e-Why, What & How · 2019-05-14

What’s the Creative Commons Search Engine & how to use it – e-Why, What & How

creative commons search engine

A new Creative Commons Search engine has just launched out of beta. The new CC search engine makes it possible for users to find Online images that are free to download & use under a CC license. Currently, there are over 300 images from 19 different collections covering various categories already indexed by CC, which means there are plenty of options to choose from.

The engine which began beta testing back in 2017 is an upgrade of Creative Common’s former engine which only provided links to other Online sources like Google Images, Pixabay, & Flickr instead of indexing images itself. But now, in its new avtaar, it has an image bank.

In addition to cataloging new images, the platform has also been redesigned for faster load-time & to provide more relevant results. The Home Page has also been redesigned with improvements in navigation & images filtering. There is also a clearer channel for sending feedback to the organization.

While the new search engine is a lot more extensive than its predecessor, it is designed to be a simpler approach to finding photos Online.

Here’s how to use the Creative Commons Search Engine:

When people search using the search engine, they are shown results from Common Crawl dataset & open APIs. Results will include Photos from Flickr, cultural artwork from museums & graphic designs photos. The collection of images is also expected to grow with time & CC hopes to prioritize collections like Wikimedia Commons & Europeana.

Simplicity is one of the main highpoints of the new Creative Commons Search Engine. To find photos, you simply put in a word or phrase & the algorithm will deliver results that fit your query. The source of the images & the Creative Commons license are also displayed along with the images. Search results can be filtered by selecting either “Use for commercial purpose” or “Modify or adapt.”  You can also restrict results to specific providers or CC licenses & it is possible to search for photos by specific creators.

There are also plans to add an advance filter feature to the Home Page, & also make it possible for users to browse the collection of images without having to enter a specific search term. In the long term, CC plans to increase the collections indexed on the search engine. There are also plans to add other types of work apart from photos with plans to index audio, open textbooks & other types of CC-licensed work in the nearest future.

Image Credit: CC

 

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