I've posted before about Creative Commons copyright. MakeUseOf had a great post this week about How to Search and Credit Properly-Licensed Photos on Flickr. A great source with lots of information about CC and Flickr, it includes something I haven't seen before, which is a Grease Monkey script that will give you the code to display the image along with the proper attribution; see the image at left for an example.
Grease Monkey is a Firefox add-on which will allow you to use small bits of JavaScript to customize how certain web pages are displayed. All you have to do is to add the Grease Monkey add-on if you do not already have it and then click the Install button on the script web page.
I normally use Google Chrome, but I'll be using Firefox now to get the code to add Flickr image to a web page. It makes the attribution so much easier!
I guess I'm on a copyright kick! I found a great post, Digital Storytelling and Copyright, for teachers and others. Among other things, the authors shares information about Creative Commons Copyright and how to do a Google search for copyright-friendly images, as well as giving some sources of royalty-free music.
I learned from this post how easy it is for copyright owners to track the use of their images! I had no idea; very interesting information.
While students have leeway under fair use, it is important for all of us, including students, to understand and abide by copyright laws.
Teachers have a responsibility to acquaint students with copyright issues, stressing the importance of abiding by copyright restrictions and citing sources of all materials used that were created by others. This wiki initiated by a teacher to provide both information on copyright and sources of copyright-friendly (primarily Creative Commons licensed) resources is a great resource in and of itself for educators and others as well. I have it bookmarked and refer to it frequently.
I have been using Creative Commons (CC) licensed photos for some time now, finding them by using Flickr's advanced search option. Compfight is a website that makes that search easier and much quicker. Basically, all you have to do is to click beside "Creative Commons" to change the parameter to "Only," enter your search tag, and click "Search." Click on your chosen photo to open it in Flickr, where you can check the CC details, and then view sizes to choose to download one or to use the link to the size of your choice. You can then copy and paste the URL or CC code to complete the attribution requirement.
You can also further define the search by using Seek Original, which refers to the size of the image: "Only" will limit results to images saved in their original size, "On" will display images of all sizes, with an informational blue bar giving dimensions of those which are not original size, and "Off" will display images of all sizes without the blue bar. Your search results can also be filtered by using a Safe Search to display only images which are safe for work.
If you aren't familiar with the Creative Commons license, it is a license granting a set of baseline rights to the owner and requiring the work (image, video, audio, text) to be attributed to the original author. I won't go into details here, but basically, for a licensed work, you will see the CC logo along with a description of the guidelines for use. You are then given the opportunity and responsibility to use the work according to those guidelines. A CC license can be obtained for no cost from Creative Commons. When creating a license, the owner can decide if he or she wants others to have the right to use the work commercially and if others will be allowed to modify the work.
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