Guides: Open access: Creative Common Licenses

Creative Commons Licenses

There are three layers in a CC license:

The legal code
The commons deeds
A machine-readable version of a license

The legal code is, as indicated, the description of the license that includes all terms and definitions that are necessary for the licenses to be legally enforceable.
The commons deeds are the abbreviated licenses terms with matching icons that is seen when you first click on a CC license. These short versions are meant to be easy to read by all without diving into the legal codes.
The machine-readable version is, as the name indicates, a standardized description of the licenses to make it easy for machines to read them.

A license can consist of four different elements which can be combined to make a total of six licenses

The four elements with abbreviations are:

Attribution (CC BY). This condition is present in all the CC license options. With this condition it is required to attribute the creator of the work when it is reused. See how attribution is best given here: https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Recommended_practices_for_attribution
NonCommercial (NC). For material with this condition is not allowed for others than the copyright owner to use the work to gain a profit of the work. Whether an intended use case is commercial is decided by the nature of the usage of the work and not the user itself.
ShareAlike (SA). Work licensed with the SA condition can be modified and used but if any modification is made available to others it must be done under the same license terms.
NoDerivatives (ND). This condition prohibits users to share any adaptations of the original work. What is considered an adaptation is decided by the relevant copyright law in each case.

CC licenses work only when a work is copyrighted. This means that the licenses cannot be applied to work not protected by copyright and that work protected by other laws, such as trademark laws, will still be under these laws even if a CC license is applied. Exceptions to use permitted under copyright law still applies if the work is under a CC license.

References:

3.1 License Design and Terminology by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0
About CC Licenses by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0
3.3 License Types by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0
Images: Icons. https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Icons, by The CC wiki, CC BY 4.0
Images: About CC Licenses. https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/cclicenses/, by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0
3.2 License Scope by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0

Choosing the right license

When you select a license for your research paper we recommend that you consider potential use cases of your article and only add restriction when you think they are necessary to prevent usage that goes beyond your wishes.

CC BY: Most permissive license – allows distribution, remixing, adaptation and further development. CC BY means that authors must always be credited regardless of use and this condition is a part of all CC licenses.

Use this license when you want to allow users to use or build upon your work in any way they see fit as long as they credit your for your work and are transparent about how they use or change your work.

CC BY-SA: A very open license – allows the same as above. If others make their own versions of your article, they must also include this open license

Use this license when you want to allow users to use your work in any way they see fit as long as they credit your for your work and are transparent about how they use or change your work - and at the same time want to make sure that users also offer their adaptions or modifications up to the public with the same level of openness.

CC BY-NC: Allows the same as CC BY, but not for commercial purposes. That is, a user may not use your work in a way that generates a profit for them.

Use this license if you can see some potential commercial uses others could use your article for that you do not wish - perhaps such use would be in conflict with your own possibility to earn profits from your work.

CC BY-NC-SA: Allows the same as CC BY-NC which prohibits commercial use cases but any adaptions or remixes created must be made available under the same SA license.

Use this license if you want to prohibit anyone else but you (or the copyright owner) from making profits of your work and at the same time want to make sure that any adaptations are made available with the same open license.

CC BY-ND: Most restrictive license – allows users to copy and distribute the article. Does not allow changes. Changes can be updating graphs, translations, shortened versions for magazines/newsletters, etc.

Use this license if you want to be the only one who can make and share any versions of your work that is not identical to the version you have made available. Note that a user can make updates and adaptations for their own private use but never make them public.

CC BY-NC-ND: The user is again only allowed to copy and distribute the article. In addition, any copying and distribution must not be done in a way that generates the user a profit. Adaptations and remixes are not allowed.

Use this license if you want to be the only one who can make and share versions of your work that is not identical with the version you have made available and you also want to prohibit any use of your work that generates the user a profit.

References:
About CC Licenses by Creative Commons, CC BY 4.0