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Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

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Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#341

Post by [deleted] »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #315
jcranmer wrote: post #246

Oral arguments have already happened: https://www.c-span.org/video/?469263-1/google-v-oracle-ameri... I wasn't able to listen to all of the arguments, but some general takeaways I had: * The justices seemed to be asking mostly technical legal questions of Google (e.g., discuss merger doctrine) and mostly doom-and-gloom questions of Oracle (e.g., how does your argument impact QWERTY keyboards?). This suggests to me th…

> This suggests to me that they're more in favor of Google's position, and are querying how to arrive at that decision from a legal basis. I wouldn't read that much into it. Google has made the argument that "this means doom-and-gloom" and Oracle that "this is technically illegal". It makes sense that they're interrogating the parties along the lines of the arguments that have been presented. I wouldn't say it's a si…

[deleted]

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#342

Post by zoe1337 »

rightbyte wrote: post #97
crazypython wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Richard Stallman would like 30 year copyrights, and to unbundle copyright.

I wonder when the first GPLd software will be public copyright and I can modify it and sell it at my wits? 60 years?

You can already modify and sell GPL licensed software. You only need to provide the modified source, and the same freedoms.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#344

Post by salawat »

mehrdadn wrote: post #299
animationwill wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A car's width is not its interface. Let's improve the analogy! My proposal => that you chose to make the door handles six inches because of UX, and Oracle showed up and said they made theirs six inches before you did.

You can't seriously suggest copying the width of 1 door handle is equivalent to copying all of the Java API, right? I don't think if Google provided an alternative for 1 function it would be in this lawsuit. Your analogy is just a tiny portion of the alternative I already portrayed: they copied the entire structure of the framework. Copy 1 door handle, 1 steering wheel, 1 precise dashboard design, 1 glove compartment…

The issue is that in engineering there are certain patterns of implementation that are simply converged on.

Upholding the API copyright would be like giving Craftsman grounds to sue Ryobi for manufacturing circular saws because Ryobi combined a power cord, an electrical motor, a toothed circular blade and a housing; a state of affairs that only seems even remotely plausible to endorse because source code is inherently a read product.

You look at it and see an authored work. I look at it and I see an n-dimensional turing-space relationship diagram as expressed through transform functions.

And last I checked, you could patent some math(RSA), but not not copyright it. Eventually it's just prior art.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#345

Post by throwaway373438 »

mehrdadn wrote: post #332
throwaway373438 wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does "1 inch narrower" mean to you, in the context of this analogy? Are you suggesting the interfaces have different names? Different sized arguments? None of those things would work. Besides, creating minor differences do not solve this problem as they would still be derivative works.

> What does "1 inch narrower" mean to you, in the context of this analogy? Are you suggesting the interfaces have different names? Different sized arguments? Your question is exactly my point. I'm suggesting what I said earlier: >> I don't think that's a good analogy at all.

It sounds like the original analogy is apt, and your followup analogy isn't.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#346

Post by dragonwriter »

Spivak wrote: post #259
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is the distinction between "runs with zero changes" and "runs with minimal changes"—or even just "runs with fewer changes"—so critical? Where is the line? Is Android "compatible" with Java programs if those programs need to be recompiled first, but no source edits are necessary? What if source edits are necessary, but can be automated? What if recompiling isn't necessary, but you need to hex edit the binary? "Com…

Because the actual implementation isn't what the courts are looking for. This is a case about Google's intention for copying the Java API. Oracle is claiming that Google copied their API because it was easier than designing a new language; Google is claiming that they did it for interoperability reasons. There is no distinction between the two because these things are presented as evidence of Google's intent, it's no…

> This is a case about Google's intention for copying the Java API.

Not centrally. The copyrightability issue is absolutely not about Google’s intentions (and if Oracle loses that, it's game over), and Google’s intentions are relevant to one half of one of four fair use factors (the “purpose and character of use” factor) which are weighed together (it's not a pass-fail each factor test) in the fair use portion.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#347

Post by mehrdadn »

throwaway373438 wrote: post #345
mehrdadn wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What does "1 inch narrower" mean to you, in the context of this analogy? Are you suggesting the interfaces have different names? Different sized arguments? Your question is exactly my point. I'm suggesting what I said earlier: >> I don't think that's a good analogy at all.

It sounds like the original analogy is apt, and your followup analogy isn't.

I wasn't the one who compared this with the width of a car and then got confused what a shorter width would even mean.

But sure, if you say so.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#348

Post by monocasa »

nitrogen wrote: post #216
strbean wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone seems to have forgotten that Sun licensed Java under an open license that would have allowed Google to use these interfaces without issue, if they had met certain criteria for supporting the full Java platform. Google essential thought "Well, we have too much bloat, and these parts are totally unneeded in our platform, so we're going to strip them out." Oracle's lawsuit is so bad-faith it is laughable.

I seem to recall Sun refusing to allow Apache Harmony's implementation of the Java stdlib to be certified, or didn't allow access to the TCK or something like that. It may have seemed at the time like trying for an official certification for Android was pointless.

Yep.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Harmony#Difficulties_to...

And adding to that, the entire enforcement mechanism was through trademarks, not copyright. And trademarks are about the only IP construct not brought up in this case.

Re: Google and Oracle's decade-long copyright battle reaches Supreme Court

#349

Post by monocasa »

colejohnson66 wrote: post #254
zaphar wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this is true. Google doesn't let you run java that was compiled for the JVM. They have an entirely different mechanism that is not the jvm for their java code to compile to. All they did was port the language to a new compile target. When you port a language over you also port the standard library or at least the parts that you need. This is standard across the industry. Every language implementation do…

Assuming Oracle wins, could the people at WG21 sue anyone who implemented C++? They wouldn’t as they work on the compilers, but I’m asking in theory.

Or better yet let's not talk about the people at WG21, but instead their employers (and whoever acquires their employers in the future) and what is in those employees' contracts about IP they create that is owned by those companies.
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