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Android Is 'Fair Use' As Google Beats Oracle In $9 Billion Lawsuit (arstechnica.com)
infernalC writes: Ars Technica is reporting that the verdict is in, and that the jury decided that Google's duplication of several Java interfaces is fair use. Ars Technica writes that Google's Android OS does not infringe upon Oracle-owned copyrights because its re-implementation of 37 Java APIs is protected by "fair use." The jury unanimously answered "yes" in response to whether or not Google's use of Java APIs was a "fair use" under copyright law. The trial is now over, since Google won. "Google's win somewhat softens the blow to software developers who previously thought programming language APIs were free to use," Ars Technica writes. "It's still the case that APIs can be protected by copyright under the law of at least one appeals court. However, the first high-profile attempt to control APIs with copyright law has now been stymied by a "fair use" defense." The amount Oracle may have asked for in damages could have been as much as $9 billion.
I copied 1 line of subjects. It's undisputed. I took your subject, I copied it, and put it right into my post.
After this, if I still had my company, I wouldn't touch Java with a ten foot pole. I'd be at the whim of whatever Oracle executive failed to meet last quarter figures. Find a true unencumbered language and use that instead.
For "code", read "lines from header files to ensure that their strlen() function - or whatever - took the same parameters in the same order as our one, when they were trying to make an independent, but compatible, reimplementation".
It's like Intel saying "They copied our circuit diagram, hundreds of pins on a layout and what they do" when someone's making, say, a chip compatible with an x86 motherboard. Nobody's suggesting that the chip they made wasn't developed entirely independently, they're saying they "own" the fact that pin 1 is 5v, pin 2 is GND, pin 3 is DATA1, etc.
It's great Google won and all, but fair use doesn't really protect the average developer. Fair use is an affirmative defense. In order to assert fair use, you have to get sued, refuse to settle, and then prove that your use is a fair use in a court of law. That will almost always get prohibitively expensive very quickly as this case has shown.
The real solutions is to make APIs not covered by copyright at all, like a directory listing or mathematical formula. I think Oracle should be able to copyright the implementation of Java, and obviously they have the right to restrict the use of the Java trademark, but the APIs should just be public domain.
And most democrats only care about minorities when a white person is behind the gun (BLM, the darker shade of KKK) and only care about perpetuating slavery - aka you vote for me and I'll keep giving you money... or food-stamps/welfare checks... Don't throw stones in glass houses - the Democrats have just as many skeletons in their bigoted closets... but those skeletons only remain there because calling them out gets one labeled racist or bigoted.
Nah. The fact that they both pay up means that Hillary would stay out of it.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Larry Ellison is a selfish hypocritical right wing fuck who was willing to wreck the entire software industry for his own personal gain.
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
And the reason Apache Harmony existed was as a credible "plan B" if Sun / Oracle started being dicks about open sourcing Java or excluding Apache from technology compatibility testing. When the OpenJDK became a thing, IBM switched to that, and Harmony basically fell by the wayside. But the implemented APIs found its way into Android.
And it wasn't the only implementation of the java.* APIs either. GNU Classpath was another one. And Kaffe had an implementation (albeit of an older Java). And in commercial-land there is Skelmir's CEE-J which was another impl that's still going. I had experience using CEE-J for set top box development and it was a delight especially since the "official" alternative was J2ME which sucked balls. But of course none of these efforts would have been worth suing for billions.
Google's "crime" was implementing an API (something which happens customarily all the time in computing) and having enough money to be worth suing. Fortunately they didn't take kindly to the shakedown and fought it out. Whatever you think of Google, this outcome is beneficial for everyone.
According to Nolo, it means exactly what I think it means.
http://www.nolo.com/dictionary...
In the context of a "reasonable jury", it would relate to a jury that is ordinary, rational, or appropriate.
The no true scottsman appellation stands: Oracle is straight up saying that a jury that fails to see things its way is not an ordinary, rational, or appropriate jury.
The assertion that there is a specific meaning to the phrase "reasonable jury" outside of this more generic use of the legal definition of the word "reasonable" does not seem to bear fruit. I have searched many different online legal dictionaries for the term, and come up empty. If there is such a specific use of the art, I would be glad to have it defined for me.
As best I can interpret, Oracle is stating that because Google's use is clearly commercial in nature, that the use cannot be a fair use, and takes this as a presupposition for its subsequent intent in the statement-- that no reasonable jury (as in, one that is aware of what constitutes fair use, and uses reason) would conclude that Google's use falls under that category.
It is a no true scottsman, because of this presupposition-- It begs the question.
To counter this line of argument that Oracle is employing, let us instead consider what an API is, and what role it plays in communication.
An API is a specification. Essentially, it is a codified set of definitions for terms, and methods of employment that are permitted within a system of communication. It is roughly analogous to a lexicon for a given written or verbal language.
EG-- a dictionary.
With this in mind, we can point out the fallacy of Oracle's statement, by replacing a few words.
"No reasonable jury could find that Googleâ(TM)s verbatim and entirely commercial use of the dictionary and stated grammar to compete against our written works was a fair use."
Basically, Oracle is presupposing that it owns a language, so any use of that language's lexicon and grammar is theirs to control-- and assert that they get this power through copyright.
Copyright provides restrictions on reproduction and use of fixed media (be it written words, moving pictures, photographs, or audio recordings--)-- it does not cover subject matter. EG, if I paint a nice still-life of some daisies, I don't get to claim ownership over the concept of painting still lifes of daisies. Only over the reproduction of my specific image of daisies.
The court demonstrated that the API documents created by Oracle can be copyrighted-- They can control the dissemination and distribution of those documents, and only those documents. They do not hold any authority over the concepts expressed in the documents. EG-- they don't own the rights to all pictures of daisies-- even if they invented daisies.
One could claim that the VM Google uses (whatever it is called these days) is a derivative work of the Java virtual machine. This is a tricky area legally-- Copyright is not the appropriate vehicle for this kind of intellectual property. (Patents are the appropriate vehicle.) The API documents describe the language and behavior used by the java virtual machine. Google has created a different virtual machine that uses the same language.
At best, the case Oracle can make here is that google copied, verbatim, their dictionary instead of writing their own. The problem, as demonstrated in court, is that there can only be one definition, and the definition given is absolutely precise, as required for a computer language. There are no other ways to rephrase or rewrite the dictionary to make it into a new literary work referencing the same language.
Again, the copyright is over the documents, not the language.
This is why the jury found the use to be a non-infringing, fair use.
An outcome that Oracle insists cannot happen, because "reasons", and that any jury that finds otherwise is not reasonable-- Nevermind that the way they reached the verdict was through application of reason and fairness.
No True Scottsman confirmed.