Creative Commons License

When you submit your thesis online, you can choose to apply a Creative Commons (CC) license, in consultation with the Supervisor and the Supervisory Committee, to your work. This section explains what CC licenses are and how to choose and apply them to your thesis. In such cases, the Creative Commons license statement will appear directly below the copyright notice on the title page of the thesis.

What is a Creative Commons License?

A Creative Commons license allows you, as a copyright holder, to give others permission to use and share your work online under certain terms and conditions while still giving you credit.

Copyright can protect your creativity and original ideas from uses you do not consent to, but copyright can be more restrictive than you might prefer. For example, if someone wants to use and share your thesis, they will need your permission first in most cases. This process can be time-consuming and a barrier to your intellectual output reaching a wider audience.

With a CC license, you can refine the extent of your copyright to allow others to re-use your work under the specific terms of the Creative Commons Licenses.

A CC license lasts for as long as the copyright of the work exists. In Canada, the copyright expires 70 years after the creator’s death. After the copyright protection expires, the work belongs to the public domain.

How does each Creative Commons License differ?

Every CC license has different components according to the following four types of license elements:  Attribution, ShareAlike, NonCommercial and  NoDerivatives. Learn about the different parts of a CC license and what they mean.

These elements can be used in six different combinations to create license combos that range from the most open (CC BY) to the most restrictive (CC BY-NC-ND).

 

Source: “ How to attribute Creative Commons Photos ” by Foter. Licensed under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license

Why should I consider a Creative Commons License?

Some pros of choosing a CC license for your thesis are:

• • Despite being available online, a thesis with “all rights reserved” cannot be reproduced or redistributed for future students’ research without explicit permission. Adding a CC license will facilitate better sharing of your work,  increase the readership of your thesis,  advance the scholarly discourse in your field and contribute to the public good. 

• CC-licensed materials can advance knowledge sharing. Learn how in this  short video by BCcampus .

• CC licenses are machine-readable, which means that search engines can detect and display your work accordingly.

Some things to keep in mind:

• Once granted, the CC license cannot be revoked. If you allow someone to re-use your work and then revoke permission, this could potentially be exploited in a lawsuit, however; as a copyright holder you can still publish a manuscript derived from your thesis and assign copyright to the publisher or apply a different CC license to it.
• You must own or control the copyright   over your work to apply a CC license. If you are re-using third party materials in your thesis, you must prominently indicate which portions of your thesis are not covered by the CC license that you are assigning or are covered by other licenses or trademark rights. Learn more about  considerations for licensors, Creative Commons .
• If you are submitting a  sandwich/integrated thesis  that consists of published articles, you may have transferred copyright over your work to the publisher. This would affect your ability to assign a CC license to parts of your thesis or the whole thesis. 

Which Creative Commons License should I choose?

Applying a CC license to your thesis is optional, and the choice to apply a CC license to your thesis is yours to make, in consultation with the Supervisor and the Supervisory Committee.

Consider the following questions:

• Do you want others to re-use your work and build upon it without having to ask your permission?
• Are you comfortable with others copying and remixing your work?
• Are you comfortable with others profiting from your work?

If you need help answering these questions and choosing a license, try the  CC License Chooser tool.

How do I apply the CC license to my thesis?

To apply a CC license to your thesis, add the CC license of your choice on the thesis title page under the Copyright statement . E.g.:  

                  ©Copyright by Jane Ann Doe 2024
                  This work is licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International.

Adding CC license information directly on the title page will ensure that readers are aware of the license even if your thesis is shared or saved locally.

You can use the  CC License Chooser tool to generate the license statement and link for the thesis title page.

Publishing from your thesis before graduation

You may want to or be expected to publish parts of your thesis before your thesis is submitted, such as with an integrated/publication-based/sandwich thesis. In this case, while you own the copyright of your written materials, a publisher may require copyright transfer of your manuscript.

You need to ensure you retain certain rights or obtain permission in order to satisfy the university’s requirement of making your thesis openly accessible via ERA and Library and Archives Canada (LAC):

1. Check whether the journal requires prior notification about U of A’s open access requirement for theses. Some journals want to be notified of this mandate whether or not they restrict the re-use of articles in theses.
2. Check whether the publisher requires copyright transfer. This should be stated on their website, in the publication agreement, or you can inquire directly with the journal.

If the publisher does not require copyright transfer (i.e., author retains copyright), then you can reuse your article/chapter in your thesis; no permission needed.

If the publisher requires copyright transfer, follow these steps:

1. Check if the publisher has special provisions for reusing your published work in your thesis.
   Check journal policies:  See  MIT Libraries' list of policy excerpts from major publishers or the journal/publisher website.
2. Check if the article is distributed under a Creative Commons license. This may allow re-use.
   Check journal CC licenses:  See the journal/publisher website or contact the journal directly.
3. If the publisher requires copyright transfer, has no special provisions and does not publish under a CC license, you will need to contact them to request permission to include your article in your thesis. You can:
   • Negotiate making the article available as part of the thesis in ERA and LAC Theses Portal; 
   • Request an embargo if the publisher only permits open sharing after some time post-publication; or
   • If permission is denied, you may include an abstract and a link to the article on the journal website in place of the chapter.

If you have further questions about copyright or Creative Commons Licenses, please contact the Copyright Office at copyright@ualberta.ca.