Recently, YouTube has added the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY) as the new licensing option for the YouTubers (YouTube users). Now, while uploading to YouTube, you can choose from the two licenses: the CC BY license and the Standard YouTube license for your videos. YouTubers can also reuse or remix the videos licensed under CC BY, provided with the inclusion of credits.

The CC BY and the Standard YouTube license

  • The Standard YouTube license allows users to retain ownership of their video, hence restricting others to reuse or remix it.
  • The Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY) allows users to still retain ownership while granting anyone the permission to reuse or remix their work as long as the attribution to the owner is given by the re-using party.

By marking your original video with a Creative Commons license, you are granting the entire YouTube community the right to reuse and edit that video. Please understand that you may ONLY mark your uploaded video with a Creative Commons license if it consists ENTIRELY of content licensable by you under the CC BY license.

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The introduction of CC BY licensing has lead YouTube to launch an ever-expanding Creative Commons Video library containing over 10,000 videos from the organizations like C-SPAN, Voice of America, PublicResource.org, and Al Jazeera. The users may access, edit, and incorporate the videos from the library into their own video projects.

The library can be accessed while using the YouTube Video Editor and clicking the CC tab, as shown in the above Screen shot. You may select the videos to be remixed by just dragging them to the story-board. YouTube automatically adds the source videos’ links to the finished video beneath the video player.

So, by choosing the CC BY license for your videos, you can help YouTube Creative Commons Video library grow, which can be utilized by anyone on YouTube to spice up their videos.