In order for your derivative work to be kosher, you need to do two things:
1. Attribute the works that you're using to the wiki and to the specific author, if possible. For example:
682's Lovely Tea Party is based on "SCP-682" by "Dr Gears": https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-682
2. Add the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 license (or CC-BY-SA for short) to the derived work. Doing this will release it under the CC-BY-SA license. Specific release statements may be found under the "For Specific Creator Types" tab.
Releasing it under the CC-BY-SA license means that people will be able to copy your work wholesale, and even sell it, provided that they properly attribute you and release their work under the same license.
Do not sell anything related to SCP-173's former image, Izumi Kato's Untitled 2004. The image is not released under Creative Commons. Commercial use of this property may result in serious legal action against the seller.
See the final tab "A Word on SCP-173" for more information.
Hey, the SCP Foundation is cool! I want to make something based off it! What should I do?
So, you want to make a work set in/based off of the SCP Foundation? That's awesome! Whether it's a game, short story, film, or anything else, we always welcome people who want to contribute to the SCP universe.
The SCP Foundation uses a specific Creative Commons license. If you want to make a work based in the SCP Foundation universe, this means you need to follow the rules of this license.
As mentioned earlier, the SCP Foundation uses a specific license, which has two key components: attribution and share-alike. Let's talk about attribution first.
Attribution
The first requirement under Creative Commons is "attribution." Any derivative works (stuff based on the SCP Foundation) must attribute back to the original source, the SCP Foundation wiki. If you use a specific SCP item or tale, you must attribute the individual article as well as the wiki. If you are using a general SCP Foundation idea (like a character, Group of Interest, or the concept of the Foundation as a whole) you only need to attribute the wiki in general.
682's Lovely Tea Party is based on "SCP-682" by "Dr Gears": https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-682
In this case, if you wanted to do a work based entirely or partially on SCP-682, then you would need to add this somewhere accompanying the work.
You do not need to follow this exact format, but according to CC any attribution you provide must include:
1. The name of the work referenced.
2. The author's name, or whatever they wish to be known as. Online screen names work for attribution as long as they are in quotes, but if the author contacts you and wants you to use their real name or some other alias, you need to oblige.
3. A link back to the source material, or other forms of citation if you're somehow referencing offline SCP materials.
Share-Alike
Any content based on the SCP Foundation is itself going to be under Creative Commons. So anything you make, you agree to share as well under these same rules. While there are other versions of the Creative Commons license, you MUST release your work under CC-BY-SA 3.0. You simply can't change the license to something else.
This also means that anyone making stuff derived from your work has to attribute you as one of the creators, and that any work made from your stuff is under the same license as well. You can't stop people from doing derivatives, but you can ask them to attribute you in the way you see fit, such as linking back to your web page or project page.
In short, this means that your derived work must be released under the CC-BY-SA, so that other people can use the same license. It is not enough to simply attribute the SCP Foundation.
So What Can You Do?
So if you agree to these two things, what can you do?
- Share: You can share or repost anything from this site. You can copy-paste entire stories and articles in their entirety and repost them to your website. You can include them in any sort of compilations of creepypastas or stories.
- Remix: You can make derivative works. You can make fanfiction, fanart, fan movies, fan mods, anything that fans can do. You could write up a TV show or movie. You can make posters or T-shirts. You can even…
- Sell: You can sell the remixes you make based on the SCP Foundation. However, keep in mind that you probably will not get rich off of them, because under Share-Alike, anyone can freely copy, use, or download your stuff, and you will have no legal recourse provided they also follow the terms of the license.
Rights Agent Notice
Use of this website constitutes legal authorization for SCP Wiki licensing staff to act as your rights agents in cases where the copyright(s) of a work published on this site is infringed by a third party. This authorization is limited to the removal of infringing content via section 512 of the DMCA, regional equivalents, or legal action. This authorization is via Informal Contract agreement, and is an extension of the formal agency authorization provided to licensing staff by the creators and copyright holders of SCP-173, the SCP Foundation concept, and the SCP Foundation logo.
Note: The below release statements are designed for general usage and projects featuring content based on a large number of SCP stories. When creating a derivative work based on one particular article, please identify the author of the work in your statement (you can find their identity via SCPPER) and (though not legally required) it is considered good form to link to their author page if they have one.
Game Developers: You are free to create and share videogames based on SCP, but you must comply with all aspects of the license as it relates to software. That means releasing the work under CC-by-SA-3.0, including the release statement prominently on any store page the game is distributed on (as well as developer websites and the like), releasing the game without DRM if the game costs money (steam and the like have developer options for this), not imposing additional legal restrictions through EULAs or equivalent user forms, and not attempting to impede any alternate distribution sources so long as those sources in turn follow the terms of the license.
Sample release statement: "Content relating to the SCP Foundation, including the SCP Foundation logo, is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://scpwiki.com/ and its authors. [Insert Game Name here], being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Note: You can also choose to license your game under GPLv3, which is compatible with our license. It is a more specialized software license that includes provisions for patent rights, but requires you to release the full source code of your game publicly- in a manner that is immediately playable and modifiable. If you do so, please still credit the SCP Foundation and its authors via attribution. See here for more information on why the Creative Commons organization recommends GPLv3 for software.
Sample GPL release statement:
"(one line to give the program's name and a brief idea of what it does.)
Copyright (C) (year) (name of author)
This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>."
Youtubers: You are free to create and share videos based on SCP, but you must license your videos under CC if the particular featured content does not fall under fair use. Most SCP youtube content, being either audio readings or original animations based on SCP, do not fall under fair use because they either reproduce the content of a work in its entirety or are entirely based on the SCP universe. An example of something that would not require a cc statement due to being clear cut fair use would be a video reviewing an SCP, while only including small selections of the text itself (or none at all). A statement that you can copy paste into your video descriptions can be found below, and you can feel free to err on the side of caution if you're not sure whether your video needs it. You are also encouraged to choose to use Youtube's own CC licensing feature in addition to making the statement, though we do not strictly require it.
To be clear, we're all in favor of readings/animations/short films/etc and have never copyright striked any such videos - and would never do so except in exceptionally negative and exploitative circumstances. The licensing warning in this section primarily exists for the protection of our youtube content creators, several of which have previously been demonitized by youtube for "content reuse" prior to licensing staff and the youtubers in question intervening with Google. It is our hope that by including this language you are less likely to be targeted by Youtube's monetization woes, in addition to the obvious legal and ethical benefits of fully complying with the license. Should you ever receive a copyright strike against one of your SCP videos on the basis of the SCP content, please inform us so we may take action against the party filing false strikes under our name.
Sample release statement: "Content relating to the SCP Foundation, including the SCP Foundation logo, is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://scpwiki.com/ and its authors. This video, being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Artists: If you create a piece of art based on an SCP and share it publicly, ie via deviantart, it needs to be licensed under CC. This is particularly important if the artwork is being sold for profit, ie as a merchandise image on a website like Redbubble. Attempting to restrict use of SCP artwork to all rights reserved or noncommercial use only is not compliant with the license, and does not fall under fair use.
Sample release statement: "Content relating to the SCP Foundation, including the SCP Foundation logo, is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://scpwiki.com/ and its authors. This artwork, being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Other wikidot users: If you are operating your own wikidot site and want to use the SCP wikis CSS, then there is some good news, as per the US copyright office, CSS is not copyrightable and thus does not fall under our license. You are free to use and remix said CSS without having to license the resulting work under CC-BY-SA. Do note that unless you are putting said work under this license you will need to remove all SCP related artwork, like the SCP logo. While not required attribution is still polite.
I've got a great idea for a SCP webseries/movie/restaurant franchise, and I need to have someone lift the Creative Commons restrictions. Can I contact the senior staff and ask them to lift it for me?
No.
The staff of the SCP Wiki act as custodians of the community and the site as a whole. The staff will not and cannot "suspend" the Creative Commons license for any reason whatsoever.
However, an author can release their original idea, which may have been written as a SCP, under a different license for someone to use, but the article itself will still be covered under Creative Commons. Furthermore, the idea of the SCP Foundation, SCP Documentation, and all other aspects of the SCP Universe are Creative Commons and cannot be un-released.
This means that, Dr. Gears, for example, can sell the copyright to his original idea "Big Lizard That Hates People And Regenerates A Lot." However, he cannot sell the copyright to SCP-682, because the idea of SCP-682, the SCP Foundation, etc. has been released under Creative Commons. And, even if he sells the copyright to "Big Lizard," SCP-682 will continue to work under Creative Commons.
What do I do if the author of a work is unknown?
Then put "author unknown" in the place of the author's name. Note that this refers to cases where the author of a work is publicly unknown due to porting from Editthis, and does not refer to simply being unaware of who an author is. Use SCPPER to find the most accurate article attribution data, with the author[s] listed under the contributors line of each individual article. If the contributors line reads "Unknown" then attribute your derivative work as instructed above.
Can I put an SCP article in a collection?
Yes, you can. However, the SCP article, and anything derived from it (like an illustration), will still have to be attributed and still have to be released under the CC-BY-SA license.
Will you endorse our project or help us promote it?
That depends. If we like the finished product, and you follow the requirements laid out in the rest of this guide, we may consider promoting you/your product on our social media sites or the front page.
We as staff will not help you promote any sort of crowdfunding effort, or assist in development of your game, series, etc. Individual site members may do so if they want.
Will you sign any sort of exclusive adaptation rights over to us?
Nope, as we have no ability to do that, nor would it actually stop anyone from adapting something from us (or even using your own adapted works) so long as they have proper attribution listed for all parties.
THE IMAGE THAT USED TO BE ON SCP-173, BASED ON THE SCULPTURE Untitled 2004 SHOULD NOT BE USED FOR COMMERCIAL PURPOSES.
Mr. Kato gave the wiki permission to use the image of Untitled 2004 for the purposes of the wiki as long as it was for non-commercial uses. However he has not released the likeness of Untitled 2004 under a Creative Commons license compatible with CC BY-SA 3.0, which is why the image has been removed from the wiki. He still holds the copyright to the sculpture. This means that you cannot use the sculpture, or its likeness, for commercial purposes. If you do use the likeness of Untitled 2004 in a commercial project, you are committing copyright infringement and may face legal injunctions.
With that said, the text of SCP-173 has been released under Creative Commons BY-SA 3.0. If you want to sell copies of the text do so to your heart's content, provided that you follow the instructions above.
In short, the image once featured on SCP-173 is barred from use in any commercial endeavor. It is encouraged that if you do want to use an image representing SCP-173, you create your own or choose one from our SCP-173 Redesign Collab Hub.
