yolink, “a next-generation search technology,” has added CC license support to its updated browser plugin. yolink’s browser plugin allows you to quickly scan your search results by specific key terms, effectively simplifying your more complex or advanced searches. Once you’ve found a relevant article, you can then share it with others via social media sites [...]

When we published Open Doors and Open Minds, we promised a companion piece that discusses in detail some of the legal considerations that university administrators and university general counsels may wish to consider in adopting a public access policy. I’m happy to say that this is now available. This excellent companion piece, providing a thorough [...]

Poet and scholar Lewis Hyde has been writing about the commons for over thirty years. His first book, The Gift (1983), is regarded as the modern classic on Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World–the 25th anniversary edition’s subtitle. His new book, Common as Air, directly addresses the cultural commons, and could hardly be [...]

The Peer 2 Peer University, more commonly known now as P2PU by a growing community of self-learners, educators, journalists, and web developers, launches its third round of courses today, opening sign-ups for “courses dealing in subject areas ranging from Collaborative Lesson Planning to Manifestations of Human Trafficking.” P2PU is simultaneously launching its School of Webcraft, [...]

Last year, we were thrilled to have Shepard Fairey craft a beautiful new design for our campaign T-shirt. Knowing they’d be a hot commodity, we kept a limited number of the shirts and are now making them available in our online store until they sell out. If you didn’t grab one of these beauties last [...]

At the beginning of this year we announced a revised approach to our education plans, focusing our activities to support of the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement. In order to do so we have worked hard to increase the amount of information available on our own site – in addition to an Education landing page and the OER [...]

SoundCloud has long been a preeminent destination for creators looking to share and distribute music and audio online. From the beginning SoundCloud has supported CC-licensing options – today they launched a slew of new features that bolster this integration broadly, with a particular impact on those looking for CC-licensed music. Advanced search options, a CC [...]

Creative Commons Australia is putting their annual conference on wheels. Previously, the national meet-ups were held at the project’s home base in Brisbane. Now the team is hitting the road and taking the event to cities across the country. Each CC Roadshow is designed for those interested in finding out about CC for the first [...]

Fotopedia, in collaboration with the UNESCO World Heritage Center, has created a breathtaking new application for the iPhone and iPad. The app builds on the concept of a coffee table book, updating and enhancing the browsing experience for the web. UNESCO World Heritage “seeks to encourage the identification, protection and preservation of cultural and natural [...]

Almost 1½ years have passed since we launched CC0 v1.0, our public domain waiver that allows rights holders to place a work as nearly as possible into the public domain, worldwide, prior to the expiration of copyright. CC0 has proven a valuable tool for governments, scientists, data providers, providers of bibliographic data, and many others [...]

Photo by Christine Mytko / CC BY-NC At the beginning of this year we announced a revised approach to our education plans, focusing our activities to support of the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement. In order to do so we have worked hard to increase the amount of information available on our own site – in [...]

Today the U.S. Department of Education took another big step in supporting open educational resources (OER). In the Federal Register, the Department released a notice of proposed priorities (NPP): The Secretary of Education proposes priorities that the Department of Education (Department) may use for any appropriate discretionary grant program in fiscal year (FY) 2011 and future years [...]

We are happy to announce an experiment in the public discussion process of our licenses, piloted by CC Costa Rica. Customarily, we post a static text document of the licenses, including a re-translation and summary of changes in English, to our website. The community can download these files and submit comments on the jurisdiction’s mailing [...]

Creative Commons CEO Joi Ito has a great post on his blog today about license proliferation. Drawing from his experience as a board member at both ICANN and the Open Source Initiative, Ito outlines the problems created by license proliferation: As sharing and the adoption of new, free licenses begins to accelerate, I believe we [...]

Photo by Luis Villa del Campo / CC BY Last month the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) sent an ill-advised fundraising letter to its members, signed by the organization’s president. The letter made obviously false and easily rebutted claims about Creative Commons and was lambasted across the net. See our response for [...]

The British Library has published a new report, Driving UK Research – Is copyright a help or a hindrance? (pdf). Sourced directly from 13 active researchers and educators, the report reflects the hindrances that copyright as currently structured pose to their daily work, and a consensus on the need for reform. The report also features [...]

Creative Commons is deeply honored to announce CERN corporate support at the “creator level”. CERN is one of the world’s premier scientific institutions–home of the Large Hadron Collider and birthplace of the web. This donation comes on the occasion of the publication under Creative Commons licenses of the first results of LHC experiments. Dr. Salvatore [...]

The Washington State Board for Community & Technical Colleges (SBCTC) recently adopted an open licensing policy for the competitive grants they administer: All digital software, educational resources and knowledge produced through competitive grants, offered through and/or managed by the SBCTC, will carry a Creative Commons Attribution License … [and] applies to all funding sources (state, [...]

Last week our month-long Catalyst Grant campaign drew to a close with over 130 project applications and nearly $50,000 raised to make those ideas a reality. The Catalyst Grant program wouldn’t be possible without the support of the 254 individual donors who helped us raise that amount, 100% of which goes to our grant program. [...]

Last week, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) sent a fundraising letter to its members calling on them to fight “opponents” such as Creative Commons, falsely claiming that we work to undermine copyright.* Creative Commons licenses are copyright licenses – plain and simple. Period. CC licenses are legal tools that creators can [...]

In the closing days our Catalyst Campaign we’ve received many outstanding proposals and expect to receive more in the closing hours. Today is the last day all donations received will go toward funding proposed projects. Grants proposed for funding under this program are being posted and tracked in a completely transparent process – you’ll be [...]

At the beginning of this year we announced a revised approach to our education plans, focusing our activities to support of the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement. In order to do so we have worked hard to increase the amount of information available on our own site – in addition to a new Education landing page and [...]

In September, Mozilla and P2PU are launching the P2PU School of Webcraft, and they invite you to participate. The partnership leverages Mozilla’s experience and the P2PU community to create a social learning environment for those who want to “learn the craft of open and standards-based web development.” The P2PU School of Webcraft is a set [...]

Today we’ve released a new CC content search interface on our Labs site for an initial live beta, testing some interface variations, before completely replacing our current search UI. Why are we changing it? Many of you use and love search.creativecommons.org, judging by actual use and tweets about the service. After four years of the [...]

Last week in the vuDAT building at Michigan State University, a group of developers interested in educational search and discovery got together to contribute code (in what’s commonly called a code sprint) to Creative Commons’ DiscoverEd project. Readers interested in the technical details about our work last week can find daily posts on CC Labs [...]

At the beginning of this year we announced a revised approach to our education plans, focusing our activities to support of the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement. In order to do so we have worked hard to increase the amount of information available on our own site – in addition to a new Education landing page and [...]

Yesterday Aviary released a brand new music creation tool, codenamed Roc. Roc employs a straight-forward grid-based interface that enables Aviary users of all musical backgrounds to create compositions easily. Most exciting to the CC community is that the instrument library accompanying Rock is released under a CC Attribution license: Best of all, completed music made [...]

Mozilla has announced the first ever Drumbeat Festival focused on learning, freedom, and the web. Mozilla wants you to save the dates November 4-5, as the festival is set to take place in Barcelona—also where the Open Ed Conference will be taking place from November 2-4. From the announcement: Learning, freedom and the web are [...]

Neal Gorenflo by Shareable | CC BY-NC-SA Last week, Shareable—the online magazine about sharing culture—launched a survey asking you how much you share. The survey contributed to CC’s Catalyst Campaign, which is continuing through the month of June. This week, CC talks with Shareable co-founder and publisher, Neal Gorenflo. The caption for Shareable is “Design [...]