Commons:Adaptation and Collection

This page is an essay; it contains the advice and/or opinions of one or more Commons contributors.
It is not a Commons policy or guideline, and editors are not obliged to follow it. Please update the page as needed, or discuss it on the talk page.

Adaptation

Whether a modification of copyrighted material is considered an adaptation depends primarily on the applicable copyright law. Copyright law reserves to an original creator the right to copy, the right to be credited and to create adaptations of the original work. If a license granted by the copyright holder allows adaptations, it grants permission to others to create and redistribute adaptations. Generally, a modification rises to the level of an adaptation under copyright law when the modified work includes copyright-protected elements of an original, previously created work.

If the combination does not create an adaptation, then you may combine any free licensed content so long as you provide attribution and comply with the additional terms (like non commercial restriction) if it applies. If you want to combine material in a way that results in the creation of an adaptation, then you must pay attention to the particular license that applies to the content you want to combine.

if you create a remix with material licensed under a ShareAlike / Copyleft license (like CC BY-SA, GFDL, FAL), you need to make sure that all of the material contributed to the remix is licensed under the same license or one that has named as compatible. Similarly, if you want to use a remix for commercial purposes, you cannot incorporate material released under one of the non commercial licenses.

Examples

Resources in the public domain and CC-BY licensed materials can be mixed; but the adapted material should be CC BY or a stricter license (like CC BY-SA, CC BY-NC, or even all rights reserved).
One Copyleft license like GFDL, FAL and CC BY-SA can be mixed with PD and CC-BY. But GFDL and CC BY-SA are not compatible with each other; so can't be used together. The adapted work must be licensed with the Copyleft license used. Now CC BY-SA and FAL are compatible. See https://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/44030 and http://artlibre.org/compatibilite-creative-commons-bysa-licence-art-libre/ See ShareAlike compatibility analysis: FAL for detailed analysis.
CC NC-SA and CC SA licenses can't be mixed together because both demands the adapted work must have same license.
CC Non derivative works (CC ND) are not eligible for remix.

Collection

All free licenses allow licensed material to be included in collections such as web pages, documents, and broadcasts. In collections, works should be included in its entirely unmodified form along with one or more other works, each constituting separate and independent works themselves, which together are assembled into a collection as a whole. A work that constitutes a Collection will not be considered an Adaptation. You may choose a license for the collection, however this does not change the license applicable to the original material. When you include free licensed content in a collection, you still must adhere to the license conditions governing your use of the material incorporated. For example, material under any of the non commercial licenses cannot be used commercially.

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