Creative Commons Toolkit

Overview

What is Creative Commons?

A Creative Commons license allows creators to place conditions on their copyrights. This gives flexibility by allowing the creator (copyright holder) the ability to grant some of their rights to the public while retaining other rights.

How Can I Use Creative Commons?

For "one-stop shopping" for images, audio, video, and text, try the Creative Commons CC Search.

Examples of Creative Commons license options:

Four types of Creative Common licenses: attribution, noncommercial, no derivative works, and share-alike.

What is Public Domain?

Works without copyright protection are included in the public domain and are available for everyone to use freely.

How Do Works Enter the Public Domain?

Their copyright has expired.
They are facts or other non-protected work (i.e., the phone book).
They are United States government works (i.e., statutes, reports, court rulings and studies).
They are published before certain dates.

What is OER?

Open Educational Resources (OERs) are free and openly licensed educational materials that can be used for teaching, learning, research, and other purposes. See also: Open Educational Resources (OER).

Resources for Finding Images in the Creative Commons

Wikimedia Commons
Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone. The Wikimedia Commons database itself and the works in it are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike License.
Flickr Creative Commons
Many Flickr users have chosen to offer their work under a Creative Commons license, and you can browse or search through content under each type of license (Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works, and Share Alike licenses).
Open Clip Art Library
This project aims to create an archive of clip art that can be used for free for any use.
Photo Everywhere
Photo Everywhere currently has more than 4,000 travel-themed images online ready for instant, free download. Many of the images here are exclusive to this site. All images have been made available free of charge under a Creative Commons license.
NOAA Photo Library
Most photos and slides in the NOAA Photo Library are in the public domain and cannot be copyrighted, and there is no fee. Educational use is encouraged.
NASA Image Gallery
NASA Image Gallery, a non-profit digital library, brings public access to NASA's image, video, and audio collections in a single, searchable resource. In general, content is not under copyright and can be used without express permission, as long as the use does not somehow imply that NASA endorses a product or cause.
USDA Image Gallery
USDA's Online Photo Center provides more than 20,000 high-quality digital images, and it continues to expand. All of the photographic images are USDA property and, consequently, are in the public domain. A credit line must be added when using one of their photographs.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Digital Library
The National Digital Library has a wide assortment of selected images, publications, video and audio clips that are in the public domain. They are free to use; no permission is necessary. They do ask that you give credit to the photographer or creator and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The New York Public Library Digital Collections
The Digital Gallery provides free and open access to over a million images digitized from the The New York Public Library's vast collections, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints, photographs and more.
Pixnio
Public domain images, royalty free stock photos, copyright-friendly free images. Not copyrighted, no rights reserved. Some pictures on this site are explicitly placed in the public domain and free for any personal or commercial use while others are available for purchase.
National Park Service Multimedia Search
The Digital Image Archives provide links to public domain digital images from many of the National Park Service sites, including national parks, monuments, battlefields, and historic sites. Works without a copyright symbol are public domain, and works with a copyright symbol are not. Public domain images are free, and may be used without a copyright release, but must not be used to imply NPS endorsement without permission.
Public Domain Pictures
Public Domain Pictures is a repository containing some free public domain photos. You can download high quality photos, upload your own pictures, get exposure and gain popularity, and improve your photographic and graphic skills.
Hubble Images
Material credited to STScI on this site was created, authored, and/or prepared for NASA under Contract NAS5-26555. Unless otherwise specifically stated, no claim to copyright is being asserted by STScI and it may be freely used as in the public domain in accordance with NASA's contract.
Library of Congress
An international (but mostly U.S.-focused) collection of photographs, posters, architectural sketches, fine prints, and more. Many images are copyrighted, and the user must investigate or seek permissions in order to use images.
Pixabay
Pixabay is an international website for sharing photos in the public domain, and includes over 4 million free images.
Unsplash
Unsplash has high quality free images and photos you can download and use for any project, commercial or noncommercial. All Unsplash photos are open. Attribution is appreciated, but not required.
Noun Project
The Noun Project offers free photos for download and over 10 million icons created by designers from 120+ countries. These icons and photos are available in the Public Domain and under the Creative Common (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) or royalty-free license.

Open Image Search

Resources for Finding Videos in the Creative Commons

YouTube
YouTube allows you to discover, watch, and share originally-created videos. YouTube provides a forum for people to connect, inform, and inspire others across the globe.
Internet Archive
This library contains thousands of digital movies uploaded by Archive users which range from classic full-length films, to daily alternative news broadcasts, to cartoons and concerts. Many of these videos are available for free download.
Open Culture
Open Culture brings together high-quality cultural & educational media for the worldwide lifelong learning community. Their mission is to centralize this content, curate it, and provide access to this high quality content whenever and wherever you want it. Open Culture includes free audio books, online courses, movies, language lessons, and ebooks.
MoviesFoundOnline.com
The movies and documentaries listed on this page have been verified to be in public domain or otherwise free for you to watch and download.

Open Video Search

Khan Academy
Khan Academy offers practice exercises, instructional videos, and a personalized learning dashboard that empower learners to study at their own pace in and outside of the classroom.
TED Talks
TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks (18 minutes or less). Viewers are able to freely view and download the videos.
Vimeo
Like YouTube, Vimeo hosts millions of Creative Commons-licensed videos. In addition, Vimeo provides a separate Creative Commons licensed video collection which makes the filtering process much easier.

Resources for Finding Course Materials in the Creative Commons

Achieving the Dream Catalog
Openly-licensed course materials developed for the Open Educational Resources Degree Initiative from many institutions
Courses, Lectures and OER Repositories — Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts
MERLOT II
Over 40,000 materials in 20 different categories
MIT OpenCourseWare
Open educational resources from over 2500 MIT courses
MyOpenMath
Pre-built course materials for math learners including homework, quizzes, and assessments
OER Commons
Over 42,000 vetted and fully-indexed Open Educational Resources
Open Course Library
Collection of high-quality, free-to-use courses stored in Google docs for easy access and downloading
Open Education Global
A site which searches available Open Educational Resources and provides users with the links
OpenLearn
Over 900 short courses, articles, activities, videos, and audio clips available for free to learn about a wide variety of topics
Open Learning Initiative
This site makes suggestions catered to individual learners based on data collected through embedded assessments
Open Michigan
Open Educational Resources including course materials, videos, lectures, and student work from the University of Michigan
Open Yale Courses
Video lectures and other course material from 40 renowned courses taught at Yale
PhET
Interactive simulations, language translations, and teacher-submitted lessons under the STEM content areas
Repository of Open and Affordable Materials — Pennsylvania State University
Free or affordable educational resources for educators and learners to download, remix, translate, localize, and adapt for their own purposes
Saylor Academy
164 open courses available for learners to enroll in and track their progress
WAMAP
A web-based mathematics assessment and course management platform free for users from WA State public educational institutions
Open Access Resources: Audio, Video, and Images — South Connecticut State University

Resources for Finding Textbooks in the Creative Commons

American Institute of Mathematics
A list of textbooks approved by the AIM for use in traditional university math courses
BC Campus
Curated collection of open textbooks that align with the 40 highest enrolled post-secondary subject areas in British Columbia
Digital Public Library of America
Highlights of collections from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States, organized into easy-to-navigate topics
Google Books
An index of millions of the world's books to preview or read for free
IntraText
Full-text digital library offering books and corpora as lexical hypertexts on Creative Commons License. IntraText is committed to accuracy, accessibility and touch-oriented cognitive ergonomics.
JSTOR
Open access to journals, ebooks, reports, images, and media
LibreTexts
A comprehensive library of over 3,000 textbooks and LibreTexts accessible to everyone for free
LibriVox
A collection of free, public domain audiobooks
Massive List of OER — California State University, San Bernardino
Milne Open Textbooks
A catalog of open textbooks authored and peer-reviewed by SUNY faculty and staff
Online Books Page — University of Pennsylvania
A catalog of freely readable online books, listing over three million books on the Web
OpenBook Publishers
A collection of peer-reviewed textbooks available for free in PDF and HTML formats
Open Library
Open Library's goal is to have "one web page for every book ever published." It is a completely open Wiki interface allowing for contributions by anyone.
OpenStax College
Possibly the most widely adopted open textbook repository for higher education available for free
Open Textbook Library
Over 1,800 open textbooks from various disciplines currently in use at universities and colleges
Open TextBook Store
Freely and openly available math textbooks created by Washington CTC faculty that can be downloaded for free or printed for a low cost
Open Washington — OER Commons
PDXScholar — Portland State University
A collection of open access textbooks and open educational resources
Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is the place where you can download over 79,000 free eBooks to read on your PC, iPad, Kindle, Sony Reader, iPhone, Android, or other portable device
Project Muse
Open access books and journals from distinguished universities available for free
Wikibooks
An open-content textbooks collection with over 3,000 books that anyone can add to or edit