The Creative Commons (CC) organisation has launched a new version of its online tool for helping users choose a Creative Commons licence for their works. According to CC Software Engineer Jonathan Palecek, the tool was rebuilt because, while it was successful, the original licence chooser was considered to be too linear and resembled a registration process. "Furthermore, as the tool had been extended numerous times, its interface became more and more cluttered," added Palecek.



The new Creative Commons licence chooser is dynamically updated as users select options and fill in attribution metadata The developer says that the licence chooser tool has been completely redesigned for "greater clarity and ease of use". The new web-based tool combines the selection and results pages into four panels to help users choose one of the six Creative Commons copyright licences. As users select options and fill in attribution metadata, the resulting licence suggestion and code for inserting the licence on a web page are dynamically updated; this further simplifies the selection process and removes the need for a submit button. The new licence chooser tool is available at creativecommons.org/choose/.

On the day after announcing the new licence chooser, the non-profit organisation also published a new draft of version 4.0 of its suite of Creative Commons licences. The second draft of incorporates changes based on feedback from the community on a number of policy issues. "We received a great deal of input and revision proposals, and people shared many informed (and sometimes passionate) opinions on a wide range of topics," said Diane Peters, CC General Counsel, adding that, "And while compromise and consensus are not always achievable, we feel the decisions reflected in draft 2 are well grounded and considered."

The comment period for the second draft is shorter than the first and, according to the draft timeline, will close in early September, after which a third and potentially final draft will be published. CC expects to finalise and release version 4.0 of the licence suite around the end of the year. A summary of all of the public discussion of the new draft – including policy and drafting decisions, and pending topics – can be found on the Draft 2 page; the first Creative Commons 4.0 draft was released in early April.

(crve)