Slashdot Mirror
Judge Rules API's Can Not Be Copyrighted
Asmodae writes "Judge Alsup in the Oracle vs Google case has finally issued his ruling on the issue of whether or not APIs can be copyrighted. That ruling is resounding no. In some fairly clear language the judge says: 'So long as the specific code used to implement a method is different, anyone is free under the Copyright Act to write his or her own code to carry out exactly the same function or specification of any methods used in the Java API.'"
Wine's safe. And everything else associated with it.
Have you heard about SoylentNews?
PJ from Groklaw:
Oracle has nothing to show for all of its efforts> For those who have depended on the self-described patent expert for your understanding of this case . . . well, maybe now you will know better than to trust a paid spokesman.
Having read the entire order (and having followed this case from near the beginning), all I can say is that I *wish* that all orders were so well prepared and presented. It appears to close all avenues for appeals, and I think the best 'showing' of any parties to this case has been Judge Alsup. He kept control of a tough case, and in my opinion, all his rulings have been well thought out, and his 'go-the-extra-mile' attitude has made this process a clear win for all (except Oracle).
gus
.. if only.
Then how else am I supposed to get rich. I wrote an amazing math library in 8th grade to do some crazy tricks and was planning on taking everyone to court. My code is pretty ingenious if you ask me:
<myMath.h>
int max(int a, int b);
int min(int a, int b);
<myMath.c>
int max(int a, int b)
{
if (a > b) { return a; }
return b;
}
int min(int a, int b)
{
if (a < b) { return a; }
return b;
}
Someone doesn't understand the meaning of the word "decimated".
That's ok, they have plenty of money to appeal where it will probably get overturned by some moron.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Really... what are some long term consequences of this decision? Could Oracle decide that if it can't have its way with Java, then nobody should have their version of Java, and simply stop making new versions? What would such a decision mean for Java?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
It is about time.
Don't pay your Java licensing fees, you cock-smoking teabaggers!
C-x C-s C-x k
Who is this API fellow, and what of his can't be copyrighted?
"In order to declare a particular functionality, the language demands that the method declaration take a particular form," notes Alsup (emphasis in original).
Indeed, this is just so. And you can't copyright "functionality"; that's akin to copyrighting a concept, which is not what copyright is about. Copyright is about protecting implementations of concepts, and those are still protected. But a programming language requires a rigid codification of the concept itself.
Oracle's response made me chuckle a little...
"The court's reliance on "interoperability" ignores the undisputed fact that Google deliberately eliminated interoperability between Android and all other Java platforms," the company said in a statement issued this afternoon. "Google's implementation intentionally fragmented Java and broke the "write once, run anywhere" promise."
That's really immaterial to the reasoning for why an APIs aren't protected under the Copyright Act in the first place. It would be relevant if "interoperability" were a defense against copyright infringement, but it's not, since the item in question wasn't protected in the first place.
Just because my implementation of fopen() breaks programs that depended on your implementation of fopen() that doesn't suddenly mean that your declaration of a function called fopen() is protected and my identical declaration is infringing. This would imply that copyright infringement claims based on APIs would suddenly be dependent on some kind of compatibility test.
And on that note, it was that last line that made me chuckle. Brings to mind something about ships and sailing, or barn doors and horses.
The enemies of Democracy are
One of them reads "API is". Just saying.
He hasn't yet, and those of us who have been following the case are eagerly awaiting his spin.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Where are those Doom of Android purveyors today?
Are there really enough towels to get that much egg off of their collective blog faces?
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Burn.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
He hasn't yet, and those of us who have been following the case are eagerly awaiting his spin.
Well, I imagine his own head has to stop spinning before he can resume spinning the FUD.
The shills sure didn't the get the first posts this time. I guess they don't like the taste of their own frosty piss.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
A smart judge? Well pinch me and wake me up! I'm going to patent him before somebody else does!
Table-ized A.I.
Yes, the case went as it should have, once it was boiled down to the fundamentals there was only one way it could go.
But let's not forget that Google did do something inherently prick-ish, they took a language and a concept that was open for everyone and popular specifically because of it's interoperability and broke the interoperability of it in their own clone.
What I'm getting at is: when a multi-billion dollar company can take something you made available with the best of intentions (don't care if Sun's intentions were good or not, the open-sourcing of Java was) and shit all over you and the ecosystem that it aids, everyone loses.
It's possible that the next time something like Java is being considered as an open-source target that the owners will carefully plan and consider how they can make it available without the same thing happening. But it's far, far more likely that they just won't bother at all.
Google's win here is a hollow one; Oracle's win would have been outright horrible, but this is only the lesser of two evils.
Is "anal-retentive" supposed to have a dash?
Table-ized A.I.
Yeah, they've got a bunch of Guinness towels.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
The summary says Google v. Oracle. There's a difference, Google didn't sue Oracle
Or will Google have to make changes to Android in order to satisfy the end result of all these court rulings?
Nonono, it is API himself that cannot be copyrighted.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Your right, thank's. I gift you that this helps alot of softwares and firmwares.
(If elected, I will support spelling reform and verb control!)
Are ABIs governed by this decision or just APIs?
This matters, since it would decide on how tight the coupling has to be in order for the GPL to significantly differ from the LGPL when it comes to software that is technically outside of the boundary of the physical code. I would consider this to be important, since this would create actual Case Law for what is and is not implied by the GPL when it comes to software that utilizes the GPL.
(99.999% of humanity would not consider there to be a problem at all, but there's the 0.001% that still believes the GPL covers software that makes use of GPL software in any way, shape or form. Unfortunately, they happen to be CEOs and corporate lawyers, otherwise they wouldn't matter. An actual legal ruling on the scope would be extremely helpful.)
Arguably, we already knew about APIs since Apple lost vs Microsoft on the basis that interfaces are not copyrightable, so this doesn't really add anything of significance to the body of law on software IP.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I'm sorry to say that, but Stallman was spot on with regarding his position about Java.
I feel nervous when I develop using a non-free framework. I much favor using a fully open source stack, as a programmer it frees me about a lot of worries.
Reading Mueller is like watching Fox News, definitely love to hate it.
Fast Federal Court and I.T.C. updates
Without the incentive of copyright, no one will ever make an API again.
How will people get paid for setting up third-party access to their data and functionality?
You laugh now, but the internet is just one big API, and now it will go da--#&@$(#$& NO CARRIER
Yeah, right.
Is "anal-retentive" supposed to have a dash?
Yes, because it is a compound adjective.
Oh wait, are you being sarcastic?
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Fukin-A?
Hell yes, ReactOS has just had a major helping hand given to it in the form of this ruling!
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
"Judge Rules APIs Can Not Be Copyrighted"
Apostrophes MEAN THINGS.
I no get my ill gotten gains from Oracle then?
"Java powers 40 billion devices. Oracle is suing all of them."
They are in other languages, because it can make a difference in pronounciation.
"Modern usage means kill/weaken a significant portion of the group/thing being decimated."
Stupid people go further than this, thinking "decimate" means "kill almost all".
It means reduce by 1/10th. Otherwise why not just make up a new word instead of screwing a delightfully precise word?
Sort of: It was pretty much taken as a given at the start of the case. The case was about whether Connectix's copying of Sony code in order to determine that the ABI was was fair use. No body tried to argue that there was any copyright issue in using the ABI itself.
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
Of course not; that's a hypen!
who could answer my interview question about taking min/max in assembly language without using any flow control...
Here it is...
http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/05/judge-says-google-only-used.html
You gotta say that he keeps his end of his Oracle employment contract.
I think we should hire a PI to investigate this.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
I'm suspecting you could power a major metripolitan area with that spin...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
the granting of monopoly on an idea is the basis for a patent, not copyright, so the notion that copyrighting an API would allow for the monopolizing ideas is NOT a justification for allowing the copyrighting of APIs -- if anything it is an argument against it...
The problem with the duelling experts has been nicely illustrated in this case: One expert calmly and clearly stating the truth, and another being wildly misleading. Duelling experts only decides which expert is the best speaker. In this case, the Oracle expert couldn't keep the truth out of his testimony, allowing the jury to discern that who was full of it.
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
I was thinking of the other case, where Microsoft is getting Android vendors to pay them or do a patent exchange based on patents that Android was violating. One of them was a very generic one about the usage of any wireless API, regardless of whether it's written by Microsoft or not.
From that POV, I found this ruling welcome - MS patent trolls can no longer work that route. They must stick to things that they themselves wrote.
...but not suggest that a troll comment should launch a thread. It's all the same political FUD, to me.
Lol omniprsident. Omnipresident is on the ___ watching ___ ___ ;)
The powers that be will take notice and show this judge around the courts of the USA as an example. There are a lot of courts in the USA, so they will have to cut him up into quite small pieces. (Apologies to Terry Pratchett)
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
So... what about child porn production cases? Necrophilia? Bestiality? Windows? You want judges to be forced to use Windows! The HUMANITY!
Any way, by your logic, the legality of slavery would be decided on by a slave trading judge. Lovely, kinda like basing your countries ideas of freedom on slave owners. That would just be silly!
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I'm surprised that *no-one* has mentioned ExpressLogic vs Green Hills (see http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4061092/Express-Logic-seeks-injunction-against-Green-Hills) at all, during this sordid saga.
It seems that was probably one of the earliest cases regarding the legitimacy of API cloning (GH tried to implement a "ThreadX"-compatible API on top of one of their proprietary RTOSes), and eventually lead to Green Hills winning against ExpressLogic (see http://www.zdnet.com/blog/gardner/ruling-expressly-denies-express-logic-its-copyrighted-api-logic/2530).
That said, I also thought of the Sony vs Connectix case - but there, Connectix used reverse-engineered PlayStation BIOS code heavily in their own product, if I remember correctly.
Whooo, wheee!!!
So what if Oracle spent 50 Million on this trial - that's peanuts. But is the bigger cost that Oracle bought Sun specifically for this lawsuit?
In a sane world you're right, "How could you possibly call an API if the argument structure was copyrightable?", but never underestimate pure bluster and colossal FUD-Pricing. (Total Mini-Me moment here... "let's sue for 100 Beeelion Dollars!".
But notice there's no penalty for a "frivolous" lawsuit. For a "measly" 50 Million, you can just drag any big corp into court and play around for a while. Even one minor claim win would pay for it.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
One flaw of "OMG" news reporting without context is that subtle points risk getting washed over by more juicy yellow journalism. Remember a few weeks back when "the jury was told it should take for granted that the structure, sequence and organization of the 37 API packages as a whole was copyrightable"? We were all jitter-bugging about. However, come on, a *programmer judge* can't be *that* stupid to have sunk the case that early. Turns out, there was a technical point of law at work, encapsulated by the expanded phrase "This, however, was not a final definitive legal ruling.". It was a technical point of law administration aimed at the complete rulings and appeals process. See the full quote below. Also see the last sentence: "Counsel were so informed but not the jury."
For their task of determining infringement and fair use, the jury was told it should take for granted that the structure, sequence and organization of the 37 API packages as a whole was copyrightable. This, however, was not a final definitive legal ruling. One reason for this instruction was so that if the judge ultimately ruled, after hearing the phase one evidence, that the structure, sequence and organization in question was not protectable but was later reversed in this regard, the court of appeals might simply reinstate the jury verdict. In this way, the court of appeals would have a wider range of alternatives without having to worry about an expensive retrial. Counsel were so informed but not the jury.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Slashdot moderating is roughly the Fibonacci sequence of the number of sentences with a bound of 8, so it usually takes 5-8 sentences to score a +5. Two sentences only scores a 2.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Thank you for that. If ever someone needs to know what that word means, I can use your post.
Really.
Where did THAT come from????
He has hasn't he?
http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/05/judge-says-google-only-used.html
Basically: "this court doesn't matter, there will be an appeal" mixed in with a healthy lack of recognition that APIs have been de facto uncopyrightable for years, it's just never been said by a judge before.
You laws on copyright define what is a derived work.
And when using FOUR NOTES of another song can create a derived work, YOU whine and whinge about the GPL blocking dynamic linking???
Really. If you're so worried about that, then get the problem solved: IN YOUR LAWS.
It's more like Google saw how fucked up Java was (with SE, ME and EE), and decided to do their own version , you know, like how Microsoft has .Net.
Funny that you mentioned that. Microsoft bad, Google good.
He ruled that the Java APIs aren't copyrightable - not that APIs as a whole aren't. That decision is yet to come.
His arguments will be case law if the matter comes up in another, similar case - and if Oracle appeal (as they probably will) and lose (pretty much a slam dunk, but it won't stop them trying), the appeals court's decision is very likely to widen his finding to the more general case. But for now, this is simply the good news that someone tried to get a court to agree that their API was copyright - and lost, hands down.
He does make one good point, or at least raises a good question. Why wait till now to decide the issue of copyrightability? Especially given that his decision is pretty clear cut in favor of Google. The judge knew all along that this was going to appeal and that with his background and knowledge he was uniquely qualified to sit on this case. He wanted to make sure he got the opportunity to lay out as much information as possible for the next judge up the ladder to prevent lawyer and 'expert' witness spin trolling an uninformed judge. Whoever sits the appeal for this case will have a a few dozen pages that succinctly, accurately, and unbiasedly describes the situation and hopefully will be much harder to sway with BS arguments like "I could code for 6 months and not come up with those 9 lines of code".
Sit on it and rotate! Eat shit and die Larry Ellison! Sanity as rules at the end of the day. Thank god the judge had the wisdom of Solomon in this matter.
So what if Oracle spent 50 Million on this trial - that's peanuts. But is the bigger cost that Oracle bought Sun specifically for this lawsuit?
As James Gosling once said
Oracle finally filed a patent lawsuit against Google. Not a big surprise. During the integration meetings between Sun and Oracle where we were being grilled about the patent situation between Sun and Google, we could see the Oracle lawyer's eyes sparkle. Filing patent suits was never in Sun's genetic code. Alas....
(Source)
So, it certainly sounds like that's the main reason Oracle purchased Sun.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Google's decision to defend its position at a trial has paid off: it gets away unscathed, at least for another couple of years, with what it's done. Very few companies in Google's place would have taken the risks associated with his before the trial began, and the risks that still remain.
The literal jury was discharged more than a week ago, but the proverbial jury is still out on this one
Judge Alsup knew all along that a decision against the copyrightability of the asserted API SSO would face a considerable risk of being overturned... it's fair to say that even he is clearly unsure of the defensibility of his ruling on appeal
Caution is required because Google has built key parts of Android on a controversial theory..
At one point he even accuses the judge of "potentially misleading" (because he used a simple example to illustrate a method definition), and then deliberately using that "misleading" example to issue a sweeping ruling that covers more complicated functions:
public static int max (int x, int y)
The order makes clear that this is merely an example to illustrate, but the choice of this example is potentially misleading. Programmers know that there are far longer and more expressive names than "max" (those who read my blog won't be surprised to hear that my own coding style is to use rather long and expressive names -- not always, but sometimes) and, especially, more complicated parameter lists and, most importantly, more project-specific types of functions than the rather generic concept of calculating the greater of two values....
In other words, he issued a sweeping ruling in order to prevent someone from potentially concluding from a ruling on this particular case of copying that there's room for potentially "sweeping" claims along the lines of monopolizing "max", or a fundamental math library.
Is the patent on 1-click ordering still valid?
The FSF asserts that accepting the GPL is required for code that links either dynamically or statically to GPL code, but in the former case the GPL code (other than the headers) is not incorporated into the distributed work, only the headers (which simply state the API, which, under this decision, is functional and, as such, not subject to copyright) are. There is a functional dependency on some code that implements the API defined by the header, but there is no requirement that it be the actual GPL code (except for the API, which under the decision here, again, is not subject to copyright.)
One might argue that a combined work is created that incorporates the GPL code when the GPLed versions of the libraries are actually linked on the end-user system, but if any person is creating that work it is the end user, and they aren't distributing it. They may need to accept the GPL with respect to that work to create it (as a derivative work of the GPL-protected work), but since they never do anything with it other than use it, none of the substantive obligations of the GPL would ever apply.
The FSF has always relied on a fairly maximal view of the scope of copyright protection in its assertions as to when accepting and abiding by the GPL is required. This is unsurprising, because the purpose of the GPL is to compel behavior, and you can only do that when people have to abide by the license. Anything that increases the scope of freedom under copyright law reduces the compulsory power of the GPL.
Particularly, the decision in this case would seem to be fatal to the FSF's position that the GPL is required for code that links dynamically to GPL libraries.
You're confused about what triggers copyright --- it's copying, not using. As long as you don't make a copy, you cannot possibly become affected by copyright. Just using something does not engage copyright. (The problem arises because programmers' use of the word "derived" is not what the Copyright Act means by "derived work".)
Just imagine what would happen if using a copyrighted work engaged copyright: An open source program running under Windows and using Windows' libraries would automatically come under Microsoft copyright, and a closed source program running under Linux would automatically become open source licensed if it used any Linux facility that has an open license.
Fortunately copyright doesn't work that way. It would be both ludicrous and self-contradictory.
You cannot create a derived work merely by using a dynamically linked copyrighted library, because you're not copying anything from it, only using its functionality. (Copying into memory for purposes of execution does not qualify as copying under the Copyright Act, that's been verified in court.)
Maybe a car analogy will help. A car is built from elements that have very strong copyrights. If you buy a car from car maker A, and then attach a tyre made by maker B, the car then uses the new tyre, yet OBVIOUSLY the car does not suddenly lose its copyright A and fall under copyright B just because it uses a tyre that has copyright B.
Using does not create a derivative work in copyright law.
I hope you don't mind, I'm using your sig over on Groklaw.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
It's been many years ago now, but Eben Moglen advised Richard Stallman that Richard was wrong about dynamic linking engaging copyright, since there is no copying being done. It's a common mistake for programmers to make because what they call "derived program" is frequently not what the Copyright Act means by "derived work".
RMS accepted that with good grace in an online reply at the time, saying something like "While the Foundation would like this to apply to dynamic libraries too, we are advised that there is no legal precedent for it.". (My words, not his.)
This issue is one of the major reasons why Eben replaced "derive" by "convey" in GPLv3, so that programmers can't continue to misapply the techie term "derive" in a legal context and hence arrive at the wrong conclusion. "Convey" can only happen on copying, never by merely using a copyrighted work, so linking dynamically to a GPLv3 work does not engage GPLv3 because the work has not been conveyed.
Nothing changes here with Judge Alsup's ruling. If he had ruled that APIs are indeed copyrightable then it would be a total game changer right across the world, and open source would be almost dead through denial of interoperability. Thankfully we were spared that because the judge understood the disaster that would have ensued.
Actually using software inherently creates a copy. In most circumstances, it is considered to be an automatic fair use exception to load an executable for the purposes of running it, but it is depending on a special exception carved into the law, and it is still copying; it merely is not infringement. That's not the same thing.
However, the larger flaw in your argument is that you (meaning the person who compiled the software) are not using the library. The user running the application is using the library. That narrow fair-use exception covers only the user, not the person compiling and distributing the application. That's a very important distinction. The end user (the purchaser or whatever) has a right to use a copyrighted work in nearly any way that he or she chooses as long as he or she does not redistribute it. To turn your car analogy around, if automobiles and tires were somehow protected by copyright, then if carmaker A decided that they were going to attach a tire made by maker B before they sold you the car, then when they sold the car, they would be redistributing tire B, and would be required to do so in a way that conforms to its license.
The general presumption that I've heard from many copyright attorneys is that as soon as you distribute an application that cannot usefully function without the original work, you are creating a derivative work. Whether you do or do not have to comply with the licensing terms of the original work depends largely on whether your use of the original work in your new work falls within a fair use exception, but as a rule, you'd be foolish to do so without complying with those terms. If you don't like that, you're free to create a new implementation with fewer restrictions and make it available. The tighter the coupling between your code and the protected code, the bigger your risk. So static linking is pretty much an automatic derivative work, dynamic linking is dicey, and running a command via the command line is much safer.
If you later redistribute a version of that application that is linked against a different implementation of that library, that new copy of the application is not a derivative work of the original library, nor is the new implementation of that library (because the API itself cannot be protected by copyright).
If the libraries are not distributed with the application and you merely use the libraries that are already installed on the user's system (which may or may not be any particular version of that library with any particular license), then the crucial question you should be asking is whether there are multiple libraries that implement the API in question. If there are not, your work could still be considered to be dependent upon that work, and potentially subject to its licensing terms.
This is, of course, just my opinion, but I've heard similar opinions from a number of copyright lawyers.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Again, you're using the techie's meaning of "derived work" which includes use of a work, and you also refer to linking. Neither of these concepts are applicable in respect of the Copyright Act. Your technical intuition is leading you astray in matters of law.
Fortunately this Oracle-Google case has cleared the air considerably just by changing the main subject of discussion from the unfortunately ambiguous "derived work" to whether APIs are copyrightable.
Since APIs are not copyrightable, and a program links only against the API of a dynamic library rather than with the library itself, this should make it clearer to techies that a program linked against a dynamic library bearing a license X cannot fall under the terms of license X under any circumstances, because only the API has been copied and that is not copyrightable.
Let me get that bottle of Whiskey out! Woo hoo!
Or at least he should have.
Developers of software for video game consoles already have to buy a license to use the platform's APIs. So do developers of software for iOS and Windows Phone 7 platforms.
I'm aware of the judge's ruling. I'm just curious as to how it would interact with things like Sony v. Hotz.