Fair Use of Science Problems

[Gherbod]

In USA. I am thinking about writing science instruction texts probably to be published online for sale by download. I wonder if I may save myself a little time in some chapters (ancient, settled science) by lifting or adapting public domain science questions from old textbooks. So how old do published science "problems" need to be to fall into the public domain? Does it differ for book with multiple authors? For materials published by corporations instead of individuals?

If I wanted to reprint a "problem" with permission do I contact the author? editor? publishing company? All of them?

Thanks for any help or advice.

[Mr. Knowitall]

If you are working with public domain materials, they're public domain. If not, they're subject to copyright.

What exactly is it that you are thinking about copying? Mathematical formulae, or the manner in which specific elements combine, or are we talking about copying "word problems" of various sorts? Or something else entirely?

[Gherbod]

Ah, I see now how my post was unclear. As a potential scientific author I want to make sure I don't misuse copyrighted materials. I read on wikipedia that a copyright may last (in USA) for merely a year or up to 70 years after the author has died. It also said that "Educational use is regarded as "fair use" in most jurisdictions, but the restrictions vary wildly from nation to nation." I feel like I need to know these detials and I don't know where to look for answers. (Thank you in advance for any you can provide.)

One concern of mine is that the nature of a science text requires that it be fundamentally similar to all other science texts covering the same subject(s). A concise treatment of the material(s) makes this a near certainty. How concerned about this should I be? What if some author whose text I have never seen sues me because I approach a topic in a similar manner?

Also, I am trying to figure out what my approach to writing science problems (as you say: word problems) should be. If I intentionally don't consult other books and write totally original problems, it's still quite likely that I would quite nearly reproduce a least a few published copyrighted works unknowingly. How concerned should I be about this?

Taking a different approach, I might want to prepare students for the types of problems which they would encounter on standardized tests. (Perhaps writing a "test-prep" style book instead of a traditional textbook.) In this case there would be a strong incentive for me to *intentionally* anticipate or very nearly reproduce sample problems that might be found on standardized tests like the AP or GRE. How different would I need to make my word problems (from published, copyrighted problems which I have consulted) to avoid copyright infringement?

Finally, if writing a classic textbook I might want to intentionally seek and copy/adapt bits from texts or scientific papers which are no longer covered by copyright. This might be for the purpose of reproducing a small section from a famous scientists' logbook from the time he was working on a classic experiment. It might also be to republish historical data and results from a famous scientific paper. Or it may be to find and reproduce famous science "problems" from the textbooks or classes of great scientists. How old do these (originally copyrighted but now quite old) texts or works have to be before I could know that they were "public domain" and could be freely used/adapted in my own work? For example, if it is the author's lifetime + 70 years then most of the published scientific work from the past century is beyond my reach, but a less draconian copyright restriction might mean I could flavor my textbook with a little interesting history.

I'm grateful for any advice or for any suggested books/texts which I could or should consult for answers. Thanks!