What Is Copyright?
See the Schaffer Library Copyright Guide!
What Are Open / Free Licenses?
Open or Free Licenses are a way for creators of educational resources (that are copyrighted) to grant permission and state the conditions under which that resource may be shared with and used by others; those conditions of use tend to grant the "Five R" permissions. In short, open licenses transform an educational resource into an open educational resource.
Exemplary open / free licenses include Creative Commons (CC) Licenses and the GNU General Public License. These are standardized ways to widely share and enable the reuse of educational resources, particularly digital ones.
