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CREATIVE COMMONS LAUNCHES CC0 and CC+ PROGRAMSSan Francisco — December 17, 2007
Today, Creative Commons announced the launch of CC0 (aka CC Zero) and CC+(aka CC Plus). These programs are major additions to CC's array of free legal
tools.
CC+
CC+ is a protocol to enable a simple way for users to get rights beyond therights granted by a CC license. For example, a Creative Commons license mightoffer noncommercial rights. With CC+, the license can also provide a link toenter into transactions beyond access to noncommercial rights — mostobviously commercial rights, but also services of use such as warranty andability to use without attribution, or even access to physical media.
"Imagine you have all of your photos on Flickr, offered to the world under the
CC Attribution-NonCommercial license," said Lawrence Lessig, CEO of Creative
Commons. "CC+ will enable you to continue offering your work to the public fornoncommercial use, but will also give you an easy way to sell commercial
licensing rights to those who want to use your work for profit."
The CC+ architecture was pioneered by early adopter CC-enabled businesses
such as Magnatune.com and is effectively implemented by numerous creatorsand intermediaries who enable a simple way to move between the sharing andcommercial economies. CC+ provides a lightweight standard around these bestpractices and is available for implementation immediately.
Creative Commons will collaborate with commercial rights agencies and othercompanies to build upon CC's metadata architecture and give the public simple"click-through" access to commercial rights and other opportunities beyond thescope of a public CC license. Companies and organizations announcing support
for CC+ include Yahoo!, Blip.tv, Beatpick, Jamendo, Pump Audio, RightsAgent,Youlicense, Strayform, Cloakx, and Copyright Clearance Center.
"The CC+ initiative adds an exciting new dimension that enables a commercial
element to co-exist within the Creative Commons framework," said Rudy
Rouhana, co-founder of RightsAgent, Inc — provider of a new service that
automates licensing to permit re-use and monetization of user-generated
content. "RightsAgent is delighted to be one of the first companies toimplement the CC+ standard. The working relationship between RightsAgent

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and Creative Commons now provides both a transactional and commercial layerthat will help further the success of Creative Commons and the success of thisinitiative," said Rouhana.
CC0
CC0 is a protocol that enables people to either (a) ASSERT that a work has nolegal restrictions attached to it, or (b) WAIVE any rights associated with a work
so it has no legal restrictions attached to it, and (c) SIGN the assertion orwaiver.
“In some ways, CC0 is similar to what our public domain dedication does now,"
said Lessig. "But with CC0, the waiver of rights will be more robustinternationally, and both the waiver and assertion will be vouched for, so that
there is a platform for reputation systems to develop. People will then be able
to judge the reliability of content's copyright status based on who has done thecertifying.”
CC0 was previewed at Creative Commons' 5th birthday event this past weekend
in San Francisco. A beta version of the protocol will be released for public
discussion on January 15, 2008. This will include the traditional components ofthe CC architecture — legal code, human-readable explanation, machinereadable metadata, and tools. The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at
Harvard Law School will collaborate with Creative Commons on drafting thelegal code for CC0.
In conjunction with the CC0 announcement, Creative Commons' project Science
Commons launched the "Protocol for Implementing Open Access Data" — amethod for ensuring that scientific databases can be legally integrated with
one another. The protocol is built on the public domain status of data in many
countries (including the United States) and provides legal certainty to bothdata deposit and data use. Science Commons has worked with data licensing
thought leaders and is pleased to announce partnerships with Jordan Hatcherand Dr. Charlotte Waelde, the legal team behind the Open Database License;
Talis, the company behind the Open Database License process; and the Open
Knowledge Foundation, creators of the Open Knowledge Definition.
"The 'freedom to integrate' is one of the fundamental freedoms for data on theWeb, and in one stroke, the Science Commons protocol integrates the primary
legal options around data into a single Open Access regime," said JohnWilbanks, Vice President for Science Commons. Data in the sciences is mostuseful when it's in the public domain, like the human genome and all thehttp://creativecommons.org

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information at the US National Center for Biotechnology Information. This
protocol, and its implementation by Talis and the Open Database License,
creates a legal tool for data creators to put their data into the same legal zone
as the genome and other key fundamental research resources.""We've recognized the importance of Open Access data at Talis for a number ofyears, and it was an obvious step for us to work with Jordan Hatcher and Dr.
Charlotte Waelde to validate our earlier efforts and to place them in a soundlegal framework from which others could also benefit,” said Dr. Paul Miller,
Talis’ Technology Evangelist. “Looking at CC0 and the Creative Commons'
Science Commons project, the synergies with our own license development
were immediately apparent. We shall now be working together with Creative
Commons and the license's new hosts at the Open Knowledge Foundation to see
the pool of remixable data grow, for the benefit of all."About Creative Commons
Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 2001, thatpromotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned
or in the public domain. Through its free copyright licenses, Creative Commons
offers authors, artists, scientists, and educators the choice of a flexible rangeof protections and freedoms that build upon the “all rights reserved” conceptof traditional copyright to enable a voluntary “some rights reserved” approach.
Creative Commons was built with and is sustained by the generous support oforganizations including the Center for the Public Domain, the Omidyar
Network, The Rockefeller Foundation, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur
Foundation, and The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, as well as
members of the public. For more information about Creative Commons, visit
http://creativecommons.org.
Contact
Mike Linksvayer
Vice President, Creative Commons
ml@creativecommons.org
Press Kit
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