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Op-ed: Oracle Attorney Says Google's Court Victory Might Kill the GPL (arstechnica.com)
Annette Hurst, an attorney at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe who represented Oracle in the recent Oracle v. Google trial, has written an opinion piece for Ars Technica in which she urges developers and creators to not celebrate Google's win in the hard-fought copyright case as the decision -- if remains intact -- is poised to make them "suffer" everywhere and also the free software movement itself "now faces substantial jeopardy." As you're aware, in a verdict earlier this week, a federal court announced that Google's Android operating system didn't infringe on Oracle-owned copyrights because its re-implementation of 37 Java APIs is protected by "fair use." Hurst writes: No business trying to commercialize software with any element of open software can afford to ignore this verdict. Dual licensing models are very common and have long depended upon a delicate balance between free use and commercial use. Royalties from licensed commercial exploitation fuel continued development and innovation of an open and free option. The balance depends upon adherence to the license restrictions in the open and free option. This jury's verdict suggests that such restrictions are now meaningless, since disregarding them is simply a matter of claiming "fair use." It is hard to see how GPL can survive such a result. In fact, it is hard to see how ownership of a copy of any software protected by copyright can survive this result. Software businesses now must accelerate their move to the cloud where everything can be controlled as a service rather than software. Consumers can expect to find decreasing options to own anything for themselves, decreasing options to control their data, decreasing options to protect their privacy.
Oracle's loss is a huge threat to free software and the GPL. That's why Stallman has been campaigning on their behalf for years now, hanging out with Ellison on his private catamaran, writing op-ed pieces supporting Oracle's treatment of Java post-Sun acquisition, etc.
I'd post the links, but it's easy enough to find them with Google.
Think of the poor unemployed yacht builders.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
It's the first hot holiday weekend of the summer, so give 'em a break. They've probably been drinking since like 11am.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Let me rephrase the lawyer's text into something more comprehensible to the masses:
Ladies and gentlemen, this is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookiee from the planet Kashyyyk. But Chewbacca lives on the planet Endor. Now think about it; that does not make sense! Why would a Wookiee, an 8-foot-tall Wookiee, want to live on Endor, with a bunch of 2-foot-tall Ewoks? That does not make sense! But more important, you have to ask yourself: What does this have to do with this case? Nothing. Ladies and gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case! It does not make sense!
Look at me. I'm a lawyer working for a multibillion dollar software company, and I'm talkin' about Chewbacca! Does that make sense? Ladies and gentlemen, I am not making any sense! None of this makes sense! And so you have to remember, when you're in that jury room deliberatin' and conjugatin' the Emancipation Proclamation, does it make sense? No! Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense! If Chewbacca lives on Endor, Google's victory will destroy the GPL!
Not biscuit. It's a muffin
Not muffin. McMuffin. Try ordering a muffin in McDonald's and wait for the blank stare from the cashier.
I just carry a picture that matches the one on the cash register. Bonus, this will also work with a robot as long as it has a camera as one of its inputs...
Only problem is that even robots can not make a McMuffin that looks remotely like the picture they have in the store of said McMuffin.
It will just cause a system error that the poor mechanical soul will never recover from.
Nothing. Now take a shit with them standing there watching you.
The fucking bigot.
If Skynet decides that human society is beyond saving because Skynet worked a McJob at McDonald's in it's youth, it's... kinda hard to argue, actually.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.