For two decades, Creative Commons, a 501(c)(3) publicly funded nonprofit, has led the movement to increase access to cultural, educational, and creative works in order to help fill knowledge gaps to promote a more equitable, innovative world. As the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDG) for Quality Education make clear: “access to inclusive education can help equip locals with the tools required to develop innovative solutions to the world’s greatest problems.”
The CC License Suite and public domain tools tools now serve as the licensing infrastructure of the open web. They are utilized by cultural institutions, artists, universities, governments, and more to unlock over 2 billion works globally; from this photograph of French feminist Caroline Rémy to this guide on creating more accessible digital documents. Thanks to our collaborative efforts with the open community and these institutions, every individual may have digital access to valuable knowledge and priceless works—like the 2.8 million images and nearly two centuries of data released into the public domain by the Smithsonian in early 2020 using CC0, the Creative Commons public domain dedication tool.
With this underlying infrastructure in place, which continues to support a growing collection of open access materials, we are tackling the problems of discoverability and accessibility on the web. With CC Search, we are making important collections of openly licensed works easy to find and reuse, regardless of language and location, from a single starting point.
Like all CC tools, CC Search is a public good, allowing anyone with an internet connection the ability to visit all corners of the world, and find material that they can learn from, reuse, and share freely.
During our first year:
These users are engaged in the use, creation, and sharing of educational materials, benefiting from easy access to openly licensed work.
We’re always listening to our community to understand the greatest needs and highest impact features we can develop, alongside watching for newly open digitized collections to help share. We are working hard to include:
We are grateful for the support of Arcadia, Amazon Web Services, Coil, Mozilla, and countless community donors in launching and growing this ambitious project. Thank you for helping us break down barriers to knowledge and culture!
