111–120 of 433 posts
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EU has the copyright directive with its upload filters.
But as the parent said, this doesn't apply And guess what, all the American services have the upload filters already. So the point is moot
>This is a complete dramatization. Are you copying 10k lines of code from a licensed code base into your project without permission and using it in your commercial product? To point back to the substance of the thread and Oracle's claims... Google didn't copy any of Oracle/Sun's Java source code base into Android Java. Oracle lawyers acknowledge this. Instead, Google copied the API of function name spellings and also…
You do realize that if literally all you do is change the names and spellings then you'll still be in violation of copyright, right? Translating a book into another language (where the names and spellings of every word are different) is still copyright infringement. The fact that the names and spellings are the same just provides evidence to the judge that copying occurred.
If you just rename all the methods and their argument variables you still open yourselves up to a lawsuit because all the plaintiff is going to do is show the judge a mapping between their and your names and it will be plain as day as to what happened.
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I am not sure I agree with this statement in the absolute. I think about art, and artists as a musician myself. One advantage of copyright is that it does, indeed, give artists recourse when people use their works without compensation. The photographer whose picture was copied and pasted onto an advertisement. The musician trying to sell their first album. You could argue that litigation is too costly for an individu…
>I am not sure I agree with this statement in the absolute. I don’t know, you see, sometimes I have some doubts about my uncertainty. But should I trust my memory about what might have happened in my head in the past? >I think about art, and artists as a musician myself. One advantage of copyright is that it does, indeed, give artists recourse when people use their works without compensation. Practices of art and cul…
> Those in Oracle's camp say if its copyright is not protected, that will discourage innovation. Look at the way YouTube Content ID encourages innovation and then imagine GitHub Content ID. “Your repository contains 3 copyrighted method calls. You’ve been issued a copyright strike.” I’d love to see every open source repo on the internet go private for 1 day as a demonstration of what could be lost if copyright is all…
This is a complete dramatization. Are you copying 10k lines of code from a licensed code base into your project without permission and using it in your commercial product? Github projects already should strive to use correct licensing, and comply with the license of code they use. There is nothing new here.
>It says what Google has done is like taking key parts of those books — chapter titles, character names, the first sentence of each paragraph — writing a new book, and selling it.
If you're reimplementing APIs as Google has done then at some point you _need_ to copy the structure of the existing API, the method signatures, the names of the methods, the descriptions of what they do, etc, and while you may be able to dig out a thesaurus to claim enough original creative work at some point it's all for moot because there's only so much you can do before you'll start infringing upon Oracles creative expression of their API which severely limits what you are able to do with it.
If Oracle wins this case it will have huge implications for any reverse engineered work like Wine or graphics drivers where such projects will cease to exist, because it won't actually matter if it's 100% your own implementation as any interface to existing APIs or hardware _will_ infringe upon other companies copyright.
As far as Youtube Content ID goes it doesn't actually matter if it's 3 seconds or 3 minutes of copyrighted work, if it's matched then Youtube will let those companies claim revenue from your video which may be an hour long. The alternative here is the legal system and courts which may absolutely agree that 3 seconds of use in an hour long video is fair use, but you're still going to end up in court to defend that usage. It's unlikely that Oracle has enough sway to force Github to implement a similar content matching system but if they did it doesn't really matter what threshold the courts set for fair use for reimplementing APIs just like it doesn't matter for Youtube, best make sure all your repos don't use something like XMLHttpRequest() or your repo may disappear, and of course if Oracle doesn't have the sway to force Github into implementing such a system you're still going to have to go check through all your your repos because if they feel you've infringed upon their creative work they'll be able to issue takedown requests and your only recourse will be through the courts.
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> If Oracle ultimately wins, it seems like millions of programmers will have to reach for a thesaurus to find synonyms to name functions. We'll have to waste brain cycles coming up and alternative spellings of methods to stay away from copyright infringement. It's worse than that isn't it? Naming is how you link things. What happens to WINE if it is illegal to use the same names Kernel32 does?
From everything I've read, Wine would quite clearly be illegal if the court rules in favor of Oracle. I am very worried about this case.
WINE is using the Windows names for the purposes of allowing Windows programs to run. This is a case where a judge would easily grant fair-use because you have to use the API surface area to provide compatibility for existing programs.
Android is using the Java names for the purposes of allowing existing Java developers to be productive, not so that existing Java programs can run.
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It is different. In the GPL case, you are distributing the software, not just using the API. I don't know if it's different enough, but it's not the exact same issue.
if I distribute the GPL library (say libreadline) with my app, I'd probably agree with you. If I expect the end user to have libreadline installed on their machine (from debian / redhat repos, and for argument sake Debian/Red Hat/et al aren't distributing my app), I think I'd disagree. I'm not distributing any GPLd code. I think its a bit more complicated if Debian/Red Hat are distributing my non GPLd app that links…
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I wonder how a meaningful discussion about namespace trees and API spelling takes place at the Supreme Court considering the background of the justices.
They're smart people and these are not hard concepts.
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anyone who believes that GPLd dynamically linked libraries impact code written to use them effectively believes that APIs can be copyrighted. (ex: the FSF believes this).
Those two are complete different concepts within copyright. Oracle claim is that google copies of header files requires copy right permission, with google saying that header files are either not protected by copyright or that using them is fair use. FSF claim in regard to dynamically linked libraries is that using them in a work creates a derivative work. For C code, software without its dynamically linked libraries…
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if I distribute the GPL library (say libreadline) with my app, I'd probably agree with you. If I expect the end user to have libreadline installed on their machine (from debian / redhat repos, and for argument sake Debian/Red Hat/et al aren't distributing my app), I think I'd disagree. I'm not distributing any GPLd code. I think its a bit more complicated if Debian/Red Hat are distributing my non GPLd app that links…
If you explain to a judge the difference between distributing a library and app code to the user, and expecting the user to download the library themselves and then you combine the app-code and the library afterward, will they care or will they see the two methods as being practically identical in terms of forming a single derivative program out of the library and app-code. In the past people argued that streaming co…
But lets get into the weeds a little. Lets say I am distributing it according to all definitions. I'm allowed to distribute GPLd material. I'm allowed to distribute non GPLd material. I'm allowed to distribute them together even (say a linux CD without the GPL impacting the rest).
The question the judge would have to answer, is the non GPLd portion a "derivative work" of the GPLd portion and is that derivative work being distributed. I'm not so clear that this the case unless one really believes that APIs can be copyrighted (then it is clearly the case).
As a simple example: lets say we accept that it is a derivative work, but then lets say I made a replacement version of libreadline that was ABI compatible (but not feature complete) with the original one, so hence my program can be dynamically linked against both but it will be a better end user experience if they use the GPL version.
To provide a somewhat more concrete thought experiment (concrete as an ABI copatible reimplemntation under a different license, thought as its making up a fact):
imagine microsoft dual licensed windows with GPL and not and they believed that if one wanted to ship a non GPL program one had to pay them a license fee to keep the program not GPLd. Now, as wine has implemented the required APIs to run my program, can I ship a non GPLd program where I refuse to license the right to be non GPLd from Microsoft that will still run on Windows? Does it change because wine exists (i.e. the answer would be different if wine didn't exist) and if so why? This case isn't to nitpick how windows is different than libreadline or the like, but just as an example of ABI compatible non feature complete implementations can exist.
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I wonder how a meaningful discussion about namespace trees and API spelling takes place at the Supreme Court considering the background of the justices.
They're smart people and these are not hard concepts.