What is a Creative Commons license?

"Creative Commons licenses give everyone from individual creators to large institutions a standardized way to grant the public permission to use their creative work under copyright law. From the reuser’s perspective, the presence of a Creative Commons license on a copyrighted work answers the question, 'What can I do with this work?”'" (Source: Creative Commons)

How is a Creative Commons License different from other types of license?

The infographic below lists the main differences between an item in the public domain, one licensed under an open (Creative Commons) license, and a copyrighted item with all rights reserved. 

There are six types of Creative Commons licenses, each of which offers different levels of openness. From most to least permissive, the license types are:

(Source: Creative Commons)

A five-minute introduction on the different Creative Commons Licenses and what they mean, from Creative Commons Aotearoa New Zealand with support from InternetNZ.