Creative Commons

The Creative Commons .org is a nonprofit entity founded by Lawrence Lessig which attempts to:


 * advocate for rights of creators to share their work with each other - without the strict requirements or flaws of Open Source which many creators reject
 * provide a parametric license with predictable terms to simplify use of works by others, similar to what prevails in the music industry where there is no need to seek specific permission for certain types of pre-cleared uses (though Creative Commons does not at present have a royalty handling system and deals only with free use)
 * define exact legal Share Alike terms to encourage share-alike that goes beyond free software and extends into music, writing, reporting and arts
 * define exact legal NoDerivs terms to permit artists who do not want work to be changed by others, e.g. as in the film industry where directors resist such modifications, to find common cause and work to defend common contracts
 * encourage open content by developing the idea of Common Content which is more exactly legally defined as anything under any of the above licenses

The Creative Commons attribution-sharealike or CC-by-sa license is normally considered to be the closest equivalent to the GFDL used here at SourceWatch. Some advocate dual-licensing open content under both so it would be easier to swap text between these two share-alike content licenses.

Board of Directors

 * Hal Abelson
 * James Boyle
 * John Buckman
 * Michael Carroll
 * Eric Eldred
 * Davis Guggenheim
 * Joi Ito
 * Lawrence Lessig (Chair)
 * Laurie Racine
 * Eric Saltzman
 * Molly Shaffer Van Houweling
 * Jimmy Wales

Technical Advisory Board
Source
 * Hal Abelson
 * Barbara Fox
 * Don McGovern
 * Eric Miller
 * Ben Adida

Contact

 * Web: http://creativecommons.org