Dallas, TX asked in Copyright for Texas

Q: I'm writing a book on covid, I'm including quotes from various doctors and medical journals, is this fair use?

I'm taking quotes from various TV interviews of Drs, medical studies and journals, and news articles ranging from topics on the vaccine to lockdowns, to masks, and treatment. I'm also commenting on the quotes while also adding criticism in some parts. I want to self publish the book for commercial use, and it would contain well over 100 quotes from different sources about covid. Would this fall under fair use without the need to track down Dr. so and so to ask them if I can quote their dialogue they said on Good Morning America or tack down the University of Arizona to quote a portion of their study on certain treatment effectiveness? Do I need permission from all these organizations and people or would this be fair use? Thank you.

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1 Lawyer Answer

A: Under U.S. fair use doctrine, a limited portion of a work may be quoted for purposes of criticism, commentary, news reporting, or academic writing. There is no bright-line test for determining the amount that may be quoted. It depends on consideration of several factors.

Note that the question of fair use is analyzed for each separately copyrighted work. For example, suppose you quote one sentence from work A, comment on it, and then quote another sentence from work B by a different copyright owner and comment on that one, A court would analyze whether the quoting of work A is fair use separately from whether the quoting of work B is fair use.

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