Slashdot Mirror
Jury Rules Google Violated Java Copyright, Google Moves For Mistrial
eldavojohn writes "Details are thin, but the long-covered Oracle v. Google trial has at least partially been decided in favor of Oracle. The jury says Google violated copyrights with Android when it used Java APIs to design the system. Google moved for a mistrial after hearing the incomplete decision. The patent infringement accusations have yet to be ruled upon."
Does the judge now have to rule on whether API's can be copyrighted?
Right. The EU has already decided that APIs are not copyrightable and wrote an extremely reasonable and balanced explanation as to why:
The object of the protection conferred by Directive 91/250 is the expression in any form of a computer program, such as the source code and the object code, which permits reproduction in different computer languages. On the basis of those considerations, the Court holds that neither the functionality of a computer program nor the programming language and the format of data files used in a computer program in order to exploit certain of its functions constitute a form of expression. Accordingly, they do not enjoy copyright protection.
To accept that the functionality of a computer program can be protected by copyright would amount to making it possible to monopolise ideas, to the detriment of technological progress and industrial development.
So maybe there's still some hope left... otherwise we'll just have to hire lawyers to write the software of the future.
I have left slashdot and am now on Soylent News. FUCK YOU DICE.
In other words, a very good day for Google, not Oracle.
Here is the link to the Groklaw updates about this case.
It would have been a lot slimper and less confusing if Slashdot had just linked to that in the first place.
Wow, copy and paste fail. Now with HTML entities
From http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~martin/webrevs/openjdk7/timsort/raw_files/new/src/share/classes/java/util/TimSort.java, here are the 9 lines of code that google is accused of infringing:
private static void rangeCheck(int arrayLen, int fromIndex, int toIndex) {
if (fromIndex > toIndex)
throw new IllegalArgumentException("fromIndex(" + fromIndex +
") > toIndex(" + toIndex+")");
if (fromIndex < 0)
throw new ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException(fromIndex);
if (toIndex > arrayLen)
throw new ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException(toIndex);
}
The code boils down to: if (x > y || x < 0 || y > max) { error(); }
Tell me how you'd write the code differently. (Keep in mind that the engineer who wrote this, Josh Bloch, used to work at Sun, then moved to Google. It's very possible he rewrote the code in the exact same way, given its triviality.)
A view with a greater understanding of the implications, Groklaw believes otherwise: "The judge has stated, pending judgment as a matter of law, that there is "zero finding of copyright liability" other than the 9 lines of code to which Oracle's damages report attributes no value. A good day for Google overall."
Read it yourself and decide: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120507122749740
Judge Alsup asked both parties to answer a list of questions, following the EU High Court decision that APIs are not copyrightable expression: "1. If the Copyright Act is meant to protect expression but not vocabulary, should the vocabulary and grammar of a computer language be copyrightable, as distinct from programs written in the language? In this regard, please comment on the May 2, 2012, decision of the High Court of the European Union." The Judge will rule as a matter of law whether the SSO of the APIs are copyrightable.
The only website that seems to always get the legal pulse right is Groklaw.