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Google Takes the Fight With Oracle To the Supreme Court
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.)
I'm trying to recall slashdot's reaction about a decade ago when the courts said that Microsoft couldn't ship their own version of the JRE with windows to run java applications.
I think it was lauded as crushing anti-competitive behavior. How is Google shipping their own custom JRE on phones they control 70% of the market for that different? I mean other than that they won't let you override the install with the Oracle version?
I agree that Oracle can die in a fire, and I will not shed a single tear, but for consistency's sake, is there something different here?
Can someone explain how it's not a slam-dunk argument that APIs fall under the scope limitation of 17 USC 102(b)? Isn't that a key underpinning of decades of case law on very nearly this exact subject (Computer Associates v. Altai, Lotus v. Borland, Sega v. Accolade, Sony v. Connectix)?
I'm trying to recall slashdot's reaction about a decade ago when the courts said that Microsoft couldn't ship their own version of the JRE with windows to run java applications.
I think it was lauded as crushing anti-competitive behavior. How is Google shipping their own custom JRE on phones they control 70% of the market for that different? I mean other than that they won't let you override the install with the Oracle version?
I agree that Oracle can die in a fire, and I will not shed a single tear, but for consistency's sake, is there something different here?
Yea, it's amazing how the public sides with the company that isn't trying to screw them at every turn.
Google is generally nice to us...
Microsoft and Oracle are about the biggest Jerks in tech...
Funny how that works, eh?
A similar situation:
I hate you because you slept with my wife, and you snag a beer our of my fridge? My reaction would be?
You just gave me a ride home after my car broken down, and you snag a beer our of the fridge. My reaction again?
Is that a double standard?
Sorta. It is basically 'we control java and no one else'. It is the same argument again
No, it is not. It is a different argument about the same assertion.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Posting AC as I have invested mod points in this discussion.
I have scanned the posts, and the biggest difference between MS's and Google's situation has not been mentioned as yet. It is that MS used the Java rip-off in products that it sold, while Google gives the stuff away gratis. This matters:
The courts need to be shown that damage has been done, and the primary test of whether significant damage has been done has always been a defensable estimate of lost income. There is no trial-tested mechanism for estimating the damage done to your business when someone down the block is giving away what you are attempting to sell. Sun/Oracle could use published MS sales data to show that MS had cut into their market and their suit against MS could go forward on that basis. But there are no sales data for Google products. In fact there is no accepted way to estimate how many persons might be using any Google product. Maybe everyone is. But maybe they are only using it because it doesn't cost them anything. Maybe if Google went away there would be no increase in the Oracle/Sun sales because everyone who was using the Google stuff would rather go without than pay anything at all.
The applicable Lemonade Stand argument: If you set up a lemonade booth and charge $.05 a glass, and your Mom provides all the ingredients, then you are in business for profit. If your twin sister Alice sets up a competing stand on the other side of the street, then you could argue that it isn't fair: Alice is stealing your business and the money she is making should really be yours. You might not get Mommy to agree to your argument, but at least you have something to argue about. But if your little sister Betty sets up a stand down the street where she is selling her crayon drawings for $.05 per page, and giving away glasses of lemonade to anyone who stops to look at them, then that might fry your buns, but there is no basis for you arguing against her activities. What she is doing is having the same effect on your business as a rain shower would. You need to accept that the business environment has changed, and change your business model accordingly. Maybe you could get out your ukileli and start busking, and give away lemonade to anyone who stops to listen to your songs. Or move your stand far away from both your sisters, like maybe around the corner. The business environment might be better for you there.
Google, and other FOSS based businesses, are changing the business environment. Businesses that have intelligent management are adapting: IBM, Redhat, and others are becoming part of the change and making good profit while doing so. Businesses that are too close to being braindead to adapt to the changes are going to dry up and blow away. The software business model of 1980 is no longer viable in the 21st century.
The full source code of the UNIX v6 kernel, as published in the Lions commentary, bore prominent copyright notices from AT&T Bell Labs.
If the system call and C library API interface is thus still owned by Bell Labs, then that covers Oracle Linux, the POSIX standard, commercial UNIX, as well as all the phones (including QNX), routers, UNIX/Linux/BSD servers/workstations, and likely much more.
Oracle had better pray that they lose.