CREATIVE COMMONS CORPORATION
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Licenses and Legal Tools
CC’s free and easy-to-use legal tools give everyone from individual creators to large companies and institutions a simple, standardized way to pre-clear usage rights. So far, there are more than 1.4 billion CC-licensed works online — all of them are available to anyone in the world to use, adapt, and build upon. We support the culture of the commons both on a user level and an institutional level.
Discovery and Collaboration Tools
In 2018, CC released a completely revamped and massively expanded CC Search — a new “front door” to The Commons that makes it easy for anyone to find knowledge and creativity they can use freely and legally.
Policy and Advocacy
We work closely with governments and institutions around the world to support them in unlocking knowledge funded for the public good. Additionally, CC helps shape the conversation about copyright reform through well-researched policy positions and campaigns that engage public support. Finally, we train and support the next generation of open community practitioners and leaders — and produce an annual event, the CC Global Summit, that brings the open community together to identify opportunities and establish priorities.
Where we work
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
Creative Commons (CC) is a nonprofit organization and global community dedicated to supporting an open and accessible Internet that is enriched with free knowledge and resources for people around the world to use, share, and cultivate. Creative Commons creates and maintains the licenses that are the standard for enabling sharing and remix. There is no larger compendium of shared human knowledge and creativity than the Commons, including over 1.4 billion digital works available under CC tools, and in the public domain. When artists, educators, scientists, governments, and other creators share work with a CC license, they become contributors to a global Commons containing hundreds of millions of openly-licensed resources available for use by anyone, globally. In addition to advancing licenses and legal tools, program areas include discovery and collaboration tools, policy and advocacy, community building, and education.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Creative Commons’ overarching strategy is to foster a vibrant, usable, and collaborative global commons, powered by an engaged community of creators, curators, and users of content, knowledge, and data. We pursue the fulfillment of this strategy by focusing in three intermediate outcome areas: discovery, collaboration, and advocacy.
Creative Commons’ 2016-2020 Organizational Strategy can be viewed at https://creativecommons.org/use-remix/ideas/
Creative Commons’ CC Search vision, strategy, and roadmap are available at https://creativecommons.org/2019/03/19/cc-search/
Creative Commons’ Global Network Strategy process and the ongoing outcomes of this work can be followed at https://network.creativecommons.org/ ; aggregated elements of the strategy process and information about participating in Platforms of the Global Network are available at https://creativecommons.org/2018/07/26/flipping-the-switch-on-a-revitalized-cc-network/ and https://creativecommons.org/2019/01/10/global-network-2/
Updates and new course releases regarding Creative Commons’ CC Certificate educational program and OER materials are available at https://certificates.creativecommons.org/
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Creative Commons is powered by a staff of two dozen talented individuals — https://creativecommons.org/about/team/ — with deep expertise and diverse skills, established networks, and a passion for cultivating openness in practice, culture, and community. Our staff, Global Network of peers and partners, and Board of Directors, comprised of notable leaders and openness advocates in the legal and technology sectors, possess the skills, relationships, and standing to contribute to all conversations about the future of openly-licensed content.
Creative Commons emphasizes strategic communications and transparency measures to increase awareness, associate brand with mission, and improve engagement with our various user groups and supporters. Our core assets — a license suite and related tools — are well documented in an open environment that encourages collaboration and input from external contributors. The latest, license version 4.0, was developed in a multi-year collaborative process with contributors from across the globe.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
The name “Creative Commons" is synonymous with legal sharing and signals that an organization or creator is committed to openness and enriching the wealth of art, research, culture, and knowledge freely available to the world. The organization has followed a steep growth trajectory since its launch nearly two decades ago. It is currently regarded as the global leader in open licensing. Creative Commons' tools are accepted as the gold standard for openly licensing content in many academic, public policy, cultural, and scientific arenas. Creative Commons has created game-changing licensing tools that have inspired and supported a movement of individual creators, advocates, institutions, and governments toward openness and full access to art, knowledge, and science.
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
CREATIVE COMMONS CORPORATION
Board of directorsas of 01/22/2024
Delia Browne
National Copyright Director, National Copyright Unit (NCU, Australia)
Delia Browne
National Copyright Director, National Copyright Unit (NCU, Australia)
Lawrence Lessig
Emeritus Board Member and Roy L. Furman Professor of Law, Harvard Law School; Director, Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, Harvard University
Carolina Botero Botero
CEO of the Colombian civil society digital rights organization Karisma Foundation; a researcher, lawyer, lecturer, writer and consultant on topics related to law and technology.
Glenn O. Brown
Works with a range of organizations on brand and identity, audience development, teambuilding, and fundraising.
Angela Oduor Lungati
Executive Director at Ushahidi
Bilal Randeree
Director for Africa/MENA at the Media Development Investment Fund
Alex Tarkowski
Strategy Director of Open Future Foundation
Jeni Tennison
Vice President ad Chief Strategy Advisor of the Open Data Institute
Marta Belcher
President and Chair of the Filecoin Foundation and the Filecoin Foundation for the Decentralized Web
James Grimmelmann
Tessler Family Professor of Digital and Information Law at Cornell Tech and Cornell Law School
Luis Villa
Co-Founder and General Counsel at Tidelift
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
No data
Gender identity
No data
Transgender Identity
No data
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data