Open Educational Resources (OERs): Home

The terms "open content" and "open educational resources" describe any copyrightable work (traditionally excluding software, which is described by other terms like "open source") that is either (1) in the public domain or (2) licensed in a manner that provides users with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5R activities:

1. Retain - the right to make, own, and control copies of the content (e.g., download, duplicate, store, and manage)
2. Reuse - the right to use the content in a wide range of ways (e.g., in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video)
3. Revise - the right to adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the content itself (e.g., translate the content into another language)
4. Remix - the right to combine the original or revised content with other material to create something new (e.g., incorporate the content into a mashup)
5. Redistribute - the right to share copies of the original content, your revisions, or your remixes with others (e.g., give a copy of the content to a friend)
   Source: OpenContent.org

The term “public domain” refers to creative materials that are not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark, or patent laws. The public owns these works, not an individual author or artist. Anyone can use a public domain work without obtaining permission, but no one can ever own it.

There are four common ways that works arrive in the public domain:

• the copyright has expired
• the copyright owner failed to follow copyright renewal rules
• the copyright owner deliberately places it in the public domain, known as “dedication,” or
• copyright law does not protect this type of work.

Basically, most things created before 1923 usually qualify.

Source: Copyright & Fair Use: Stanford University Libraries

Many resources such as OERs are made and intentionally licensed as open. Usually this is using the Creative Commons License.

The goal of using OERs is to lower the textbook/materials cost for students. OERs don't have to totally replace the textbook but they can.