Creative Commons goes hand-in-hand with the Open Access/ Open Education movement to encourage copyright holders to share more freely works for which they hold the copyright. When using Creative Commons, a copyright holder can agree to licensing terms that allow more sharing than that allowed by copyright as part of the Copyright law. "With a Creative Commons license, you keep your copyright but allow people to copy and distribute your work provided they give you credit — and only on the conditions you specify..."1 Once registered with Creative Commons, the copyright holder displays symbols showing these modifications.
An excellent video on their website explains the Creative Commons concept.
As a result of Creative Commons licensing, some information that was previously only available to a limited number of people, due to monetary constraints, can now be made available to anyone with internet access.
1. Creative Commons, "License Your Work," Creative Commons, http://creativecommons.org/choose/, January 9, 2010.
