as an active supporter of the Creative Commons i have sought to find a way to embed Creative Commons licensing meta-data in all my creative works - photographs, videos, my website and more.

Creative Commons RDFa data is embedded in the footer of each page of my website. this data identifies me as the creator and therefore the owner of this resource. it has a link to a Creative Commons license page describing the requirements for using any information or material from my site. there is also a like to a page where other permissions are noted. this provides a framework for others to use my materials in their own creations.

embedding Creative Commons licenses in other file formats is supported by many software developers including Microsoft for their Office 2003/XP and 2007/2010 products, Sun Microsystems for their Open Office products (developed by the Creative Commons) and Google for much of their documentation and for some of their software tools.

although Adobe uses Creative Commons licensing in much of their product documentation and help files, none of the Adobe Creative Suite of products supports embedding Creative Commons licensing 'out of the box'.

most Adobe products support a FileInfo dialog under the File menu and it is here that all the metadata embedded in a file are exposed for viewing as well as editing. some products (like Bridge and Premiere Pro) offer 'mini-metadata' panels where this data is also exposed.

as a software developer is a previous incarnation and a photographer in this one i decided to develop a complete set of tools that would add Creative Commons metadata support to the creative suite product line, primarily in Photoshop/Bridge and Photoshop Lightroom.

• an XMP FileInfo panel for embedding Creative Commons metadata in CS4 and CS5 products is available here. note that in CS3 and prior the Creative Commons provides the needed files here
• a plugin adding Creative Commons metadata to Photoshop Lightroom is available here.