Open Access Licences
A licence regulates the ways in which a work may be used or can be used (rights of use). A distinction must be made between the "author contract" = agreement between the publishing institution and the author as the originator and the "end user licence" = granting of rights to the reader, for example the further distribution and use of a work under certain conditions.
End user licences (open content licences)
The licences allow authors to release their content for use under certain conditions. They do not waive their rights (all rights of use remain with the author!), but determine who else may do what with their works and under what conditions.
Only contributions that are distributed under a free licence are truly open access (e.g. CC0 or CC-BY). Well-known open content licences that are widely used in the field of science include
- Creative Commons licences (CCL)
- Digital Peer Publishing Licences (DPPL)
- GNU General Public Licences (GPL)
CC-BY-NC module
The NC (= NonCommercial) component is problematic, as it is often not clear in which cases commercial use is involved. Commercial use is quite common in science and education: scientific events can often be regarded as commercial; private, non-governmental universities and scientific institutions, non-profit organisations and associations operate in a commercial sector. These areas would generally be excluded from the re-utilisation of works bearing the NC component.
