Which Creative Commons licence are you?

Answer five questions below to discover your inner Creative Commons licence.

Disclaimer: this quiz is for entertainment and educational purposes only. It aims to increase understanding of Creative Commons (CC) licences but it is not endorsed by or associated with the CC organisation. Public domain CC logos are used for illustrative purposes only, in line with the CC trademark policies.

Your answers will not be used for any purpose and your personal data are not being collected.

Four cartoon characters demonstrating the uses of the CC BY, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC and CC BY-SA terms of Creative Commons licences. — Adapted (cropped) from an infographic by Martin Missfeldt / Bildersuche.org. CC BY-SA.

You have invited friends round for dinner. Everyone loves your vegan chocolate cake. A few friends ask for the recipe. One of them runs a cake shop and another is hosting a big birthday party next week. Do you share the recipe with them?

An chocolate-iced cake on a cake stand. — Image by Freepik.

Sure! Very happy for others to have the chance to eat something so delicious.

I would only give the recipe to the friend whose birthday it is. Why should the shop make money out of this?

I'll share the recipe but I'm nervous about people ruining it. What if they add too much sugar or create a non-vegan version? It would be against my principles...

I'll share the recipe as long as it doesn't become THEIR exclusive recipe -they should be happy to pass it on and be as generous with it as I am.

I'm not sharing this. It took me ages to perfect this recipe. They can develop their own.

I'll share the recipe but expect a big shout-out at the party and a credit line on the shop's menu.

Now imagine you have created something much more critical to the future of humanity than a recipe. It's research data that would help other researchers develop a vaccine much more quickly. What do you do?

A syringe drawing liquid from a small bottle. — Image by Freepik.

I'll make my results openly available but people will have to credit me.

This has been years of laborious research. I'm not sharing it.

Of course others can use the data, but for commercial uses they would need to come to me for permission.

I will make this available to anyone, as long as they don't make any changes to my work.

Sharing with no restrictions.

These findings should be open and others should be able to build upon the data. However, to make sure the data stay open, they will need to share future versions in the same way.

You have written this fantastic textbook, which could become a core resource in your field. Textbooks are notoriously expensive. Would you consider making the e-book freely available to students aroud the world?

An open book on a wooden surface against a blue background. Several pages from the open book fly upwards. — Image by jannoon028 on Freepik

I think I would do this, but I'm uncomfortable about others changing the content.

I would do this but others should not sell copies or adaptations of copuies without my permission.

This has been a lot of work. I would like exclusive rights and would not be happy to share it.

Education is for everyone. I would share the book online.

Education is for all, and I would gladly make it available, as long as people credit me when they share or adapt it themselves.

Of course I would share, but future versions by others should also be free to share and reuse.

What about a monograph? Scholarly books are expensive, too, and not readily available to everyone. Would you consider taking your book available to the public?

Two hardback books with a mortar board on top. In the background, a further pile of books. — Image by Freepik.

Yes. If my publisher supported this, I would publish an open monograph, as long as I am credited as the author.

Yes, my book should be as open as possible for everyone to read and share, but others should be stopped from making money out of it without my permission.

Others can read it but not adapt it in anyway. I don't want my work to be misrepresented.

It's the ideas in the book that count. I want to reach as many people as possible so I'll make it as open as possible.

I'm comfortable with others sharing it and making adaptations, but they will have to make their versions as open as mine, too.

You are a musician, visual artist or film maker (pick whichever suits you). Would you consider making your music, art, designs or films freely available for others to enjoy? Would you consider making your work freely available to others?

"Test print of Open Goldberg Variations edition" by MuseScore is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

If I did this, how would I make a living? I don't see how this would work.

I could make some of my work freely available to share and reuse, but I would always want credit for my work.

I would be happy for my work to be shared and reuse, but to adapt, remix or translate they would have to come to me for permission.

Others can certainly share and adapt my work, but not make money out of it without my permission.

Art should be for everyone. I'm sharing my work with no restrictions.

I want to contribute to free culture. My work should be open to others, but anyone adapting my work should also keep it open like I do.

You are public domain: CC0.

You are not a licence, you are a waiver! You are community-spirited and have the public's interests at the heart of everything you do. You don't require money and, while you would still appreciate being recognised for your efforts, you don't require this from others. You are probably being used to license a piece of software code or dataset and do more than your share towards knowledge equity. You'd be at home in the open source community, in Figshare or the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.

Image by Patrick Hochstenbach, CC BY 4.0 https://hochstenbach.wordpress.com/2014/11/10/creative-commons/.

You are the quintessential CC BY licence.

You are a typical Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence: generous, adaptable, progressive and caring, while expecting to be acknowledged for what you do. Research funders love you, and so do Universities and many other organisations. You are best friends with most open access articles and many open monographs, images, datasets and open educational resources (OERs). Keep it up with the free culture!

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.

Creative Commons. Public domain.

You are a Share-Alike licence.

You are probably a CC BY-SA licence. You don't just support Wikipedia: you are Wikipedia. You are generous but expect others to be the same. Open and idealistic, with strong ideas about how the world should work, you don't mind people making changes to your work to improve it, as long as the new works are as open to others as yours was. You are also likely to have copy-lefty friends in the software community.

You may also be a CC BY-SA-NC licence, which means you would prefer to have a say in who benefits financially from your efforts. In that case, you are probably a Nine Inch Nails fan.

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.

Infographic: "Creative Commons - What does it mean?" (by Martin Missfeldt / Bildersuche.org). Feel free to use and share it but please mention the author (CC-BY-SA). Image adapted by C Daoutis.

You are a non-commercial licence.

Money, money, money - is this all you think about? Just kidding. It's a bit more complicated than that.

In some contexts, an NC licence, preventing others from using your work commercially, may be the appropriate choice. For example, the future development of a product may depend on finding the right funder for it.

It may still be worth taking a moment to think whether you really need this NC term in some works. In what ways could the non-commercial term limit the impact of your work?

You may be a CC BY-NC licence, a CC BY-NC-SA licence or the most restrictive of all: CC BY-NC-ND licence, wanting some control over adaptations, too.

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.

Two cartoon dogs are talking about commercial reuse of 'freely' available works. One of the two dogs has strong opinions against others using her work commercially, but admits she hasn't made any money, either. — Nina Paley, Mimi and Eunice, CC BY-SA.

You are a CC BY-ND licence.

You are happy to share your work exactly as it is, but still want editorial control, so to speak: you are not comfortable with adaptations without your permission. This could be for many reasons, including concerns about your opinions being misrepresented or your product being adapted in ways you don't approve of.

It's worth keeping in mind that your sibling, CC BY, allows adaptations but still expects others to be clear that changes were made and only attribute the original work to you.

Allowing adaptations could mean that what you have created can be further improved and used in novel ways that would benefit the world - and you would still be acknowledged.

You may also be a CC BY-NC-ND, allowing sharing but not commercial reuse or adaptations.

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.

Two people sharing a plate with two identical cakes with with icing sugar on top and hearts in the middle. — Image by Freepik.

You are copyright through and through.

Sorry, you are not a Creative Commons licence. You are a living, breathing copyright symbol.

You may think you are the unwelcome guest at Creative Commons parties - the kind of guest that reads a (copyright-protected, lawfully acquired) book in the corner while the cool open licences have fun. This isn't true! Remember that copyright and open licences go hand-in-hand. No one wants to abolish you: you are still present and respected - what the licences do is give some permissions to help knowledge be shared more openly.

To learn more about open licences, join one of our upcoming sessions. Register at https://shorturl.at/gprxA or email copyright@ucl.ac.uk.