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Google Takes the Fight With Oracle To the Supreme Court

Posted by timothy on from the by-the-power-your-black-robe-we-beseech-thee dept.

whoever57 writes Google has asked the Supreme Court to review the issue of whether APIs can be copyrighted. Google beat Oracle in the trial court, where a judge with a software background ruled that APIs could not be copyrighted. but the Appeals court sided with Oracle, ruling that APIs can be copyrighted. Now Google is asking the Supreme Court to overturn that decision. (Also of interest.)

2 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. A few huge differences by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    1. The don't use the Java brand and don't call it Java.
    2. Its not based on Sun/Oracle sources and relies on a clean room implementation
    3. Google didn't sign a licensing contract then violate it like MS did.

  2. Re:You can copyright maps and manuals by reebmmm · · Score: 5, Informative

    Patent/IP Attorney chiming in.

    You can copyright maps and manuals

    Sure. You're very specific expression of both. You don't get to copyright the "facts" in either case. Everyone is free to copy the factual aspects of both maps and manuals. The distinction is an important one. And while not addressing maps and manuals directly in their petition, Google takes on the concept: you can write a book about art, but you don't get to stop other people from doing that art.

    You can draw (and potentially get a copyright for) an outline of the world, but you can't stop other people from doing the same.

    Google's argument about the API isn't all that much different: you can copyright an implementation of the API, but you don't get a copyright for the "facts" of the API: function names, arrangement, etc. The argument is that copyright, by statute, expressly does not extend to "extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work." (17 USC 102(b)). This is not a trivial argument. It's also pretty important because if Oracle/Federal Circuit are correct, then you can have de facto patent protection for a century without any of the procedural protections such as examination.