History - Creative Commons

Celebrate 25 Years of Creative Commons! As we mark a quarter-century of empowering creators and keeping knowledge free, your support helps us build the next 25 years of the global commons. Help us kick off our end-of-year giving campaign early! Donate today!
Melies color Voyage dans la lune, by Georges Méliès, Public Domain.
Creative Commons (CC) was born from a simple idea: access to knowledge is a human right, and sharing that knowledge is fundamental to the growth and progress of humanity. Copyright, particularly as it is written into the U.S. Constitution, was created to incentivize authors to share their works by granting them a limited monopoly over them. But the continued extension of that term and copyright’s default to “all rights reserved” began to create a central tension as the internet made sharing easier than ever and remixing became the new norm.
When the United States enacted a piece of copyright legislation in 1998 (called the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act) which extended the term of copyright for every work in the country by 20 years, Stanford Law Professor Lawrence Lessig believed this new law was unconstitutional. Together with a web publisher, Eric Eldred, who had made a career of making works available as they passed into the public domain, they challenged the constitutionality of the Act. The case, known as Eldred v. Ashcroft, went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Eldred lost the case, but Lessig was inspired by Eldred’s goal and the fight they had undertaken together. From that idea, Lessig along with Edlred and Hal Abelson founded a small nonprofit organization to help power the open movement, and Creative Commons was born. In 2002, the new organization published the Creative Commons licenses: a set of free, public licenses that allow creators to keep their copyrights while sharing their works on their own terms.
From the start, Creative Commons licenses were intended to be used by creators all over the world. The CC founders were initially motivated by a piece of U.S. copyright legislation, but similarly restrictive copyright laws all over the world restricted how our shared culture and collective knowledge could be used. Today, Creative Commons licenses are used on tens of billions of works.
Since the founding of Creative Commons, much has changed about the way people share, remix, and access content. CC has responded by evolving to address new legislation, policy, and new technologies that have the potential to limit access to knowledge. Today, in the age of AI, where all human expressions are also now data for machines, CC’s mission has never been more important. We’re here to protect the commons and find ways for humanity to create and share in ways that are beneficial for all.
AI systems depend on vast amounts of human-created content, often collected without the awareness or involvement of those who made it. This dynamic has concentrated power in the hands of a few and undermined trust in the social contract of the commons. CC licenses became the legal and normative foundation of the open movement, but it is clear that new tools, new frameworks, and new approaches are needed to address the ways that AI has disrupted the online ecosystem of sharing.
As Creative Commons celebrates its 25th year in 2026, we continue to build a commons of knowledge and culture that is inclusive, just, and inspires reciprocity. Learn about the infrastructure we build and maintain [link to Build] and the ways in which those tools are put into practice [link to Implement] across sectors and across the globe to empower the world to share.
CC’s achievements and work of the past 25 years have not been done alone. Our community of activists, researchers, artists, policymakers, and engaged citizens passionate about open access has helped CC grow from a law school basement into a global nonprofit organization and a powerful movement. Learn how to join us [link to Ways to Give] in the work ahead.
1998: The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA)
The CTEA was a piece of copyright legislation in the United States that extended the term of copyright for every work in the United States—even those already copyrighted—for another 20 years. With this legislation, the copyright term for individuals equaled the creator’s life plus 70 years. Stanford Law Professor Lawrence Lessig believed this new law was unconstitutional. The term of copyright had been continually extended over the years, and a wealth of copyrighted works were put in limbo, unable to move into the public domain and join the pool of knowledge and creativity to be used to create new works.
1999: Eldred v. Ashcroft
Represented by Lawrence Lessig, web publisher Eric Eldred, who had made a career of making works available as they passed the public domain, challenged the constitutionality of the CTEA. The historical purpose of copyright as written into the U.S. Constitution was to create an incentive for authors to share their works by granting them a limited monopoly over them. Lessig argued that the CTEA was inconsistent with the spirit of the U.S. Constitution’s progress clause, which allows for securing exclusive rights for limited times—not indefinitely. Lessig’s interpretation of the inclusion of the clause was that it was intended to ensure that copyright holders don’t too heavily influence the development and distribution of our culture. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court but resulted in a loss for Eldred.
2001: Creative Commons is Founded
In 2001, Lawrence Lessig, Hal Abelson, and Eric Eldred created a nonprofit organization called Creative Commons. Intended as a grassroots movement of creators, also known as copyright owners, Creative Commons aimed to devise a way of allowing them to decide the terms on which they shared their work. Instead of choosing between retaining or relinquishing all rights, creators could define their own terms.
2002: The First Creative Commons Licenses
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