Licensing

Since the United States ratified the Berne Convention in 1989, copyright has been automatically granted to authors. For works created after 1978, this government-granted monopoly will last until 70 years after the author's death (or 95 years after publication for anonymous works, pseudonymous works, or works made for hire). This means that, without a license, it is often illegal to reproduce, create derivative works, distribute, publicly perform, or publicly display a modern work.^[1] Beginning with the movement for software libre in the 1980's, a number of copyright licenses have been written to generally allow for a freer flow of information, by imposing fewer or more targeted restrictions than the law's default set.

License Lists

• Creative Commons licenses
• Commentary on various licenses by the Free Software Foundation
• Discussion of licenses from FreedomDefined.org
• Licenses approved by the Open Source Institute categorized