Creative Commons

This project was started by Lawrence Lessig and other well-known Internet leaders. Its aim is to set up easy-to-customize licenses that are less restrictive than the default (which gives all rights to the creator). Thus, for example, a budding musician could easily write a contract that allows listeners to make copies (more generous than the default) but not resell those copies. When their software is running, a creator can quite literally point-and-click their way to a copyright license that suits their needs. Further, the exact contract will be easy to find, so that users can quickly determine the allowable uses of copyright material.

http://creativecommons.org/