Supreme Court May Decide the Fate of APIs (But Also Klingonese and Dothraki)

New submitter nerdpocalypse writes: In a larger battle than even Godzilla v. Mothra, Google v. Oracle threatens not only Japan but the entire nerd world. What is at stake is how a language can be [copyrighted]. This affects not just programming languages, APIs, and everything that runs ... well ... everything, but also the copyright status of new languages such as Klingon and Dothraki.

Comments

SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[ciaran2014]

Software Freedom Law Center's brief regarding whether the Supreme Court should take the case or not:

https://www.softwarefreedom.or...

Re:SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[phantomfive]

What I gather is the linked article at Slate seems more ominous than this sounds.

The Slate article is sensationalistic, like most news these days, designed to make people feel outrage.

From the brief, I understand that Google took code and changed it (which may or may not be against the terms) and then redistributed it (via the SDK? the Android OS?) for developers to use.

Java was designed with the intention of every implementation to be 100% compatible.....the same APIs, the same runtime, etc. When Google made Android, they used an incompatible version of Java (mainly changing UI code, but also the runtime and some other things). They used Java to make things easier for developers.

So now the question is whether it is allowed for Google to do that, or if Oracle has the right to stop them. This isn't about whether you are violating copyright if you use a language, and that's one area the Slate article seems confused.

It is also not about whether you can use an API for interoperability purposes. That is covered by fair use, and will still be covered by fair use, no matter how this case is decided. But interoperability not why Android used Java.......Android used Java to make it easier for developers to write programs for their system.

Re:SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[Jane Q. Public]

Java was designed with the intention of every implementation to be 100% compatible.....the same APIs, the same runtime, etc.

Who are you trying to fool?

Of course that's the way Java was designed! But the very moment Oracle gained rights to it, Oracle started adjusting the code and the license to give Oracle unique compatibility and unique licensing. Anyone who thinks otherwise just hasn't watched it happen. Java is the single biggest RECENT reason people have accused Oracle of trying to kill open source. For a while MySQL took the headlines but that's done.

MySQL... same story in a nutshell. That's why nobody uses Oracle MySQL anymore. Everybody who is anybody is now running MariaDB as a drop-in replacement. (If you didn't read that correctly, I will intercept your snide remark: I stated "as a replacement for MySQL".)

The Javapocalypse hasn't happened yet under Oracle, but it's far past the time it was first expected. Yet, the situation hasn't really gotten better. Like MySQL, it's time someone else forked it HARD and took it away from Oracle. Otherwise it (intentionally) won't go anywhere.

Re:SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[Bing Tsher E]

Bullshit. If your point is correct, then Compaq's reverse engineered BIOS was illegal and the whole era of the PC Clone was a violation of IBM's IP rights. We'd need to pry the BIOS out of every PC Compatible in existence. And since IBM doesn't even make PCs anymore, that means we all cease using desktop and laptop PCs. It probably even applies to Apple by this point.

Re:SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[Rob Y.]

It depends on what you mean by 'entire API'. Modern computer languages are more than just the syntax and compiler. Even C would be pretty useless as a language without a standard set of libraries that every C app uses. sprintf is arguably not a library API, but an intergral part of the C language. Same goes for the classes in the 'java' API. Without them, it's not Java, and you can't claim that the language is freely implementable without those API's also being freely implementable. Otherwise, there are no standards at all.

Re:SFLC's brief explains parts of this well

[NostalgiaForInfinity]

Note that if Java's API were judged to be a creative work, then Java's APIs themselves would be violating many other copyrights, since they are derived from APIs found in Smalltalk, C++, and others.

Godzilla

[Whiteox]

We are all aware that Godzilla is now a citizen of Japan?

Jurisdiction

[rossdee]

The US Supreme Court has no jurisdiction outside of the USA.
So this isn't going to affect Klingons

Re:Jurisdiction

[Black Parrot]

Unless they visit the USA.

I don't get it

[msobkow]

Why can't Google just ship an OpenJDK build for ARM instead of screwing around with breaking the portability contract of the byte code?

This whole situation is the most asinine pissing match I have seen since SCO...

Re:I don't get it

[tlambert]

Why can't Google just ship an OpenJDK build for ARM instead of screwing around with breaking the portability contract of the byte code?

For the same reason that they went with Dalvik, and the same reason their libc is derived from BSD libc (Bionic), instead of GLibc: to get out from under the license, and allow, indisputably, commercial code for which source code is not provided, and to (effectively) technologically, rather than merely legally, indemnify developers, in order to attract commercial developers to the platform.

Oracle has tried to get a piece of Android on and off for years, the same way it tried to get a piece of Linux, and the same way it bought out MySQL and the BSD dbm libraries, when they couldn't legally raise their hand against them.

Re:I don't get it

[elwinc]

Actually, Sun Microsystems made a VM and, in 2006, released it under the GPL. So the only real question at this point is whether there is anything in Dalvic that was not released by Sun in 2006-7. Oracle can hope for control over a few small crumbs, but most of the cookies in the Java jar have been free and open source for over 9 years.

So in layman's terms...

[tlambert]

So in layman's terms... the SFLC want the Supreme to refuse to hear the case, because they think that the copying of a trivial function, difficult to implement in any other embodiment, allows a "thin end of the wedge" argument in favor of GPL'ing everything on Android.

They specifically cite the Lotus v. Borland case in support of this.

They specifically avoid citing the Ashton Tate v. Fox Software case, because doing so would contradict their claims, and weaken the argument that the Supreme court should hear the case.

Clearly, someone needs to file an Amicus brief citing Ashton Tate v. Fox Software, and suggest that the brief needs to be heard.

I had to laugh when I read this...

[mark-t]

Oracle, the appeals court, and the Department of Justice think that owning a copyright on a language isnâ(TM)t a big deal, because others can always invent new words rather than copying

Of course, the enormous flaw in this notion is that if you always have to invent new words simply to avoid copying anyone else, then nobody else is actually going to understand you. This is particularly true for things like spoken or written languages, but carries an element of truth to it for computer languages as well. While inventing any language can arguably already be challenging, inventing one that other people will actually use or adopt is usually either a function of the notoriety of the inventor, a matter of blind luck, or some combination of the two.

Since it can be argued that copyright provides a mechanism for otherwise possibly unknown artists to publish their works on the same relatively level playing field as those who may have already gained some notoriety, it seems I think that suggesting that such things should somehow be copyrightable is even at best wholly counter-productive.

Re:I had to laugh when I read this...

[silentcoder]

Wrong.
  The GPL prevents linking via API to existing GPL'd libraries. It does not stop you from writing your own library with the exact same method declarations but your OWN implementation.
What google did is specifically NOT prevented by the GPL either.

The GPL focusses on linking because that means MY implementation is used by your code. If you write your own library with the same declarations and your own implementation - then even though your application code is unchanged, I no longer hold a claim.

Indeed most of GNU's libraries (both those under the GPL like readline and those under the LGPL like glibc) could not have existed if Oracle is right - since they were mostly re-implementations of long-existing APIs that every Unix OS ever developed also included. LibC in particular - EVERY unix since the very first Bell Labs one has had a generic C library - and they all implemented essentially the same core set of functions. Their APIs are all virtually identical yet they were all deemed legal and all under their own distinct copyrights. Some were proprietory, some were BSD licensed (i.e. the libc's in every BSD today) and GNU made theirs LGPLd.

A better example would be the wine project. Wine reimplemented just about the entire windows API - all the calls are identical - so identical that you can run windows programs and games with Wine - but every implementation written from scratch as a clean-room reverse-engineer process. That has been legal for many, many years -this case threatens that. It would make it possible for Microsoft to get Wine declared illegal.

If this is illegal Wine would actually be MORE illegal since it is much more compatible with the original API than Android is with Java. In fact that is Oracle's entire PR about this matter: that they are trying to sue google for NOT making the API ENTIRELY compatible with theirs !

Disclaimer: I am a former Oracle engineer, I quite my job because I could not in good conscience keep working for the company that filed this suit !

Re:I had to laugh when I read this...

[gnupun]

Second, yes, using the same titles is, in fact, okay [copyright.gov].

The pdf states "Copyright not available for titles and short phrases." But the table of contents of a book is not one phrase, rather it is a sequence of dozens of phrases. So it should be copyrightable, like API.

Google has copied the premise of the book (Java platform), its table of contents (API) and rewritten the text within the chapters (reimplementing API) but keeping the same ToC. It should license the stuff it copied (API/ToC).

Fourth, what does it take to be a standard in your mind? What is your opinion on the Java platform documentation?

Oracle still owns the standard. Just because something is standardized by a company, does not mean it is free to use by other entities.

API versus Look and Feel

[Taco Cowboy]

We nerds know what API is. Unfortunately most of the non-nerds out there can't grasp the concept of API

Most of them will eventually equate "API" with "look and feel" - and they will think that if Microsoft can get to defend their "Windows look and feel" of course Oracle can deny Google to use their Java API

Add to that Apple at one time obtained a 'rounded corner' patent, therefore, I will not be surprised if the SCOTUS ending up siding with Oracle

Re:API versus Look and Feel

[mark-t]

First, foremost, always and finally, API's are ultimately a collection of names. Names are not copyrightable entities.

The only way you can infringe on somebody's IP for copying a name of something is if that name was trademarked.... but trademark and copyright are two different things. Java may be trademarked, but that's not what Google copied... they copied the

NAMES

of the functions that are in Java. Unless Oracle can show they've trademarked the names that Google copied, I can't see how they can really win this one. There are also pretty strict rules on what is even allowed to be trademarked in the first place, and I would dare say that even *IF* Oracle tries to use that tactic, they would probably find that virtually none of the alleged infringements are actually trademarkable.

If I had to guess

[MikeRT]

At least Scalia, Thomas and Alito will hammer Oracle. They tend to be very antagonistic to arguments like this. In Kelo v. New London, which was a similar abuse of intent in the law (5th amendment there), they wrote scathing dissents. Allowing APIs to be copyrighted is like allowing technical jargon (that's not trademarked) to be copyrighted. They fall dangerously close to the list of things the Copyright Office says are not covered by law.

Part of this makes me wonder if this isn't a "heads we win, tails you lose" scenario for Oracle. If they win, they get to badly hurt Google. If they lose, there's a Supreme Court precedent that allows them to clone any small competitor's products (patent considerations notwithstanding) at a 100% API compatible level and use Oracle integration and consulting to ram them out of business. It smells like a Larry Ellison strategy.

Affects more than "entire nerd world"

[walterbyrd]

Article makes it sound like this is some silly squabble among nerds. Like an argument over a StarTrek episode.

I suspect a lot of non-nerd people may be surprised about the far-reaching implications of this decision.

Why again do we let them decide it?

[Opportunist]

I know it's a bit offtopic, but ... in the recent past, I couldn't help but come to one revelation: We allow people to make important decisions who have in no way demonstrated that they know anything about the subject. More often than not, they have actually demonstrated that they have ZERO knowledge, and, what's worse, no intention to change this in any way.

Why again do we allow these people to make decisions?

I mean, if, say, scientists would make our laws, I could live with that. Scientists usually know their subjects. That's basically their work. But politicians? Most of them are lawyers, for crying out loud. What knowledge and insight do you expect from someone who was too stupid to study something useful?