Non-commercial refers to an activity or entity that does not in some sense involve commerce

Commerce

While business refers to the value-creating activities of an organization for profit, commerce means the whole system of an economy that constitutes an environment for business. The system includes legal, economic, political, social, cultural, and technological systems that are in operation in any...

, at least relative to similar activities that do have a commercial objective or emphasis. For example, advertising

Advertising

Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...

-free community radio

Community radio

Community radio is a type of radio service, that offers a third model of radio broadcasting beyond commercial broadcasting and public broadcasting. Community stations can serve geographic communities and communities of interest...

 stations are typically nonprofit organization

Nonprofit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

s staffed by individuals volunteering

Volunteering

Volunteering is generally considered an altruistic activity, intended to promote good or improve human quality of life, but people also volunteer for their own skill development, to meet others, to make contacts for possible employment, to have fun, and a variety of other reasons that could be...

 their efforts to air a wide variety of radio programming, and do not run explicit radio advertisements, included in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 specific grouping of "non-commercial educational

Non-commercial educational

The term non-commercial educational applies to a radio station or TV station that does not accept on air advertisements , as defined in the United States by the Federal Communications Commission . NCE stations do not pay broadcast license fees for their non-profit uses of the radio spectrum...

" (NCE) public radio stations. Some Creative Commons license

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons licenses are several copyright licenses that allow the distribution of copyrighted works. The licenses differ by several combinations that condition the terms of distribution. They were initially released on December 16, 2002 by Creative Commons, a U.S...

s include a "non-commercial" option, controversial in definition and application.