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Sun CEO Explicitly Endorsed Java's Use In Android
An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet writes: 'If you believe Oracle's patent lawsuits against Google for its use of Java in Android, Google has stolen not just patented ideas but directly copied Java code. In short, Google is a red-handed thief and should pay Oracle over a billion in damages. There's just one little problem with this portrayal of Google as an intellectual property (IP) bandit. When Android first came out, Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz, then Java's owner, greeted the news with 'heartfelt congratulations.' Whoops.'"
Those assholes killed Solaris and deserve to be taken to the cleaners by Google.
The article states that Sun was supporting Android with development tools in NetBeans.
Where are they then?
As they saying goes, never let the truth get in the way of a good story!
If there's a financial gain to be made, and the judge seems to think that Oracle at least have some legitimate claim deep within their case, then this won't change much.
Schwartz even looks like a pretentious IP troll. Also, I'm shocked that ZDNet took some time off from bobbing for Jobs' apples.
Schwartz offered a public "congratulations" and privately Sun notified Google they would need to license it.
Just exactly how does his public congratulations waive any right of payment. In fact it doesn't even address it. Cheers to the ignorant, wishful thinkers that believe this is any way, shape or forum constitutes a license waiver.
Awful, I know, but I could not hold myself. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estoppel
Definitely puts Oracle in an difficult position but does the current owner of a company assume the liability of "word-of-mouth" statements by a former owner? What's more, are they actually a legal binding agreement? I like Oracle about as much as I like Microsoft and Apple, but it seems to me that what it comes down to is Google would need to produce an actual legal document signed by Sun to make anything matter out of this.
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Google has already submitted the said blog post as part of its defense http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/california/candce/3:2010cv03561/231846/103/0.pdf (Exhibit M) So, this is not a new development and unlikely to change anything.
Oracle is doing us all a favor. By confronting Google head-on with software patents they are forcing Google to decide how to fight in this war. Do they collect patents like HTC is doing, and try to join the emerging smartphone patent cartel? Or do they continue to push for an open platform that breaks the cartels? It will have to be one or the other, the middle road isn't sustainable (they will continue to be sued over and over).
In 2007, Google had exactly 1 lawyer, world-wide, who was concerned with patents. They believed software patents were not relevant to their business except as useful tools to protect their search / indexing algorithms.
Today, it's clear we're in a war over whether the future of mobile computing is open, or locked down like mobile phones have always been. The only way to win such a war is to bring enough money into play to affect the law on patents, and that means, today, Google. It's like the USA reluctant to enter WWII.
So, I really hope Oracle continues to hurt Google with this.
I think Google probably is in the right, but I'm surprised that Google seems to be in 'bet the company' litigation over this, bearing in mind the runaway success of Android and its upside as far as Google is concerned. $100million bucks for billions in return seems like a small price to pay.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
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Even worse, according to Wikipedia, when he resigned from Sun he announced it as a haiku on Twitter:
.... an obvious IP ripoff from BeOS!
(Yeah, yeah, I know, I shouldn't feed 'em...)
MS used to push stealing from them. As they said, a stolen item from me robs my competitor of money. This was how they destroyed Borland. Now, where life gets interesting is how will the courts see this? Sun was NOT out to illegally destroy a competitor. They were happy to have Google use it. Hopefully, this destroys Oracle's lawsuit, while still allowing Google''s counter claims to continue forward.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I don't think it's binding. Sun sold its patents effectively (with everything else), so whatever Sun CEO may have said previously is not words of patents' owner anymore. So there.
Well, of course the Sun CEO was happy. Just like Microsoft is happy that millions of chinese are pirating Windows rather than installing Linux.
Drink, drugs... or clumsy trolling?
All true computer users who are awesome like me prefer programs writtin in LISP because these progems tend to be toring complete and therefore moreuseful mand robust intheir architechters than scripting languigis like JaVa!!!
And if you code like you type, You will sound like you have a lisp.
Restore the madness of youth's lechery
I must be imagining things, then. Because I could have sworn that there are Android projects in my NetBeans projects folder. Ho hum.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Then use Clojure! I'm sure it can compile to Dalvik too.
Not mutually exclusive.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
Estoppel by record—This frequently arises as issue/cause of action estoppel or judicial estoppel where the orders or judgments made in previous legal proceedings prevent the parties from relitigating the same issues or causes of action,
Estoppel by deed (often regarded as technical or formal estoppels)—Where rules of evidence prevent a litigant from denying the truth of what was said or done
Estoppel by silence—Estoppel that prevents a person from asserting something when he had the right and opportunity to do so earlier, and such silence put another person at a disadvantage.
Laches—estoppel in equity by delay. Laches has been considered both a reliance-based estoppel, and a sui generis estoppel.
With apologies to Cardinal Fang.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
When in the past I have addressed customers as a director, I have always been careful to state that either no oral comments I made would be legally binding, or I would have to refuse all questions on technical or commercial matters, for this very reason. This is exactly the same as a politician speaking "off the record".
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
That's clearly bullshit, because ideas aren't patentable. Implementations of ideas, i.e. inventions, are. Expressions of ideas, e.g. novels, artwork aren't - but they can be copyrighted.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
But if you look closer, you'll find that what had been intended to be a Lisp application was mostly hacked together in Perl.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Statements matter in court. You can't go and say one thing, and then act in an opposite manner and expect a court to be ok with that, particularly when you are talking damages. So no, this won't make everything go away, if it would have it probably would have already gone away. But it does weaken Oracle's case.
Oracle's argument is basically that Google is evil, stole their tech, and owes them a bunch of damages because of that. Google is trying to show that isn't the case. things like this help.
Also something to keep in mind, not directly relevant here but related, is that in many jurisdictions verbal contracts are legally binding. For important things people use signed contracts to keep things from being "he said she said" but verbal contracts are binding and enforceable. You can't make a contractual promise then back out.
That's not what happened here, but somewhat related.
That's why he used OR instead of XOR. ;)
They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance. - Terry Pratchett
It's unfortunate that Schwartz's blog is gone, and that ZDNet didn't drill down a little more carefully to check dates on things. I was working with Sun on the java.net site at the time, through a contract with O'Reilly. As I recall, the story is actually somewhat worse. The rumor mill reported that Android would be using Java, and Schwartz went off half-cocked and praised Google for the "Java/Linux platform". Writing for java.net, I said "But I didn't end up putting this on the front page, because I just couldn't source the Java angle well enough (no offense, Jonathan, but you did say ZFS would be on Leopard...)." (that's the current editor's headshot on the page, not me, BTW).
Not too much later, Google laid out the details of Android, including the Dalvik VM, which meant that Google was only using Java the language (which it didn't have to license) and not Java the VM (which it would have had to). What I heard through the back channel was that Sun was pissed, believing it had been stabbed in the back. This made for a very awkward scene at Sun's mobile-focused "ME Developer Days" a few months later in January 2008: the Sun people had clearly been told to not talk about Android or acknowledge it in any way, which led of a few awkward moments of dancing around the elephant in the room. The first night of the conference, the Java Posse stopped by for dinner, and upon seeing Dick Wall (who at that time worked at Google), the first thing I said to him was "man, are they pissed at you guys."
Relevant dates and links:
Anyways, assuming my recollection of events and this timeline is accurate, Schwartz's blog should not be taken as an indication that Sun knew about and approved what Google was doing with Android. What it does prove is what a lot of people knew then but wouldn't say: Schwartz was a clueless loud-mouthed buffoon who happily fiddled away on his blog as SUNW burned.
Damn. I wish that actually happened. I have to say, I am not a fan of Eclipse.
The author of the summary seems to be unaware that IP is been shown fairly convincingly to be a sham term. See
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.html
MS Java was a trojan: Microsoft put stuff in the sun.java tree that would have been 100% acceptable in the microsoft.java tree. Why? So that you'd use a construct that would work on 85% of your clients and not on anyone using non-Microsoft products. Why? To ensure the lock-in continued.
Google, which sells its users' eyes (and other personal info) to advertisers, or Oracle, who doesn't sell anything without an humongous price tag?
Does Goggle have a written document giving them explicit permission to use the patents in question? I mean the thoughts of an old CEO may be enlightening about how Sun's CEO felt about Android at the time, but it means nothing since we are talking about a different CEO of a different company. If only Google had some sort of licensing agreement in place to indemnify themselves.
The only damning evidence I see is that Google probably should have presented an offer to Sun's board (and stockholders) to purchase Sun before Oracle had a chance.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
So now I can patent the bare ideas?
Open Source Network Inventory for the masses! Kuwaiba
Fuck Oracle. This rant is unrelated to TFA, however it rings true for Oracle's leeching style; I will take pleasure in sledgehammering my rack of SunFire servers once I've procured replacements from another mfr. There is no way I will give those fuckers ONE CENT for what Sun rightly provided for free.
Never underestimate the power of the Schwartz!
Sig Follows: "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." -- Mark Twain
you forgot the xkcd link !
Okay, I'm sure Google should have done their due diligence in verifying that Dalvik's VM solution was in the clear.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalvik_(software)
So Dalvik has to be proven to be a clean-room implementation. Perhaps someone more versed in this tech can comment why this is not publicly known and can be proven to not use Sun's runtime. Wouldn't that piece be available to review in the open source project (http://code.google.com/p/dalvik/)?
Wearing pants should always be optional.
IANAL but find the whole idea of patenting software and business processes ridiculous.
Regarding the alleged Java patents specifically:
Java is modeled after C++ and should not qualify for any patents due to obviousness.
Java was released in 1995. Any patents related to it should have expired by now.
This whole software patent nonsense is killing innovation and accomplishing the opposite intent of the U.S. Constitution. The patent office is derelict in it's duties deferring the issue to courts, who often throw patents out (as has happened in this case). The system has been corrupted by patent trolls such as Intellectual Ventures who have the money and clout to buy politicians.
Perhaps when everything is licensed and sold from Germany (which does not recognize these ridiculous patents), the U.S. will wise up.
It's so nice to see that after the pony-tailed idiot (Scwartz) destroyed Sun, he's showing up to mess with Oracle.
Honestly, Oracle should have kept him on. They deserve each other.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Congratulations on stealing our IP... we plan on Celebrations once your product becomes wildly successful and we successfully initiate the litigation process!
Until Oracle puts an irrational number on the table, I think g.co will keep up the good fight.
I'm beginning to suspect this guy (For a Free Internet) is a machine... have you seen his previous posts? Either he is one, or he hasn't passed the "toring" test himself.
Democracy: Crowdsourcing a country near you
He likes that it would use Java. He did not necessarily like that people copy from Java and create and slightly incompatible platform. While the license to use the Java source code is open, the patents are only provided if you play by Suns rules.