node/2725 Attribution 4.0 International License.

Whenever sources other than the OAPEN-UK guide

are reused, this is clearly indicated in the footnotes
throughout the document and the sources are
properly attributed.