Licensing, Creative Commons and attribution

Licensing is when the owner of intellectual property gives permission for someone else to use their work, under conditions the owner sets out. You need that permission before using protected work, unless a legal exception applies or a licence already covers what you want to do.

Licensing sets the rules

A licence is not a free-for-all: the owner decides exactly what is allowed, and the conditions are binding. Typical restrictions include:

• Non-commercial use only — you can use the work in a free project but not to make money, so a community newsletter is fine while a shop's advert is not.
• Share-alike — if you adapt the work, your new version must be released under the same licence, so nobody can lock up your improved version.
• No adaptations — the work has to be used exactly as it is, with no edits.

Break a condition and you fall outside the licence, which makes your use unauthorised.

Creative Commons

Creative Commons (CC) is a type of licensing that lets work be used free of charge, provided you keep to the conditions the owner has chosen. For example, a track marked CC BY-NC could be used in a school robotics club video, but not as background music in a company advert, because NC means non-commercial. A Creative Commons licence does not mean a work has no conditions and can be used however you like.

Attribution

Attribution means acknowledging the original creator when their work is used under a licence or with permission. Most Creative Commons licences require it. If you use a CC-licensed dragon illustration by a local artist on a club website, name the artist and state the licence, for example "Illustration by J. Okafor, CC BY 4.0", with a link to the licence terms. Credit does not create permission: attributing a song you had no right to use does not make that use legal.