So you have probably seen a very pretty or cool picture on the internet and decided that you wanted to use it, but didn’t know if it was free for you to use. So in this blog, I will be telling you about copyright and creative commons, as well as some information about public domain images.

What is Copyright?

Copyright is a legal right that grants the creator of an original work the ability to determine whether their work can be used, and if it can be used, under what conditions; so in simple terms, the ‘right to copy’. When it is not stated that something is free to use, or that it is public domain work, it means that it is copyright and not free to use because the law automatically grants full copyright over any creative work a person makes. If someone does use the work of someone else and claims it as their own, legal action can be taken upon them.

So what if someone wants to give others permission to use their work, but only in ways they want? This is where creative commons comes in.

Introducing Creative Commons

Creative Commons is an organization that gives creators free content licenses, called creative commons licenses, to apply to their work. With these licenses, creators give others permission to use their work without having to ask them for permission. Creators use creative commons licenses so that others can utilize their work by adapting, modifying, and sharing it, in ways stated in the creator’s creative commons license, without having to stress about copyright infringement. This allows people to share their work and allows people to connect through this sharing of creative work, creating what is known as a shared culture. Creative Commons is especially important because if everything was under copyright, we would not be able to use images and videos in the manner we do now. Students, like me, use images for projects; without creative commons images, our projects would be boring and much less appealing.

There are 6 different types of creative commons licenses that creators can apply to their work. Below is a video explaining the different licenses, as well as further explaining creative commons and its benefits.

https://vimeo.com/25684782

Finding Creative Commons Images

If you simply search on Google for an image, it is difficult to identify creative commons images. That is why it is best to use websites that offer creative commons websites, along with their copyright information.

One website that you can use is Compfight, which is a simple website. You simply type the name of whatever you want a photo of and then pick the photo you want from the many that come up. Just be sure that you choose the Creative Commons option for the licensing option and use pictures that are below the dotted line. After doing that, you download the picture in the size you wish and then you are free to use it in the ways stated in the creative commons license of the image. Just remember to copy the HTML given so that you can attribute the image properly.

Another website that can be used to find creative commons images is Flickr. Flickr is an image hosting service and video hosting service that has a bit more variety than Compfight. Flickr is a popular website that users use to share and embed personal photographs. It is also used by photo researchers and by bloggers to host images that they embed in blogs and social media.

Attributing Creative Commons Images

Even when using creative commons images, it is still a requirement of all Creative Commons Licenses that you give credit to the author, meaning you can’t just use creative commons image without crediting the person who made it. Within or at the end your blog post you must attribute the image, include the creator’s copyright information and link the photo back to its original photo page.

Below is an example of a properly attributed creative commons image.

Public Domain Images

Public domain images are images that are not under copyright or creative commons. Images enter this category if the creator wants his/her picture to be a public domain image or if an image is not copyrightable. Images can also become public domain images if their copyright or creative commons license has expired.

It is not a set-in-stone requirement that you attribute public domain images, but it is preferred that you do so. This can be done by attributing the image within or at the end of your blog post, and also including possible copyright information and linking the image back to its original page.

Two websites that can be used to find public domain images are Pixabay and Unsplash. With both of these websites, you do not need to attribute images, and you can modify images in any way you wish.

Thanks for reading my post and I hope you benefited from this post, just as I did when I was writing it. Feel free to leave any comments or questions in the comments section.