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What are the Creative Commons Licenses?

When browsing online we often find content that we would like to copy and reuse in our own work. But are we allowed to do so? Who do we need to contact to find out? Which conditions apply?

Online content that is not labelled is generally protected by copyright and should never be copied into your work unless you have asked for permission first.

The Creative Commons (CC) licenses are an easy tool for creators of content to communicate that their work is available for reuse and to communicate the rules for the reuse, e.g. that you must be attributed as the creator.

On the other hand, the CC licenses are an easy way for the users to see that content is allowed to be reused and to find the conditions for the reuse.

What kind of content can be labelled with Creative Commons?

The CC licenses can be applied to almost any online content that can be copyright protected, e.g. artwork, graphics, photographs, music, educational resources, presentation slides, databases, e-books, research papers and research data.

What license options are there?

A overview of the various license options is shown in the table below. More details can be found on the website of the Creative Commons. If you unsure which license to choose for your own work, try out the CC Licence Chooser.

How to Find CC images that you can reuse in your own work

Visit the Commons Search to search for reusable images from several platforms. You can also limit your search by works that can be reused commercially or those that allow for remixes.

CC Licenses in Science

The CC licenses and public domain tools are widely used to share scientific research and data. The most common licence type used for Open Access publications and datasets is the CC BY. Here are two examples for a research paper in the journal Frontiers and a research dataset in the repository Zenodo.

If you still have questions about the Creative Commons, consult their extensive FAQ or contact us at naturwissenschaften@hbz.uzh.ch.