We are thrilled to recap the first in our series of 25th anniversary events, celebrating some of the most notable moments in the history of the development and deployment of our legal tools from creation to translation; and from advocacy to adoption. Each event highlighted both the ways in which CC licenses created unique movements within each sector but also the commonalities between fields and the people who have dedicated their careers to better sharing.

The Legacy & History of Open Education

Our first panel of experts were from the field of Open Education: Kathryn Kure, Dr. Cable Green, and Dr. Angela DeBarger, moderated by CC’s Jennryn Wetzler. 

The Open Education panel explored how openness transformed learning by challenging traditional models of access and ownership. Open educational resources (OER) have enabled educators and learners around the world to adapt, translate, and build upon materials, creating more inclusive and locally relevant learning experiences. CC licenses are what made this possible at scale by giving users a standardized, machine-readable way to mark materials, which meant institutions didn’t have to negotiate permissions one by one. The shift from bespoke agreements to common infrastructure is what allowed OER to grow from isolated pilot projects into global practice.

All three panelists recognized the foundational role of policy in the open education movement. Dr. Green shared that whenever he thinks of open education, he brings it back to the very start. “For me  the foundational principle that everything is based on in our work is the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 26 that says the right to education is a fundamental human right. This is our right—for everyone.” Dr. DeBarger echoed this sentiment in speaking about UNESCO’s Recommendation on OER. “[It] was certainly a catalyst in bringing visibility and validity to the work.”

However, speak to any educator and you will know that while policy and theory matter, it is the implementation, the on-the-ground practical work to bring that policy to the classroom that truly makes a difference. Kathryn Kure shared, “I like to see theory become praxis. In South Africa, many of the problems we’ve been looking at solving are challenges of a place with low to intermittent electricity, no data or limited data, a Moodle box on a Raspberry Pi. Incredibly under-resourced. And there’s this huge disparity between the Global North and Global South, where you can have a cornucopia of data or content here, and the reality on the ground is very different.…You understand that there are real challenges in implementing it.”

Dr. DeBarger summed it up when she stated, “Language is important, but if you care about impact, it’s really about what it takes to put these words into action, those policy-to-practice connections. It matters who’s championing the work in each country and what supports and partnerships they need to expand adoption and use of OER, and how they create the conditions so that open resources and practices translate into meaningful differences in how students learn and see themselves as learners.”

Unsurprisingly, the theme of the panel was the human center of education. Panelists encouraged us, even as new technologies emerge, to stay true to the principles of Open Education, where a pluralistic and communal approach to learning best supports the encouragement of critical thinking and collaboration in curriculum design by and for communities of learners. At the end of the day, education is about bringing communities together. As Dr. Green aptly said, “Policies don’t stand alone.”

The Legacy & History of Open Science

To learn more about the history of the open movement as it relates to science and open access, we heard from experts Melissa Hagemann, John Wilbanks, and Dr. Vinodh Ilangovan, moderated by CC’s Monica Granados.

Open Science has reshaped how research is created, shared, and accessed. The panel highlighted how open approaches to scientific knowledge can accelerate discovery, increase transparency, and make research more accessible beyond traditional academic systems. From open data to open access publishing, the movement reflects a belief that knowledge created through collective effort should be available to support collective progress. 

One striking example of open sharing leading to collective progress was one Wilbanks shared of the Tres Cantos Antimalarial Set (TCAMS) data set. The dataset contained over 13,000 chemical compounds that had been established as bioactive against the malaria organism. The stewards of the dataset released them under a CC0 license, waiving all copyright and future patent rights. A decade of building on that open dataset led to a number of those compounds now moving toward human testing for the treatment of malaria in a completely open-source drug discovery project. “And it all started upstream with ‘We waive IP,’” Wilbanks said.

The open science movement predates CC, but the critical infrastructure that the CC licenses provided led to something bigger. Dr. Ilangovan shared, “In a bigger sense, normalizing the idea that all research outputs should be made reusable by default, that is what CC has done as a bigger milestone. Because that also opens up a larger area for new scholarship. For example, data analysis on genomes wouldn’t have been possible if there was no CC license on those datasets.”

CC licenses were the legal tools that enabled frictionless sharing. And, as the panelists pointed out, this infrastructure is often one that is taken for granted. CC licenses have done their job so well that they have become nearly invisible. “Just as roads and buildings are maintained,” Monica Granados stated, “we should be maintaining this infrastructure that so many things are built on top of.” John Wilbanks agreed, adding that the future of open science in the next 25 years will depend on that very infrastructure. As large language models pull from the content that has been digitized, “at the end of the day, that infrastructure on which [AI] runs is going to be vital.”

For all of the panelists, the goal of the open science movement has never been to make research open simply for the sake of being open. It has always and will continue to be about the progress and evolution of science, of global knowledge, and of humanity itself.

The Legacy & History of Copyright & Open Licensing

Discussing the history of copyright and & open licensing were Tyng-Ruey Chuang, Kat Walsh, and Tomoaki Watanabe, moderated by CC’s Diyana Noory. 

The legal experts spoke to the early development of the CC licenses and how they changed the relationship between creators and the public by offering a flexible alternative to traditional copyright. Rather than simply asking what people could not do with creative works, open licensing created a framework for creators to define how their work could be shared, reused, and built upon. The panel reflected on how these tools grew from legal infrastructure into a global movement built around collaboration, attribution, and reciprocity.

Some of the biggest challenges of creating the licenses became their biggest strengths: translation, interoperability between legal jurisdictions, balancing simplicity with legal enforceability. Tyng-Ruey Chuang spoke to the challenge of even translating the name Creative Commons into the traditional Chinese they use in Taiwan. The final translation, Chong Yong, translates to “create” and “use,” pointing to the cyclical nature of the licenses. They enable sharing which enables creation which enables further sharing.

Of course, translation involves more than just the literal translation from one language to another. Each license needed to be localized for each legal jurisdiction as well. CC utilized local experts for this process, both a practical decision and one key to the licenses becoming a global movement. The local experts that assisted with the project became local experts in their use—experts who could answer questions specific to their communities’ needs and advocate for their adoption.

And while it is difficult to pinpoint exactly what ingredient in the licenses led to their evolution into the standard for sharing worldwide, that fact cannot be denied. Tyng-Ruey Chuang mentioned his surprise upon learning that CC licenses had become so standardized that they were being taught to the next generation in their Intellectual Property Protection classes. “CC licenses have become the vocabulary to exchange the ideas of sharing.”

The Legacy & History of Open Culture

For our Open Culture panel, we were joined by panelists: Medhavi Gandhi, Merete Sanderhoff, Andrea Wallace, and Giovanna Fortenelle, with CC’s Brigitte Vézina providing opening remarks, and CC’s Dee Harris moderating. 

The conversation touched on numerous topics including how museums, libraries, archives, and cultural institutions have embraced openness to make heritage more accessible and meaningful. Much of that shift was made possible in practice by CC0, CC’s public domain dedication tool, which gave institutions a way to release rights at scale instead of negotiating reuse terms with each individual partner or researcher. Panelists reflected on the shift from institutions seeing collections as assets to control toward recognizing their role as stewards of shared cultural resources. “We have in our DNA the obligation to be for everyone,” Merete Sanderhoff from the National Gallery of Denmark stated. “We are merely the stewards of the collections we hold. They’re not ours to own but we take care of them on behalf of the public.”

Merete continued by sharing that openness began with a simple question: If cultural collections could be shared with one organization, why not share them with everyone? The conversation also explored the responsibilities that come with openness,  including ensuring that communities are respected, living traditions are protected, and new technologies like AI are developed in ways aligned with public values. She concluded: “Opening your collection and your data allows and invites users to interact freely with it and share their knowledge back, thus enriching all of us.”

Giovanna Fontenella shared the story of Madam X, the 19th century painting by John Singer Sargent, that inspired an iconic Hollywood dress and demonstrated how that story had only become visible once that artwork held by The Metropolitan Museum of Art was shared widely on Wikipedia. 

Andrea Wallace made the case that opening up heritage collections was not as scary as it may sound and that there were ways to reconcile open and free access to heritage with an institution’s revenue generating activites. She also emphasized the need to appropriate care of heritage and for ensuring respect for Indigenous rights and protocols.  

And Medhavi Gandhi pointed to the power of open to help communities reclaim their heritage and restore the narrative, calling attention to remaining gaps, including the digital divide and the need to break down linguistic barriers.

Continued Celebrations

Thank you to all of our wonderful panelists, participants, and CC team members who contributed to these rich conversations about CC’s beginnings and the legacy and history of our work over our first 25 years. In the coming months we’ll host two more acts of this series centering CC’s community and the future of Creative Commons and sharing.

We look forward to sharing more events with you soon. Stay up to date on what’s coming at creativecommons.org/events and through our newsletter at mail.creativecommons.org/subscribe. 

Posted 02 July 2026