Open Access (OA) literature is:
After an author or copyright-holder consents to making their work free on the Internet, minimal or no restrictions are attached to the work.
In most fields scholarly journals do not pay authors. Authors can therefore consent to OA without loss of revenue. OA is compatible with peer-review and all major OA initiatives for scientific and scholarly literature support the importance of OA. Most journal editors and referees participating in peer-review donate their time and expertise.
OA literature is not free to produce but is often less expensive to produce than conventionally published literature. Issues surrounding OA center around whether scholarly literature can be made available at no charge and whether there are alternative methods to fund OA than by charging readers or creating access barriers.
Suber, P. (2012). Open Access Overview. Retrieved from http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/overview.htm
Works that are in the public domain can be freely used without permission.
Works are in the public domain because they were not subject to copyright in the first place, the term of the copyright has expired, or the copyright holder has granted that the work may be used freely and without seeking permission.
Generally speaking, in Canada, the term of copyright is the life of the creator of the work, plus fifty years.
Authors and creators use a Creative Commons license to give the public permission to share and use their creative works under conditions specified by the author. (i.e. “Some Rights Reserved”).
If you find material with a Creative Commons license be sure to read and abide by the terms specified, which usually include attribution.
Find out more about Creative Commons licenses and search for material at creativecommons.org.
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Works that are copied with permission must carry an attribution statement that includes:
Sample statement:
"Copyright (name of publisher, and copyright author(s), date of publication). This material has been copied with permission of the copyright holder. Resale or further copying of this material is strictly prohibited."