Open Educational Resources: OER: What About Copyright?

Creative Commons licensing is at the heart of the OER movement.  Creative Commons allows creators to specify more flexible forms of copyright that allow others to copy, alter, distribute, and make use of their work. 

If you are re-mixing or revising materials created by someone else, you must follow the license on the original work. Note: OER does not mean taking documents from the Internet or periodical articles and combining them into a book.  Those items are copyrighted; that would be copyright infringement.

Look at the licensing on the work you wish to use in your course.  Some licensing requires you only to give attribution to the original author.  Other stipulations include Share Alike, Non-Commercial, and No Derivatives.  An explanation of the different licensing options is in the box below.

CC Licensed by Creative Commons 2002

CC Hack Library School

CC Licensed by  Aotearoa New Zealand