3. Do I already have permission?

a. Open Access

You are free to use any material which is Open Access or in the Public Domain

b. Creative Commons (CC)

Creative Commons licences allow creators to grant permission to share their work in a simple and standardised way.  There are several licence terms that can be added to a work – the following table shows the initials, logos and brief description of each of them:

Logo	Initials and Type of Licence	Description
	CC BY Attribution	Can be used, adapted, shared, even commercially – as long as you credit the original creation
	CC BY-SA Attribution and ShareAlike	Can be used, adapted, including commercially and shared – as long as you share with the same licence and credit the original creation
	CC BY-ND Attribution-NonDerivs (no derivatives)	Can re-use the work for any purpose, including commercially; however, it cannot be adapted and credit must be provided
	CC BY-NC Attribution-NonCommercial	Can be used, adapted and shared – but, not commercially. As always, credit must be given
	CC BY-NC-SA Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike	Can be re-used, adapted and shared non-commercially, as long as you credit the creator and license new creations under the identical terms
	CC BY-NC-ND Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs	The most restrictive of the licences, allowing downloading and sharing with others as long as you credit the creator. No changes can be made and it cannot be used commercially
You may also see the following:
	CC0 No rights reserved	Free to use (including for commercial use) No attribution required (but considered ‘good form’ if you do)
	All rights reserved	Material cannot be used without permission or under an exception (not a Creative Commons licence)

By default, all theses uploaded to WIRE are given CC BY-NC-ND. In other words, anyone can download it to read and share – but, they cannot change anything and cannot use it commercially.

You can request a more permissive licence if required – please contact the Scholarly Communications Team WIRE@wlv.ac.uk.

c. Is it material covered by the Open Government Licence?

Crown copyright covers materials created by civil servants, government departments and agencies, civil servants and ministers. This includes government publications, legislation, and many public records.

The Open Government Licence allows the re-use of Crown copyright works.

For further information on using Crown copyrighted materials please see the National Archives website.

Next: Checklist for seeking permission to use copyrighted material

Image Credits

Open Access logo: art designer at PLoS,- http://www.plos.org CC BY-SA 3.0 (from Wikimedia Commons)