Coruscans

Photo by Ian W. Scott

Can you imagine this being the wall of your dining room? I can, and do, but only when I think of what I'd do if I won the lottery.

This wall painting came from the House of Livia in Rome, the murals of which are now housed in the National Museum of Rome, Palazzo Massimo. This photograph was taken by Ian W. Scott and I was able to find this at Flickr.com

Photo by Ian W. Scott

Here's a close-up of the same wall so you can see the beautiful detail that goes into Roman wall painting, also taken by Ian W. Scott.

Before this week, if I wanted to use an image in a presentation for students or in a blog, I would probably go to Google Images, take whatever I could get (I was usually disappointed when looking for something specific), and then use it without knowing where it had come from and being unable to attribute any kind of credit.

I wasn't modeling very good behavior for students. In the classroom, students need to learn to give credit for the creative efforts of others. It's fair to the creators and, it also helps teachers to recognize students' own original work and creativity.

Fortunately for those of us who are taking advantage of the Read/Write web and want our students to do so too, there is a resource helping us find images (and other creative works too) and use them in a way that is fair to the original creator.

Creative Commons is a nonprofit corporation who provide free licenses, consistent with rules of copyright, to mark creative work with the freedom the creator wants it to carry. They are creating a middle ground between "all rights reserved" full copyrighting, when works can't be used or remixed at all, and public domain, when works can be used in any way without any recognition of the artist.

Creative Commons offers six different kinds of license to meet creators various needs.




1. Attribution: the work can be used, distributed, remixed, reworked, for commercial or non-commercial use as long as credit is attributed to the original creator.




2. Attribution Share Alike: the work can be used, distributed, remixed, reworked, for commercial or non-commercial use as long as credit is attributed to the original creator. Any derivative work created from the original must also have an Attribution Share Alike license (so the cycle of creativity can continue).




3. Attribution No Derivatives: work can be used commercially or non-commercially as long as credit is attributed and the work remains unchanged.




4. Attribution Non-Commercial: Remixing and reworking are both allowed. New works must acknowledge the original creator and be non-commercial. Those who've used the original work don't have to license their derivative works on the same terms.




5. Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike: Others can remix and rework the original non-commercially as long as credit is given. All new work based on the original will also carry the same license (so all derivatives are also non-commercial).




6. Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives: Work cannot be changed or used commercially in any way. Can be used non commercially if credit is given to creator (sometimes called the "free advertising " license).

For example, both the images I've used have the Attribution Share Alike license. This means I can use them if I attribute the images to Ian W. Scott, I can change the image (maybe add captions showing all the different kinds of flowers and their symbolic significance), use the image in another work (a presentation perhaps), and even sell that other work, but I would have to license my new creation with an Attribution Share Alike license.

I've very pleased to have found a way not only to find great images, but also to share them fairly.