Applying a Creative Commons Licence to your Thesis
What is a Creative Commons Licence?
As copyright owner in the content of your thesis, you are able to set the terms of use that will apply to others who gain access to a copy of your thesis. The default terms of use are generally “all rights reserved”, but these could restrict sharing or re-use of your thesis without your explicit permission. An open licence can set a specific but more permissive set of terms that would allow for certain uses under the specified conditions without requiring additional permission from you as the copyright owner. The licence is “open” in the sense that these permitted uses would be available to anyone who observed the specified conditions. Creative Commons has established a suite of open licences to address a range of such conditions. It is important to note that once your work is made available under an open licence, it will become problematic to make the terms of use more restrictive should you wish to do so later.
Would applying a Creative Commons Licence to my thesis be a good choice for me?
An open licence on your thesis will make it easier for other scholars to re-use and share your work, which could be a benefit to you. However, any agreements you have already made or you expect to make regarding the content of your thesis might complicate matters. For example, if you have or intend to separately publish a chapter of your thesis, this might present a complication. If you have already entered into a publishing agreement that covers part of your thesis, then that agreement may prevent your applying an open licence to your thesis. Similarly, if you intend to seek the separate publication of part of your thesis, then having applied an open licence to your thesis might limit your publication options. Also, if your thesis includes third-party content that is used with permission, or portions of your thesis were co-authored, then those permissions to use that content in your thesis may not allow for your applying an open licence to your thesis.
It should be noted that the required non-exclusive licence to make your thesis freely available online via Library and Archives Canada has no impact on your ability to apply an open licence to your thesis.
If I would like to apply a Creative Commons Licence to my thesis, which one should I choose?
All Creative Commons (or “CC”) Licences require attribution, so that any re-use or sharing of your thesis under a CC Licence would require that you receive appropriate credit. If this attribution is the only condition of use that you would like to require on users, then the CC BY licence might be an appropriate choice for you. Which licence you choose depends on the terms of use you would like to apply to those interested in using your thesis.
The four conditions are Attribution, NonCommercial, NoDerivatives and ShareAlike. Attribution is part of all of the six available licences, but the others may be added either singly or in combination (but note that NoDerivatives and ShareAlike are mutually inconsistent).
The descriptions of each of the four conditions are as follows:
- Attribution (BY) — The user of your thesis must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. They may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests that you (the licensor) endorses them or their use.
- NonCommercial (NC) — They may not use the material for commercial purposes.
- NoDerivatives (ND) — If they remix, transform, or build upon the material, they may not distribute the modified material.
- ShareAlike (SA) — If they remix, transform, or build upon the material, they must distribute their contributions under the same license as the original.
The six available CC licences are the following (with links to the licence):
- CC BY https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
- CC BY-NC https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
- CC BY-ND https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
- CC BY-SA https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
- CC BY-NC-ND https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
- CC BY-NC-SA https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
How do I add the CC Licence to my thesis?
On the title page of your thesis, beneath the line with the © designation, indicate the licence you would like to apply with descriptive text such as “This thesis is licensed under a Creative Commons [LICENSE TYPE, e.g., Attribution-NonCommercial] 4.0 International License,” and include a link from the descriptive text to the appropriate licence (i.e., one of the six links provided above). Though not a requirement, you may choose to accompany the CC licence text with the appropriate icon available at https://creativecommons.org/mission/downloads/.
Where can I go for additional information?
Consult the Faculty of Graduate & Postdoctoral Studies' Creative Commons License page to learn more.
If you have any questions or concerns about CC licences or applying an open licence to your thesis, please contact the Copyright Office at copyright@ualberta.ca.