Acquiring Essential Knowledge
WHY SHARE?
Because educators and librarians can share OER with everyone for near zero cost,[1] we should do this. After all, education is fundamentally about sharing knowledge and ideas. Libraries are about archiving, sharing, and helping learners to find the knowledge they seek. When we CC-license our work, we are sharing that work with the public under simple, legal permissions. Sharing your work is a gift to the world.
CHOOSING A CC LICENSE FOR OER
As you may remember, not all educational materials that are available under a CC license are OER. Review the chart in figure 5.7 that details which CC licenses work well for education resources and which do not.
The two CC NoDerivatives (ND) licenses are not OER-compatible licenses because they don’t allow the public to revise or remix the educational resource. Because the ND licenses do not meet the 5Rs or any of the major OER definitions, the Open Education movement does not consider ND-licensed educational resources to be “OER.”
| most freedom |  |
OER |
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Not OER | |
| least freedom | 
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NOTE
- ↑ While in many EU member states and some other countries cost may not be a problem, restrictive copyright and narrow fair use and fair dealing rights can limit new teaching methods.
