What is an open educational resource?
An open educational resource is a teaching, learning, or research work that carries a public copyright license permitting the 5R activities: retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute. The single legal condition that makes an OER an OER is the license, not the institution, the funding, or the author's intention. Unless the license grants permission to revise and redistribute, the resource is not open in the sense that matters for education. The decisive exception is the NoDerivatives condition: any resource under CC BY-ND or CC BY-NC-ND blocks shared revision, so it cannot function as an open educational resource in a collaborative classroom. Confirm the exact license version and the six conditions on the creator's own site, not on a repository or a search thumbnail.
What an Open Educational Resource Actually Requires
Copyright Ownership Comes First
An OER starts with copyright. The creator owns copyright from the moment the work is fixed in a tangible medium. An open educational resource does not remove copyright; the creator keeps copyright and grants the public specific permissions in advance through a standard Creative Commons license. The permission is worldwide, royalty-free, non-sublicensable, non-exclusive, and irrevocable for the term of the licensed copyright and similar rights. The license operates on top of copyright, so it applies only where copyright or similar rights require permission. Exceptions such as fair use or fair dealing operate separately; if an exception authorises the use, the license conditions do not apply to that use. Their scope varies by jurisdiction.
Who Can Apply the License
Only the copyright holder, or someone with express authority, may apply a CC license. That means a resource your institution bought from a publisher is not an OER unless the publisher applied the license. Joint authors, employment ownership, commissioned-work terms, performer rights, samples, and third-party inclusions must be confirmed first. A license notice should identify the work and creator, name and link the exact license and version, link the source where useful, and clearly exclude material not covered. No registration with Creative Commons is required.
The 5R Activities and What Each Licence Allows
The five activities that define an open educational resource are retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute. Each of the six 4.0 International licenses supports retain and reuse automatically. The three permissions that distinguish one license from another are revise (create adaptations), remix (combine with another work), and redistribute (share copies).
Open Licenses That Support All Five
CC BY 4.0 supports all five activities, including commercial use, with the single condition of attribution. CC BY-SA 4.0 adds ShareAlike: if you share an adaptation, it must use CC BY-SA 4.0 or a license Creative Commons has formally named as compatible. CC BY-NC 4.0 permits all five activities for NonCommercial purposes only. CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 adds the ShareAlike condition to the NonCommercial limit.
ND Licenses Block Revision
CC BY-ND 4.0 and CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 permit sharing of unadapted material only. ND blocks shared revision, which removes the revise and remix activities from the 5R framework. A resource under either ND license cannot serve as an OER in a setting where students or instructors need to adapt the material. Reproduction in a different format alone does not create Adapted Material under the 4.0 definition, so format-shifting a PDF to HTML is not a revision, but editing the content or combining it with another work likely is an adaptation. Whether cropping, excerpting, or combining creates an adaptation depends on applicable copyright law; there is no universal boundary.
| Licence | Retain | Reuse | Revise | Remix | Redistribute | Commercial Use |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CC BY 4.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| CC BY-SA 4.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes, with SA | Yes |
| CC BY-ND 4.0 | Yes | Yes | No | No | Unadapted only | Yes |
| CC BY-NC 4.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes, with SA | No |
| CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 | Yes | Yes | No | No | Unadapted only | No |
Separating Licence Permission From Other Rules
License vs. Academic Citation
The CC license is the permission for copyright and similar rights. It is not a substitute for academic citation, institutional policy, funder rules, or statutory exceptions. Academic attribution and license attribution serve different purposes; do both when both apply. A journal article may be open access but still carry a CC license that limits reuse. Open access describes access and may or may not grant broad reuse; read the article's exact license.
Funder, University, and Platform Rules
Journal, funder, university, and repository rules are additional constraints. A funder may require CC BY; a university may require a specific repository license; a repository may add platform-specific terms that conflict with the license. Platform interfaces and terms change. Open the source, read the exact license, capture evidence, and use the platform's current credit field. Do not assume a menu path is permanent.
Common Questions
Can an OER be used for commercial purposes?
It depends on the license. CC BY and CC BY-SA permit commercial use. CC BY-NC, CC BY-NC-SA, CC BY-NC-ND, and CC BY-ND all use the NonCommercial condition, which version 4.0 defines as not primarily intended for or directed toward commercial advantage or monetary compensation. The identity of the user, business, nonprofit, school, or individual, does not decide the issue by itself. Advertising, sponsorship, fundraising, internal business use, and mixed purposes require context. There is no bright-line rule.
Does a CC license replace the need for attribution?
No. All six Creative Commons 4.0 International licenses require attribution. Under 4.0, a reuser must retain, when supplied by the licensor: identification of the creator and designated attribution parties; a copyright notice; a notice referring to the license; a warranty disclaimer; and a URI or hyperlink to the material where reasonably practicable. The reuser must link or refer to the license and indicate modifications, retaining earlier modification notices. This may be done in any reasonable manner for the medium. TASL, title, author, source, license, is a useful attribution mnemonic, not the complete legal text.
What happens if someone breaches the license conditions?
Under version 4.0, rights under the license terminate automatically on breach. They are automatically reinstated from the date the violation is cured if it is cured within 30 days after the violator discovers it; they may also be expressly reinstated by the licensor. Cure does not erase possible liability for the period of violation. Older versions have different termination language and do not contain the same automatic 30-day mechanism.
Can a creator change the license after sharing the work?
The licensor may stop distributing the work or offer it under other terms, but cannot withdraw the license from people who already received it while complying with its terms. Dual licensing is permitted. Separate permission can waive a condition for a particular user without changing the public CC offer.
Is a CC0 work the same as a CC-licensed work?
No. CC0 is a public-domain dedication with a waiver, a fallback license where waiver is not effective, and a non-assertion promise limited to remaining Copyright and Related Rights. It aims to remove copyright and related-right conditions as far as the affirmer is legally able. CC0 and the Public Domain Mark are not among the six licenses. PDM changes no rights; it marks material believed to be free of known copyright restrictions worldwide. Neither tool guarantees that privacy, publicity, trademark, patent, contract, cultural-heritage, or other law permits a use.
Can I combine two OERs with different licenses?
Combining material is not automatically lawful because each input uses a CC license. ND may block sharing the combination if it is an adaptation. SA may require a specific adapter's license. Two inputs can impose incompatible terms. Use the official compatibility chart and distinguish mere aggregation from an integrated adaptation. Creative Commons lists one-way compatibility from BY-SA 4.0 to GPLv3 for adapted material; this does not turn a CC license into a software license or create compatibility in the reverse direction.
What is the difference between a collection and an adaptation?
A collection keeps separate works separate, such as unchanged essays in an anthology. Each work retains its own license; the collection's overall license does not replace those licenses. Adapted Material is based on and modifies the licensed work in a way requiring copyright permission. Only the contribution made by the adapter is covered by the adapter's license; notices for the original must remain.