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Oracle vs Google: Copyright Claims Must Remain
swandives writes "More in the Oracle/Google patent infringement saga. Oracle says no court has ever found that APIs for software like Java are ineligible for copyright protection. The claims were made in its objection to Google's request that the court make a summary judgment on Oracle's copyright allegations. In early August, Google asked the judge to rule that Google doesn't infringe Oracle copyright in its implementation of Android. In an objection to that request, Oracle asked the judge to let the charge go to trial. Earlier, Judge Alsup denied Google's attempt to get a potentially damaging e-mail redacted. Looks like this one could take a while."
Java took the C++ api in part. Oracle is arguing that they themselves are commiting copyright infringement.
Yes. Yes. Yes.
You are an idiot that clearly has never done any of these.
Otherwise you would know how absurd the concept of copyright on an API really is.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Google did to Java on Phones exactly what we criticized Microsoft for through all those years of Slashdot existence.
Not exactly: -
First, Google made the code open source.
Second, Google never proclaimed JavaVM compatibility.
That's a far cry from Microsoft's behaviors.
They took the API, they partially implemented them, then made their own incompatibilities, then took over the market with their incompatible implementation.
While I agree with this, it is not illegal. After all, everything was open source according to SUN.
Next please.
You totally missed the point. You're talking about copyright on the code implementing the API - while the real topic here is whether or not the API calls (function names) themselves can be copywritten.
And of course the answer is 'no', because that prevents any and all compatible implementations. In fact, you'd be in violation simply for writing a program that called the API - since you have to use the function names in the calling program.
Oracle's lawyers know nothing about programming, apparently. If things worked like they're trying to say they do, Microsoft could sue anyone that made software for Windows because at some point you used a header that included the Windows API function names.
It's slightly different. Google didn't market it as Google Java, and in fact took pains to say that "the syntax looks like Java but it is compiled to run on the Dalvik VM".
Do No Evil? I don't think so.
FYI: Google's moto is "Don't be evil" not "Do no evil".
If a court rules that a company can own an API, then everybody's software becomes infringing!
This isn't a new concern. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, I worked (as a "consultant") on a number of projects at Digital. One of the discussions that came up occasionally was why DEC's unix systems were all based on BSD, and not Sys/V. It was well-known that DEC had Sys/V running on their hardware internally, but for some reason they didn't want to sell it.
The explanation that came up every time was that the Digital lawyers had nixed the use of Sys/V and other AT&T code for the same reason that we're discussing now: The run-time libraries all contained AT&T copyright notices in every routine, so if you linked to those libraries, your binaries would contain AT&T copyright notices. This included libc, so pretty much all binaries produced on Sys/V contained lots of AT&T copyright notices. There was a very good chance that AT&T would have a legal claim on any software that contained those copyright notices.
The lawyers apparently did point out that the status of these copyright claims in binaries was a legal "gray area" that had never been properly tested in the courts. Their professional legal advice was to let someone else be the sucker^H^H^H^H^H^Hguinea pig who paid the legal fees to fight AT&T on the issue. Until that was decided, using AT&T binary libraries was legally too risky, and since the BSD libraries were not such a legal threat, DEC should stick with BSD, which did the job just fine.
Disclaimer: I never personally talked to any of these purported DEC lawyers to verify this story. But it was widely believed by all the DEC insiders that I talked to. I'd imagine that the same sort of discussions must be going on inside a lot of current companies with respect to java. I'd also guess that a lot of companies lawyers are advising that their clients minimize the use of java until the courts sort out the legal issues, just to be on the safe side. Why risk your company's profits on a language that may be legally incumbered in ways that are unknowable today, when there are similar languages (python, perl, etc.) that the geeks say are just as good and are legally safe to use..
(Yeah, I know I'm risking a language flame war by that last comment. Hopefully the mods here will mark them OT. ;-)
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
This is a variation on the whole "a digital file is just a number, and you can't copyright a number" rhetoric.
No, not at all like that.
An API is an invention. It's something that did not exist until someone created it, like a song, book, or movie.
Like a book? So this little list below:
Foundation
Foundation and Empire
Second Foundation
Foundations Edge
Foundation and Earth
Is that an invention? Or simply a description of what exists?
A software library is a set of callable functions. How is a list of the function signatures (the "API") in that library somehow different?
Ah, but perhaps you'll tell me I'm putting the cart before the horse, the API was written first, and the library came after?!
So what? Suppose Asimov, had scribbled the following on a napkin back before he penned Foundation... (And yes set aside for a moment, that Foundation wasn't penned as a novel originally...it's not the point)
Foundation
Foundation and Empire
Second Foundation
Foundations Edge
Foundation and Earth
At that point, yes this list of titles was an invention, a work of fiction on its own, the books did not exist, he had yet to write them. Fast forward a few decades... the books are written. And the list, is now a description of what exists, and it would be absurd to argue that people wishing to enumerate his works should be forbidden from writing:
Foundation
Foundation and Empire
Second Foundation
Foundations Edge
Foundation and Earth
Simply because he had written this list on a napkin before he started.
How exactly is an API different?
Further, an API is by definition, the method by which other software interfaces with it.
Copyright law has specific exceptions that explicitly and specifically allow reverse engineering and decompiling just to figure out what the interface specification actual is -- in the event that its not readily available/documented so that the discovered interface could be used for interoperability.
It would absolutely absurd if after going through all that trouble to legally protect our ability to discover what the interface is ( (hmm "discover"... as is describe something that exists), to then prohibit us from writing it down or using it, when the express purpose of the section of law was to enable interoperability.