Create OER - Copyright | OER - Lamson Library at Plymouth State University

What is Creative Commons?

The most common open licenses used with OER are the Creative Commons Licenses. These customizable licenses allow creators to choose the terms that are right for them. Use the Creative Commons License Chooser to determine what license is right for you.

"Creative Commons Licenses Explained" by MaconEastLibraryProject is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

The 6 Creative Commons Licenses

	Attribution CC BY This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, 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-ShareAlike CC BY-SA This license lets others remix, tweak, 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. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.
	Attribution-NoDerivs CC BY-ND This license allows for redistribution, commercial and non-commercial, as long as it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with credit to you.
	Attribution-NonCommercial CC BY-NC This license lets others remix, tweak, 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-NonCommercial-ShareAlike CC BY-NC-SA This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms.
	Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 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.

Creative Commons Video

Questions to Consider When Creating OER

Planning on creating an OER yourself? Consider these 4 questions:

Which open license is right for you?

Visit the Creative Commons tab of this guide to learn about some of your options and how to apply the licenses.

How will people discover your OER?

A file sitting on your computer isn't very useful; to maximize the visibility of your OER, you must find a platform to host it. Consider the options on the Find OER tab of this guide.

How easy will it be for others to revise and remix your OER?

Consider the ALMS framework in order to help you choose formats that can be edited by others.

If involving students in the creation of your OER, how best to respect their rights and privacy?

Let students decide. Offer students a choice of whether to openly license their work for inclusion in the OER and don't penalize students who opt out. Consider alternative ways for students to fulfill course requirements.

Allow pseudonyms. Some students have valid reasons for wanting to avoid leaving a digital footprint.

Inform students of their copyrights. Librarian Christin Wixson is available to drop into classes to support student understanding of copyright and OER.

See A Guide to Making Open Textbooks with Students for more information.

ALMS Framework

Content in this box is based on original writing by David Wiley, which was published freely under CC BY 4.0.

Consider the ALMS framework when designing your own OER to increase the usefulness of your open content:

Access to Editing Tools: Is the open content published in a format that can only be revised or remixed using tools that are extremely expensive (e.g., 3DS MAX)? Is the open content published in a format that can be revised or remixed using tools that are freely available and run on all major platforms (e.g., OpenOffice)?
Level of Expertise Required: Is the open content published in a format that requires a significant amount technical expertise to revise or remix (e.g., Blender)? Is the open content published in a format that requires a minimum level of technical expertise to revise or remix (e.g., Word)?
Meaningfully Editable: Is the open content published in a manner that makes its content essentially impossible to revise or remix (e.g., a scanned image of a handwritten document)? Is the open content published in a manner making its content easy to revise or remix (e.g., a text file)?
Self-Sourced: It the format preferred for consuming the open content the same format preferred for revising or remixing the open content (e.g., HTML)? Is the format preferred for consuming the open content different from the format preferred for revising or remixing the open content (e.g. Flash FLA vs SWF)?

If you are having technical difficulties revising or remixing others' OERs, contact your librarian.