Open Access News

News from the open access movement


Sunday, October 19, 2008

U. Michigan library to CC license all its works

MLibrary and Creative Commons Licenses, undated but apparently recent. See also the announcement on the Creative Commons blog.

The University of Michigan Library has decided to adopt Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial licenses for all works created by the Library for which the Regents of the University of Michigan hold the copyrights. These works include bibliographies, research guides, lesson plans, and technology tutorials. We believe that the adoption of Creative Commons licenses is perfectly aligned with our mission, "to contribute to the common good by collecting, organizing, preserving, communicating, and sharing the record of human knowledge."

University Librarian Paul Courant said, "... By marking our copyrighted content as available for reuse, we offer the University community and the public a rich set of educational resources free from traditional permissions barriers." ...

What resources will be available with Creative Commons licenses?
All original copyrighted material that is created by Library staff and in which the copyright belongs to the Regents of the University of Michigan will be available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial license. This includes bibliographies, research guides, lesson plans, and other resources. ...

The Library has begun attaching Creative Commons licenses to content throughout its website, but some pages do not include the license code yet. The licenses will be fully integrated into the Library's new website design, scheduled for release in Fall 2008. ...