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For musicians who offer free music downloads, Creative Commons represents a simple, free alternative to traditional copyright registration.  No tedious forms.  No filing fees.  No waiting.  It's instant, no-cost copyright goodness.  What's more, the protections offered by Creative Commons are flexible, to allow for certain uses of your music, such as remixing or incorporation into commercial or non-commercial video and other derivative works, if that's what you want.  This is a boon for DIY musicians whose traditional '©' and 'circle-P' symbols tell DJs, podcasters and filmmakers, "hands off my music."  And so, they use somebody else's music instead.  Opportunity lost.

On the downside, implementing Creative Commons properly isn't entirely straightforward, and the examples demonstrated on the org's website are highly technical, aimed squarely at developers.  Assuming that your drummer is also your "web guy" and that he doesn't know an MP3 ID3 tag frame from an SHA1 hash, a little help here could go a long way.  Let's jam.

Disclaimer

Before we continue, understand that I am not an attorney and that none of the information presented in this article should be construed as legal advice.  The information presented here is meant to introduce an optional copyright method but without suggesting its suitability for any particular purpose.  Use this information at your own risk.  For copyright advice, consult an experienced entertainment lawyer.

Also, please note that certain statements and examples presented in this article are particular to the laws and government of the United States of America.  Musicians operating in other countries should be mindful of their local requirements.

What is Creative Commons?

In simple, drummer-friendly terms, Creative Commons is a non-profit organization that has crafted a series of easy-to-understand usage licenses that are free to ascribe to your music files.  Each license has a friendly, human-readable version, backed by a not-so-friendly lawyer-readable version.  Take, for example, this Creative Commons license, specified in many of my own freely downloadable MP3 audio files:

This is a screen capture of the human-readable version of the license (located at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/us/).  At the bottom of the license, you'll find a link to the actual license - the "legal code."

As of this writing, there are six licenses to choose from (and a "public domain" license), each incorporating one or more of these four basic conditions:

• Attribution (abbreviated, "BY") - requires that any copies or derivative works (if allowed) provide proper credit to the owner of the original work.  For example, if a podcast incorporates your music in its opening title sequence, the producer must credit you in the podcast.
• Share-Alike ("SA") - requires that any derivative works (if allowed) employ the same Creative Commons license.  In this manner, you may preclude commercial use of your music in remixes, for example, or require that remixes may be made of remixes.
• Non-Commercial ("NC") - prohibits copies, derivatives and redistribution in conjunction with any commercial activity.
• No Derivative Works ("ND") - allows others to create, redistribute and perform only verbatim copies of the work.

So, for example, the aforementioned Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial license (abbreviated, "CC BY-NC") employs the Attribution and Non-Commercial conditions, while omitting the Share-Alike and No Derivative Works conditions. As such, others may remix and incorporate my CC BY-NC-licensed music into a film or video project, but only for non-commercial display and redistribution.  Also, without the Share-Alike condition, those filmmakers needn't employ the same CC BY-NC license.  They may, for example, employ a more restrictive CC BY-NC-ND license, to prevent further modification of their film.  [In case you're wondering, they may not employ a less-restrictive license to undermine the Non-Commercial condition of my original license.  This isn't clear in the human-readable version but clarified in the license's legal code.]

Mix and match these conditions and you'll discover six logical license combinations.  They're pretty obvious, but for a complete description of the six licenses and their conditions, visit Creative Commons' About Licenses page.  Furthermore, additional conditions and license types may be introduced in the future, so be sure to check with Creative Commons for the latest updates.

What Does Creative Commons NOT Do?

It's worth emphasizing that none of the Creative Commons licenses prohibit copying or redistribution outright.  For this level of "All Rights Reserved" old-skool control (and RIAA-style paranoia), use traditional Copyright instead.

Furthermore, Creative Commons does not offer any copyright registration services - they neither timestamp nor catalogue your music in a central database.  Should the originality of your work be challenged, you'll not have a central authority to turn to for verification of your music submission or registration date.  And while alternatives do exist, they are uncertain, at best.  For example, you might upload your song file to the Internet Archive but with few guarantees that the file (or the organization) will survive, unaltered over time.  As such, the reliability of such evidence is questionable and may offer no worthwhile legal support.  As of this writing, there appear to be no trusted / bonded third-party registration solutions, as were once provided by the now-defunct National Academy of Songwriters' SongBank service.

Lastly, a Creative Commons license might not jive with your other contractual obligations.  For example, your music publisher or performing rights organization (e.g., ASCAP, BMI, SESAC), if you work with one, may require that your songs be registered with the U.S. Copyright Office, for example, in order to perform its regular duties.  Such obligations might not preclude also releasing a Creative Commons-licensed music file, but then the effort- and cost-saving benefits of Creative Commons are largely wasted.

On the upside, just as with traditional Copyright, a Creative Commons license does not preclude further licensing of the CC-licensed work.  You may, for example, authorize commercial use of your music by a particular studio for use in a film, even though the music is already licensed to the public under a CC BY-NC (non-commercial) license.

Next Stop:  How to Implement Creative Commons

Correct application of a Creative Commons license, as recommended by the organization, entails two distinct steps.  First, you must label, or "tag," your audio file with the necessary Creative Commons information.  Then, you should create and publish a file download and verification page on your web site.

We'll discuss the first of these steps, file tagging, in Part 2 of this article.  And, yes, we'll be gettin' technical, so bring your MP3s and eye protection.  And your drummer.