Could someone explain licenses to me?

[Keryee]

Hi, guys! I was wondering… I'm currently in the process of making a visual novel with my group, and I've heard a lot of stuff about Creative Commons and different licenses. So what exactly are they? And how do you know what kind of license your project has? Or... how do you go about obtaining a license for your VN?

Sorry, I'm just very confused in general. xD

[Jate]

You may want to check out http://creativecommons.org/

Licenses tell people what they can and can't do with your work, such as using it, altering it, sharing it, or selling it. You know what license your project has by getting it. If you haven't gotten one, you don't have a license.

This is from that site:

Attribution
CC BY
This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation. This is the most accommodating of licenses offered. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials.

Attribution-ShareAlike
CC BY-SA
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to “copyleft” free and open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.

Attribution-NoDerivs
CC BY-ND
This license allows for redistribution, commercial and non-commercial, as long as it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with credit to you.

Attribution-NonCommercial
CC BY-NC
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
CC BY-NC-SA
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs
CC BY-NC-ND
This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, only allowing others to download your works and share them with others as long as they credit you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.

It'll recommend one for you to use here: I'll recommend a license to you on this page http://creativecommons.org/choose/

If you don't want a CC license I'm not sure where to direct you, as I've never gone that route. But I'm sure you can find out more about that easily enough with some google searches, or just waiting for a more informative reply from someone else.

[Keryee]

You may want to check out http://creativecommons.org/

This is from that site:

Attribution
CC BY
This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation. This is the most accommodating of licenses offered. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials.

Attribution-ShareAlike
CC BY-SA
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to “copyleft” free and open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.

Attribution-NoDerivs
CC BY-ND
This license allows for redistribution, commercial and non-commercial, as long as it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with credit to you.

Attribution-NonCommercial
CC BY-NC
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
CC BY-NC-SA
This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs
CC BY-NC-ND
This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, only allowing others to download your works and share them with others as long as they credit you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.

It'll recommend one for you to use here: I'll recommend a license to you on this page http://creativecommons.org/choose/

Oh, god, thank you so much. And thanks for not laughing at me for asking about this. The NonCommercial-ShareAlike one sounds like it makes the most sense to me for our project-- thanks so much, seriously!

[Jate]

Glad I could help ^u^b

[trooper6]

Creative Commons is for when you want your game to be open to the world in some form or other. There is also the traditional copyright process if you don't want that. In Hong Kong you would want to check out this web page: http://www.ipd.gov.hk/eng/pub_press/publications/hk.htm

[firecat]

the list is not complete, one of the rarest in creative commons is "public domain". this type of license gives the user to use the material in anyway shape or form without any Attribution (crited). I also want to warn you about certain website that tell you about creative commons but never given them, these types of websites are dangerous to use, if you dont see any author in the music download that is a sign of a copyright music.