Hi,

I am planning on writing a book that contains solutions to maths problems in the standard text books. I was just wondering if this would be legal??

I would then hope to self publish and sell the book on amazon and ebay, any thoughts?

Thanks

As far as I know it's not illegal, assuming such books don't already have a solutions booklet or leaflet available - for the teachers, at least. If they do, then you might be infringing their copyright.



- NaomiM

Was about to say the same - but if you quote the problems, that might infringe.

The Society of Authors might know, and there are also these guys:

http://www.copyrightservice.co.uk/

Emma

<Added>

Meant to say, that link is to a commercial organisation, but it has useful information, clearly put. Just be aware that the 'copyright registration' service it offers is designed to make money, and isn't in the least necessary.

Do you know if there is a demand for such an answers book amongst maths students?

<Added>

Just to add that a selling point of such books is that they are "frequently updated and revised" which may mean that your answers book will soon be out of date.

The thing is, to get the marks you generally need to show your working.

So I can't see how you could display the full answer (ie with working) without quoting the question.

Also presumably at SOME point the company must have produced an answers booklet, if only for the teachers, so if your working and solution is correct then your answers will mirror theirs and will be a copyright infringement.

Seek advice, but I can't see how you can do this in a way that doesn't involve reproducing substantial chunks of copyright material.

Another question is which text book do you give the answers for?
My niece is now studying maths at Univ. and she's passed us two carrier bags full of GCSE and A'Level maths books, while our local school prefers to use old SATS papers
Any particular school may use just one or two text books, changing them every few years depending on their budget, but the school down the road may have a more up to date version, while the school in the next County may use one by a different publisher altogether.

Yes I realised that I would have to include the questions, which would infringe the copywright of the text book authors.

I do believe that there is a potential market for these books as I would target a popular text book. Within the popular text books there are answers to questions at the back of the book, however these do not show any working.

Students can waste a large ammount of time when they become stuck on a question, e.g. they may spend up to 40mins stuck on one question and not progress onto other questions due to one minor mistake in their calculation.

I can sympathise. I'm hopeless at maths and so wouldn't be able to help with homework - I leave that chore to my husband.

Would it be better to set up a website?

This is exactly what I was thinking, creating a distance learning website, this would then operate like a school or college, which are allowed to use text books. I would then essentially be providing a service, rarther than a book.

Any thoughts?
Peter

<Added>

However it does seem to be easiest to write a book (which would be about 300 pages), making a website is a lot of work and I do not know exactly how to do it.

<Added>

Making a good profeshinal looking website that is, I could quite easily make a poor looking website.

BUt would a website solve anything? Publishing stuff on a website is subject to the same copyright restrictions as books. Though with less risk of course - in that if you get caught you don't have to pulp your printrun, you just take down or alter the site.

Schools or unis are different in that they teach from copies of books that they've bought - they don't freely reproduce the content for profit.

Maybe students could post their maths problems on a website and either check out answers in a 'database' of maths solutions, or pay for you to show them how to work it out.
But, yes, whether it's on a website or in a book, you'll need to contact the publisher(s) of the text books you're quoting from to ask permission to use copyrighted material.



- NaomiM