For others, the CC legal tools and their icons express an affinity for a set of core values. CC icons have become ubiquitous symbols for sharing, openness, and human collaboration. The CC logo and icons are now part of the permanent design collection at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
While there is no single motivation for using CC licenses, there is a basic sense that CC licensing is rooted in a fundamental belief that knowledge and creativity are the building blocks of our culture rather than simple commodities from which to extract market value. The licenses reflect a belief that everyone has something to contribute, and that no one can own our shared culture. Fundamentally, the licenses reflect a belief in the promise and benefits of sharing.
THE MOVEMENT
Since 2001, a global coalition of people has formed around Creative Commons and open licensing.[1] This includes activists working on copyright reform around the globe; policy-makers advancing policies that mandate open access to publicly funded educational resources, research, and data; and creators who share a core set of values. In fact, most of the people and institutions that are part of the CC movement are not formally connected to Creative Commons.
Creative Commons has a formal CC Global Network,[2] which includes lawyers, activists, scholars, artists, and more, all working on a wide range of projects and issues connected to sharing and collaboration. But the CC Global Network is just one player in the larger open movement, which includes Wikipedians, Mozillians, open access advocates, and many more.
Open source software is cited as the first domain where networked open sharing produced a tangible benefit as a movement that went much further than technology. The Conversation website’s Explainer summarizes other movements (http://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-the-open-movement-10308) adds other examples, such as Open Innovation in the corporate world, Open Data (see the Open Data Commons at https://opendatacommons.org), and Crowdsourcing. There is also the Open Access movement, which aims to make research widely available; the Open Science movement; and the growing movement around Open Educational Resources.
CREATIVE COMMONS: THE ORGANIZATION
Creative Commons is a small nonprofit organization that stewards the CC legal tools and helps power the open movement. Creative Commons is a distributed organization, with CC staff and contractors working around the world.
NOTES
- ↑ While other custom open copyright licenses have been developed in the past, we recommend using Creative Commons licenses because they are up-to-date, free to use, and have been broadly adopted by governments, institutions, and individuals as the global standard for open copyright licenses.
- ↑ The work of the CC Global Network is organized into what we call “Network Platforms;” think of them as working groups. Anyone interested in working on a Platform can join and contribute as much or as little time and effort as they choose. Read more about our Network Platforms at https://creativecommons.org/about/global-affiliate-network/network-platforms/ to see if there is an area of work that interests you. If interested, please get involved!
