Author: Erica Levi

What are the Creative Commons licences?

9 December 2021 /

Creative Commons (CC) licences are one of the public copyright licences that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted creation.

A CC licence is used when an author or copyright owner wants to give other people the right to share, use and build upon a work the author has created.

CC licences are built on copyright and are designed to give more options to creators
who want to share.

Why do we need CC licences?

The CC licences were created in response to an outdated global copyright legal system and to help address the tension between creators’ ability to share digital works globally and copyright regulation.

What is the CC licence scope?

CC licences are appropriate for creators to provide people with permissions governed by copyright from the onset.

  • They warrant that there may be other not covered rights at play with the work that restrict how it is used (i.e., patents, trademarks, privacy and publicity rights) that must be managed separately.

Scenarios in which copyright does not apply and CC licences do not either:

Letting someone specifically read your article or watch your video is not regulated by copyright law.

When fair use, fair dealing or other limitation and exception to copyright applies.

When the work is in the public domain.

How do the Creative Commons licences work technically?

What are the elements of the Creative Commons?

What are the six Creative Commons licences?

How to you reference and acknowledge Creative Commons licensed works?

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

What is copyright?

9 December 2021 /

Copyright is a legal right that grants the creator of original work exclusive rights for its use and distribution. It automatically grants all rights reserved to creators (no one else can copy, distribute, perform, adapt or otherwise use the work in violation of those exclusive rights).

Unlike other forms of IP, such as patents and trademarks, copyright protection exists automatically from the moment material is created. It does not have to be explicitly declared to be in effect.

Copyright law needs to strike a delicate balance between protecting creative works and allowing the public to use them:

  • Protection: a set of exclusive rights granted to authors to allow them to earn from their work and so incentivize them to produce new work
  • Dissemination: limits to the scope of exclusive rights to enable the spread of knowledge and dissemination of the works created through the copyright incentive

Creative Commons licences operate within copyright law, but they utilise a some rights reserved approach.

They grant the public permission to use the works under certain standardised conditions for as long as the underlying copyright lasts or until one violates the licence terms.

The licences were designed to be a free, voluntary solution for creators who want to grant the public up-front permissions to use their works.

See the following links:

What is the public domain?

What is copyrightable?

Economic and moral rights

Authorship and ownership of copyright

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

What is Intellectual Property (IP)?

9 December 2021 /

Intellectual Property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of human intelligence.

It empowers creators to restrict others from using their creative works. It includes copyright, patents and trademarks, which are all protected by specific laws:

  • Copyright is a legal right that grants the creator of original work exclusive rights for its use and distribution
  • Trademarks enable producers of goods and services to protect their reputation, and they safeguard the public by giving them a simple way to differentiate between similar products and services
  • Patents give inventors a time-limited monopoly on their inventions as an exclusive right to exploit them.
  • Design rights protect the visual appearance of an object or part of an object.
  • Other types of IP are trade secrets, publicity rights and moral rights

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Coventry University’s information and guidance

9 December 2021 /

The following resources provide you with the University’s information and guidance:

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Copyright advice

9 December 2021 /

The Glasgow Caledonian University UK Copyright Advisor is a tool that gives online information (but not legal advice) on copyright considerations on audio files, book chapters, computer codes, images, journal articles, maps and video files.

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Exceptions in copyright

8 December 2021 /

In some parts of the world, copyright law has some limitations and allows some exceptions (for example, ‘fair use’ and ‘fair dealing’) to ensure that the rights of the public are not unduly restricted by copyright.

Thus, by offering exceptions to copyright, the Law permits certain very specific situations where you may be permitted limited use of copyright works without the copyright owner’s permission.

Exceptions and limitations to copyright vary by country, and they have territorial jurisdiction, meaning they apply only to that specific country.

In other words, since copyright law is unique to its jurisdiction, an exception could be valid in one country but not in others.

For more details, look at the Intellectual Property Office guide Exceptions to copyright: Education and Teaching.

See some more details of exceptions permitted by the UK in copyright law, with particular application to online teaching:

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Exception: parody, caricature and pastiche

8 December 2021 /

It is essential to understand that this exception only permits use for the purposes of caricature, parody, or pastiche to the extent that it is fair dealing. This must not be derogatory or cause commercial harm to the original.

Please see this article on a court case

Only Fools and Horses firm sues creators of ‘cushty’ dining events

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Exception: helping disabled people

8 December 2021 /

There are two exceptions to copyright for the benefit of disabled people:

  1. You, or someone acting on your behalf, make a copy of a lawfully obtained copyright work in a format that helps you access the material.
  2. Educational establishments and charity organisations reproduce, communicate, make available, distribute and lend accessible format copies of protected works on behalf of disabled people. The exception permits acts such as:
    • Making Braille, audio or large-print copies of books, newspapers or magazines for visually impaired people
    • Adding audio descriptions to films or broadcasts for visually impaired people
    • Making sub-titled films or broadcasts for deaf or hard-of-hearing people
    • Making accessible copies of books, newspapers or magazines for dyslexic people.

However, the following requirements have to be met:

  • Accessible copies of copyright-protected works can be made only from lawfully-accessed copies
  • An accessible copy can only be made by a disabled person or an authorised body acting on their behalf
  • The copy can only be made for the personal use of a disabled person. Accessible copies cannot be made, communicated, made available, distributed or lent to a person who is not a disabled person under these exceptions
  • An accessible copy must only change a copyrighted work to the extent that is necessary to convert it to an accessible format
  • It must be done on a non-profit basis

Note: there is a discrepancy between accessibility regulations and copyright law, where the former doesn’t take precedent over the latter

Creating a transcript from a third-party-owned resource constitutes an adaptation, and it can only be done with the copyright holder’s permission.

See also Can I make a transcript from a third party owned video?

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Exception: illustration for instruction

8 December 2021 /

A limited amount of material can be used to illustrate a point in a lesson.

Additionally, several exceptions allow copyright works to be used for educational purposes, such as:

  • Copying of works in any medium (meaning minor uses, such as displaying a few lines of poetry on an interactive whiteboard, are permitted, unlike uses which would undermine sales of teaching material) as long as the use is
    • solely to illustrate a point
    • not done for commercial purposes
    • accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement, and
    • the use is considered fair dealing.
  • Performing, playing or showing copyrighted works in a school, university or other educational establishments for educational purposes. However, it only applies if the audience is limited to teachers, pupils and others directly connected with the activities of the establishment.
  • If permitted under specific licences such as CLA and ERA licences.

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

Exception: criticism, review and reporting current events

8 December 2021 /

Fair dealing with a work for the purpose of reporting current events is allowed for any copyrighted work other than a photograph. In all cases, sufficient acknowledgement will be required.

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The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.

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