Creative Commons

You use and love CC licenses but have you ever wondered how they came to be? Understanding CC’s origin story adds deeper context to our licenses, our mission, and the tension, spirit, and drama of a pivotal moment in copyright history that’s often overlooked. To kick off Creative Commons’ 25th anniversary celebrations, we’re taking a look back at where it all began. Join CC’s own Shanna Hollich, Learning and Training Manager, for an exploration of early internet culture, key copyright concepts, the birth of the CC licenses, and their impact over the past 25 years. Register today! https://buff.ly/rah7ZuD Image: "Creative Commons guiding the contributors" by Ju gatsu mikka, 2009, CC BY-SA 3.0. This image is a derivative work of "Liberty Leading the People" by Eugène Delacroix, 1830, in the public domain.

It's only March, but our ins and outs for the year are clear 📈

You still have time to submit to the CC 25th Anniversary zine! What does the theme "Remix is Resistance" mean to you, your life, your work? Submissions can be personal, political, messy, poetic, imperfect. This is your chance to get creative and contribute your self-expression to a community-created work! https://buff.ly/2XEDDkB

Tam 10 yıl önce bugün, 11 Mart 2016’da Creative Commons Türkiye lansmanını açıklık kavramına gönül vermiş seçkin bir davetli grubu ile birlikte Özyeğin Üniversitesinde gerçekleştirdik. Lansmandan bu yana geçen 10 yıl boyunca sayısız etkinlik, savunuculuk faaliyeti ve paydaşlarımızla açıklığı temel alan çeşitli organizasyonlar içinde yer aldık. Öncelikle çalışmalarımızda bize destek olan herkese teşekkürlerimizi iletmek istiyoruz. Gönüllü katılımı esas alan bir sivil toplum hareketi olarak Creative Commons elbette ki topluluğun desteği olmadan hedeflerine ulaşamaz. “Açık Kültürü Birlikte İnşa Edelim” derken tam da bu noktaya dikkat çekmek istedik geçtiğimiz 10 yıl boyunca. Creative Commons Türkiye ile ilgili detaylı bilgiye ve kısa tarihçesine Web sitemizdeki “Biz Kimiz?” bölümünden ulaşabilirsiniz. Yine yapılan çalışmalara ana sayfada yer alan “Ne Yapıyoruz?” bölümünden erişmeniz mümkün. “Kaynaklar” bölümünde ise gerçekleştirdiğimiz hemen her etkinlik ile ilgili materyaller yer almakta; tarih içinde kısa bir gezintiye buradan da çıkabilirsiniz. Nice 10 senelere, hep birlikte..! https://lnkd.in/dtAtzrUv

When AI systems produce outputs without attribution, important context can be lost. Information with no indication of where it came from makes it difficult to trust, check accuracy, and credit the people whose work made it possible. Read our new issue brief for a primer on the challenges and opportunities of incorporating attribution into AI outputs.

This Friday, we are holding our first Community Office Hours! Stop by to hear a brief presentation from Jocelyn Miyara, CC's Community Engagement & Strategy Manager, about what we're up to for the year, and then we'll open the floor for questions and conversation. We hope to see you there! https://buff.ly/8p9HYOC Image by Mark Wang for Fine Acts x OBI, licensed with CC BY NC SA 4.0.

Another SXSW for the books. Three sessions in three days about one big question: how do we keep the global commons of shared knowledge open, trusted, and sustainable in the age of AI? The answer? We kept coming back to a set of paradoxes. AI is being built on the largest extraction of shared knowledge in history. And yet many of our current legal frameworks treat machine reuse as an extension of the same principles that allow people to access knowledge and culture without barriers. Gratitude to Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP and Siegel Family Endowment for supporting our attendance at SXSW. We’re so grateful to have collaborated on quality programming and bringing these conversations out of our echo chambers and to the broader community. AI is unlocking incredible creativity and possibility, while also amplifying bias, misinformation, job disruption, and environmental costs. What does it mean to keep the internet human? Does individual voice still matter in a world where voices can be replicated infinitely? Should there be ways to signal what is human-created online? These questions matter. But there is one central problem. The commons has always worked because people believe in the basic bargain: we share knowledge because everyone benefits from a growing marketplace of ideas. AI is testing that bargain. This is exactly the kind of moment when the norms, infrastructure, and governance of the commons need to evolve so sharing can continue in ways that remain fair, trusted, and sustainable. There are no easy answers. But bringing some balance back to the relationship between creators and AI developers is step #1 Technology is moving faster than law or regulation can keep up. Doing something now feels absolutely necessary. And remember, the future of AI depends on the future of the commons, not the other way around. Grateful to our collaborators, partners, and friends who joined us in tackling these questions together Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP Kayvan Ghaffari Ed Cavazos Jordan H. Burt Sandro Serra Digitalarun Ifeoma Ajunwa, J.D., LLM, Ph.D. Alex Haskell sam seidel Lisa Watts Laura Maher Katy Knight Joshua Elder Karan Kumar CJ Carr Erica Osher Ellery Wong Oren Bracha Ensuring organizations like CC have a seat at the table is an important way to support the ongoing development of a sustainable commons in the age of AI. If you are able, please consider contributing to our work or considering event sponsorships that enable our presence in spaces like SXSW. Photo credit to Rebecca Ross licensed with CC BY 4.0.

At a time of geopolitical uncertainty and tightening resources, digital public goods showed what is possible through shared, open approaches. The 2025 State of the Digital Public Goods Ecosystem Report captures a year of growth, real-world impact, and renewed collective action—and where further collaboration is needed next. Read the report: https://lnkd.in/dnP5d9vQ  Digital Public Goods Alliance #DPG #DigitalPublicGoods #DPGA #2025DPGEcosytemReport

In response to large AI models’ extractive relationship with web content, new approaches to governing machine access are emerging. But all of these approaches are predicated on being able to distinguish between different forms of machine use. Our newest issue brief describes why a common vocabulary for machine use is needed but proving difficult to achieve, and where definitions are currently being debated.

If you're headed to SXSW, we'd love to see you! Find Anna Tumadóttir and hear more about CC's work at two events while you're in Austin: AI & Creative Capital: Consent, Governance, and the Future of the Open Web March 13 | 2:00-6:00 CT CC, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP, and EFF-Austin present an exploration of sharing in the age of AI, the future of the open web, and creativity in AI-driven markets, featuring Kayvan Ghaffari, Anna Tumadóttir, Alex Haskell, Arun Sundararajan, and others! Register: https://buff.ly/feHE4d1 The Knowledge Paradox: When Does Sharing Become Theft? March 14 | 2:30-3:30 CT As Creative Commons marks our 25th anniversary, we confront a question: how do we keep knowledge open without enabling its exploitation? The Siegel Family Endowment presents this panel featuring sam seidel, Anna Tumadóttir, and Lisa Watts. Register: https://lnkd.in/gmxFApXG