How to properly use Creative Commons images on your projects (opens in new tab)

(gozesty.com)

27 pointsardeay12y ago10 comments

10 comments

CC continues to confuse me with so many options. I'd like to use a CC (non-CC0 or public domain) licensed photo as part of my blog template header. Do I really need to put the attribution and link in my template, because that will make my web site look ridiculous.. Any ideas?

sentenza12y ago

Never forget that you can try to contact the creator of the image if you are unclear about such things! If you don't want to have the attribuition in your blog header, shoot them a message and ask if they'd be ok with you putting that in your "About" page or at the bottom of you sidebar or some other such place.

Also, be careful not to remove any license-pertaining metadata from the image.

ardeayOP12y ago

People I have contacted (unless they are a professional photographer) have been excited that I wanted to use their photo or sound clips. Makes their day, makes my day :)

mlinksva12y ago

I bet you can do it in a way that doesn't make your site look ridiculous. Do you have somewhere in a sidebar or footer an about/meta section that has the likes of "powered by wordpress"? That'd be a "reasonable to the medium" place to provide attribution and license notice for a header image, IMO.

Or find a CC0/public domain image to use. One source category https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Public_domain or add keywords to search https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASe...

edj12y ago

Navigating the (admittedly confusing) CC licenses and figuring out how to place attribution that's both obvious and subtle seem like reasonable prices to pay for using an awesome image for free.

hnha12y ago

It's just 3 options from the top of my head. Attribution, Non Commercial, No Derivatives. And then any combination of those. I find them very easy to understand, especially compared to some custom licenses I have seen where I have to think hard if I can manage to abide the terms.

bhousel12y ago

Use wordpress? Just install the photodropper plugin.

I'm not associated with the project, I just discovered it last week and it does exactly what I need.

cclogg12y ago

The funny thing is by default Flickr sets all your photos to 'copyright'... and upon realizing this I set out to make all my photos completely copyright free (not even attribution)... but then it turns out you can't even do that. At a minimum you have to have attribution. I'm just happy when people use my photos; I feel bad they have to deal with all this license stuff.

donpdonp12y ago

How can I get that transparent inside-the-image attribution that is shown on the first photo in the post?

mlinksva12y ago

Inspect the code on that post. :)

Uglier but fully self-contained example http://gondwanaland.com/mlog/2012/01/08/css-text-overlay-att...

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10 comments

diminish12y ago

sentenza12y ago

Also, be careful not to remove any license-pertaining metadata from the image.

ardeayOP12y ago

People I have contacted (unless they are a professional photographer) have been excited that I wanted to use their photo or sound clips. Makes their day, makes my day :)

mlinksva12y ago

edj12y ago

Navigating the (admittedly confusing) CC licenses and figuring out how to place attribution that's both obvious and subtle seem like reasonable prices to pay for using an awesome image for free.

hnha12y ago

bhousel12y ago

Use wordpress? Just install the photodropper plugin.

I'm not associated with the project, I just discovered it last week and it does exactly what I need.

cclogg12y ago

donpdonp12y ago

How can I get that transparent inside-the-image attribution that is shown on the first photo in the post?

mlinksva12y ago

Inspect the code on that post. :)

Uglier but fully self-contained example http://gondwanaland.com/mlog/2012/01/08/css-text-overlay-att...

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse