OER Handbook/license OER
Note: The page is outdated, please see http://www.wikieducator.org/OER_Handbook/educator instead.
Contents
Licensing guidelines
Basic
The legal aspects of an OER project can be daunting. Excellent resources exist online, and you will find communities of practice that are willing to help with your questions, but the best solution is a local expert who you can rely on. This is another area, where it makes sense to identify and leverage existing expertise within your institution. If there is a legal department that has expertise in copyright law, try to get them on board for advice.
Copyright law varies from country to country, but it generally provides legal protection - over a limited period of time - for original works. It does not matter if these works are published or not, both are protected.
Copyright reserves certain rights to copyright holder, and others need to ask permission to do any of the following:
- Create derivative works from the original work
- Distribute originals or copies of the work
- Publicly display or perform the work.
Once the copyright period is over, these limitations fall away. Once the limitations have expired, the work is said to be 'in the public domain.' In general, a work in the public domain can be used without the author's permission as well as modified to suit whatever purpose you would like. It is difficult to give the exact rules and freedoms granted by public domain, as it varies from country to country.
Additionally, certain exemptions to copyright protection are set out in laws or regulation, referred to as fair use in some countries, or fair dealings in others. As with public domain, what constitutes fair use varies from country to country.
As mentioned in the introduction, legal issues prevent the wide-spread sharing of educational resources without the use of a 'copyleft' license. This section will describe some of the most popular copyleft licenses including Creatives Commons and the GNU Free Documentation License(GFDL).
Creative Commons license
Creative Commons started as a way to reserve some rights over a intellectual property without making it absolutely free, as is the case when something is put in the public domain. There is no single Creative Commons license. Rather, there are several different versions of the Creative Commons license, which allow for different freedoms. The idea behind Creative Commons is to give users a simple way of understanding copyright, without complicated legal jargon.
However, in order to understand how Creative Commons works, there are a few terms you need to know the definition for. Here's a sample Creative Commons license.
Get the license image
CC-BY-NC-SA
The "BY" clause of the license is short for "By Attribution." That means whenever this resource the author needs to be given credit. Creative Commons does not specify how the attribution must be given, except that it should follow any stipulations given by the author. For example, an author must specify that attribution must read "John Doe - Wikia Inc. http://www.wikia.com." In those cases you should follow the author's wishes. If the author does not specify it is up to you to determine how to attribute the work. As an example, say you have an image that you used in an instructional video. You are not obligated to give attribution at the exact moment in the video you use the image, but you would want to list the author and possibly the URL of the image at the credits in the end. However, you are ethically obligated to display the attribution in a clear and meaningful manner. Putting the attribution in a tiny font size or providing simply the username without any indication where the resource came from would be examples of unethical attribution.
The "NC" clause stands for "Non-Commercial." The Non-Commercial clause specifies that a work cannot be used for commercial. For example, a non-profit organization would be allowed to use the work as part of its promotional material. However, a bank, or other type of commercial organization, could not use it. The Non-Commercial clause is arguably one of the most controversial clauses, for several reason. One reason it is controversial is that there is no exact definition of non-commercial. Some might argue that a fund raising brochure by a church still constitutes a commercial use because the purpose is to obtain money, even though the organization itself is non-profit. Some, such as open education commentator Stephen Downes, believe that the non-commercial clause is essential to preserving OER, because without it companies will take up OER and use it without supporting contributors. In fact, he believes that companies will use their resources to make their version of the OER that costs money more attractive or available than the free version and will essentially silence the creator. Others, such as David Wiley (another figure in the OER community), believe that the Non-Commercial clause prevents legitimate uses of OER.
"SA" stands for "Share-Alike." This clause is a very important one. The "SA" clause specifies that however the resource is used, it must shared in the same way. For example, say you were creating a video that used a song that was licensed with a "Share-Alike" clause. That video must then be licensed with the same license as the picture. Some believe that the SA clause is extremely important in assuring that OER stays freely available to the community. Others feel that the SA is an impediment to legitimate uses of OER that for one reason or another are not able license the new work as Share-Alike.
"ND" stands for "No Derivatives." Derivatives are variations from the original. Examples of derivatives might include: rewriting text, cropping an image or reducing the length of the video. Putting a "No Derivatives" clause on the license prevents
Here's an example of some of the license possibilities:
Attribution (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, in terms of what others can do with your works licensed under Attribution.
Attribution Share Alike (by-sa)
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial reasons, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use.
Attribution No Derivatives (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 Non-commercial (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 Non-commercial Share Alike (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. Others can download and redistribute your work just like the by-nc-nd license, but they can also translate, make remixes, and produce new stories based on your work. All new work based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also be non-commercial in nature.
Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives (by-nc-nd)
This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, allowing redistribution. This license is often called the “free advertising” license because it allows others to download your works and share them with others as long as they mention you and link back to you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.
Source:
http://creativecommons.org/about/license/
Which license should I use?
It is difficult to give an exact answer. If you are using OER with a Share-Alike clause, then you must abide by the terms of the license and redistribute the OER with the same license. In other cases, it is a matter of personal choice. Some believe that in order for an OER to be truly free, it must contain a Non-Commercial clause to prevent commercial entities from hoarding materials and blocking access to free versions. Others feel that because commercial activity is difficult to define, OER should be licensed without a Non-Commercial clause, to ensure the widest possible use.
When you are ready to license your OER, think of your audience. Will they want to use it for something that might be considered commercial activity? Are you concerned about commercial entities using the OER? The answers to these questions will help you decide whether or not to use the Non-Commercial clause. You may also want to ask yourself "Do I care if someone develops a resource from my OER that is not open?" If so, use a Share-Alike clause so users are required to share resulting materials.
Don't worry too much about how you license your first OER. Many people switch licenses depending on a particular project. As you learn more about OER and the community you will have a better sense of what to license future OER.
Adding a Creative Commons license to a website
Some services, such as Flickr, have their own custom method for selecting a license. Other services use the same license for all of the resources hosted on their website. However, if you need to license a resource on an individual website it is a fairly straightforward process.
First, go to the Creative Commons website. Select "License a work," which is found in the top-right corner. You'll then see a list of questions for you to answer. The first question asks whether you want to allow commercial use. The second question asks whether you want to allow derivatives. Next, you'll be asked to select the country of jurisdiction (which is the country you are located in). Once you click "Select a License," you'll be taken to a different new page. On this new page, you'll have three options for license images. Each of the images lead to same license, it is purely a matter of aesthetic taste. The text below is the HTML code that should be entered into the page. If you do not know HTML, consult an education technologist or someone who is knowledgeable in web programming and design.
Once the image is on the website, visitors will be able to click on it and see the terms of the license.
Advanced
Del.icio.us tags: oer-toolkit licensing
The legal aspects of an OER project can be daunting. Excellent resources exist online, and you will find communities of practice that are willing to help with your questions, but the best solution is a local expert who you can rely on. This is another area, where it makes sense to identify and leverage existing expertise within your institution. If there is a legal department that has expertise in copyright law, try to get them on board for advice.
Copyright law varies from country to country, but it generally provides legal protection - over a limited period of time - for original works. It does not matter if these works are published or not, both are protected.
Copyright reserves certain rights to copyright holder, and others need to ask permission to do any of the following:
- Create derivative works from the original work
- Distribute originals or copies of the work
- Publicly display or perform the work.
Once the copyright period is over, these limitations fall away.
In most countries, certain exemptions to copyright protection are set out in laws or regulation, referred to as fair use in some countries, or fair dealings in others. Typically education institutions will be allowed some flexibility in reproducing copyrighted materials for the purpose of education. However, the law is often unclear on the exact amount of flexibility, and republication on the Internet is certainly not allowed under fair use or fair dealings provisions.
Copyright alternatives – Creative Commons and other licenses
OER projects make use of free and open content licenses, which are based on the legal protection that copyright affords, but specify clearly which rights the author shares with users of the content. The most popular set of licenses are the creative commons licenses, but many other exist. Most creative commons licenses allow users to freely use and redistribute the licensed works, but they have to attribute the original author. Some licenses are more restrictive, and don't allow modification (creation of derivative works), or commercial use. Another option (Share Alike) is referred to as copyleft, because it requires all users to license any derivative works under a similar free and open license. The GNU Free Documentation license has special significance, because it is used by the Wikipedia project.
The long list of license options can be confusing. In addition, some licenses are incompatible with each other. License incompatibility means that content that is licensed under a particular type of license cannot be combined with content that is licensed under certain other licenses. A table that highlights which licenses are compatible with each other is provided in a later section of this document. License incompatibility has resulted in distinct knowledge silos of open educational resources. This is an unfortunate situation since most of the authors are trying to make their materials widely accessible and encourage others to modify and adapt them to local needs.
The following image demonstrates how license incompatibilities currently break the OER space into separate clusters of content. It uses four popular OER project (MIT OpenCourseware, Wikipedia, WikiEducator, and Connexions) and their license choices, which do not allow mixing of the content.
Illustration: OER Galaxies diagram by David Wiley http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/339
The discussion over which license is the most free and open, and which of the creative commons options to use and which to avoid has raged on for many months. The ccLearn project, an initiative by creative commons and the Hewlett Foundation is trying to address this issue by educating on the use of particular licenses, and by creating a transition strategy that will increase compatibility between different sets of resource in the future. See their recommendations below.
To guide OER project struggling to find the right type of license, the ccLearn project (a division of creative commons that focuses on education) has defined three levels of freedom of OERs, and provides some guidelines on choosing the appropriate level of freedom (ccLearn, 2007). [NEED A LINK]
Some projects have designed their own custom licenses, for example the BCCampus license developed by the Bccampus project in Canada, which limits the Openness to use in the province of British Columbia.
The BC Commons license is similar to the Creative Commons license but limits sharing to the local context of BC’s public post-secondary system. Resources licensed via BC Commons are available to BC public post-secondary faculty and staff only. This option provides developers with an opportunity to experience sustainable development benefits through sharing on a local level, among peers, before considering the larger global context. Over 90% of OPDF developers have chosen the BC Commons license. Paul Stacey, Bccampus case-study (2007)
Applying licenses to different types of content Creative commons licenses are applied in different ways to different types of media: Text: Insert license into text documents (for example, add a footer with the license terms) Audio: In the case of MP3 files, the license can be inserted into the file, in the form of so-called ID3 tags. Video: Insert a short sequence that displays license icons at the beginning and end of the video and print the license details on the medium (CD/DVD) and cover. E-learning system: Many software applications now allow automatic integration of licenses, which will then be appended to all pages. License icons and template text are available for download from the http://www.creativecommons.org site, and a set of common questions and answers is provided for those wanting to learn more: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/FAQ.
Clearing copyrights
One of the most burdensome aspects of publishing OERs is to verify and ensure that none of the materials you intend to license under such a free and open license, fall under someone else's copyright. In other words, you can't publish content that you do not own as OER without explicit permission from the copyright holder.
Launching an OER initiative in 2003 was not met with open arm enthusiasm by all. Having to deal with Intellectual Property and copyright issues up front caused our developers a lot of angst as these are contentious issues handled in different ways at each public post secondary institution. While a considered and legally counselled approach was built in to our OER initiative IP and copyright are emotional issues that tend to get people riled up requiring rational and continuous explanation to sooth. Paul Stacey, BCCampus case-study (2007)
The first step is usually to review the general guidelines with regard to ownership of resources developed by employees of your institution. Some institutions require all employees to cede ownership to the institution, others allow more flexibility. Further, universities might have clear licensing guidelines for resources developed by its employees. In this case the employee still holds the copyright, but can be required to license the materials under a specific license.
Fair use exemption usually do not apply to content published on the Internet, and the legal details are difficult to navigate even for an educated layman. It is best to clarify ownership, and publish only resources that you are legally entitled to.
| University of the Western Cape, South Africa
The University of the Western Cape has an official policy for publishing "free content" and "free / open courseware" that applies to all educational content produced at UWC. The policy sets out three licensing scenarios that make use of Creative Commons licenses. Creative Commons licenses provide a more flexible framework for authors to determine which rights they want to reserve and which rights they want to make available to create a vibrant and open knowledge and education commons. Content for which no immediate commercial revenue is expected (CC BY-SA) The default license for educational content produced at UWC is the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike (by-sa) license. This is the license that most respects freedom, by allowing copying for any purpose and production of derivative works as long as those derivative works are made available to the community under identical terms. It is this restriction that ensures any derivative works, even if done for commercial purposes, come back to the author and the community. Content is expected to be published commercially (CC BY-NC-SA) In cases where content is expected to be published commercially, the appropriate license is Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike Non-commercial (by-sa-nc), which allows content to be copied and extended for non-commercial purposes only. It may seem counter-intuitive, but content published in this manner generally earns greater revenue from sales than content published under full copyright. Following the elapse of a period of time after which commercial revenue is unlikely, to be gained, the license will revert to by-sa even for work in this category. The recommended time period is 5 years, but the authors are free to alter this to a shorter or longer period depending on circumstances. Content, for which derivative works are not appropriate (CC BY-ND) The appropriate license for opinion pieces and other works where the author feels it is important that the work not be altered or extended in any way (this also prevents translations) is the Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives (by-nd). |
(
: Is there an online link to the UWC policy? Would be nice to have this as an example)
(: We should ask Leigh about a shortened Case study for Otago Poly's new IP policy. There is a first draft case study here)
A key BCcampus educator service is using contractual agreements and licenses to sort out Intellectual Property (IP) rights and copyright of resources in advance, as part of the development process. Agreements and licenses state: - who owns what - for what uses the property is offered - what conditions of acknowledgement and/or payment apply to each use. Paul Stacey, BCcampus case-study (2007)
Get legal advice from the experts
It is extremely useful to develop a good working relationship with one of your universities lawyers, or at least a copyright expert based at the university (good places to start looking are the Law Faculty or the library).
Together with this person, review the existing law and regulations, and develop a licensing strategy that fits within the university policies and allows the level of freedom most appropriate to your situation.
Applying licenses to different types of content. Creative commons licenses are applied in different ways to different types of media:
- Text: Insert license into text documents (for example, add a footer with the license terms)
- Audio: In the case of MP3 files, the license can be inserted into the file, in the form of so-called ID3 tags.
- Video: Insert a short sequence that displays license icons at the beginning and end of the video and print the license details on the medium (CD/DVD) and cover.
- E-learning system: Many software applications now allow automatic integration of licenses, which will then be appended to all pages.
License icons and template text are available for download from the http://www.creativecommons.org site, and a set of common questions and answers is provided for those wanting to learn more: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/FAQ.
