Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 771 posts

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#41

Post by guram11 »

Aqueous wrote: post #6

This might not just be a disaster for Google - it could be a disaster for software everywhere. If APIs become copyrightable, what happens to any open source software the implements a proprietary API? Supreme court judges just do not have the conceptual framework to properly adjudicate this. I don't think it's going to be possible to teach them the difference between interface and implementation within the parameters…

> This is not going to end well

relax, its 2020 so now lets just enjoy how "crazy" this whole thing can go to and finally if Oracle wins... we RIOT, won't end well alright

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#42

Post by kls »

I am really not up on copyright law, but I see this as analogous to someone writing a book. Say I wrote a book and titled all of my chapters the same as another book, the book was given a different title and the chapters themselves where very different on the inside but naturally my table of contents looks exactly the same, would this be considered infringe in the publishing world (I don't know)?

Also based on that:

If it would why would API's be different?

If not how was it applied differently here?

What if in the above scenario, I added some extra chapters so the TOC has all the chapters the other book had, but the TOC is not a 1 for 1?

If my analogy is wrong, what am I not seeing?

I know as someone who writes software, API's not being copyrightable is preferable, but I would like to understand how the law sees it when dealing with real physicals works and understand if the law is applied the same when it moves to less concrete works.

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#43

Post by dragonwriter »

This article really overstates the case by focusing on copyrightability while leaving fair use for a tag at the end.

Winning on fair use is not a disaster for Google. Google winning on fair use on procedural grounds, if the Court uses that as an excuse not to even answer the copyrightability question (the narrowest possible grounds for a Google victory), does not, contrary to the article's claim that "a Google win on a narrow procedural question would create a lot of legal uncertainty in the software industry", create any new legal uncertainty for the industry.

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#44

Post by ffpip »

xiphias2 wrote: post #26
bradfitz wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Few billion dollars, sure. Except that little Supreme Court decision on API copyrightability thing.

Why would that be so bad for Google? Can you please explain?

Read the article.

The case was bad for Google because their lawyer was bad.

The case would be bad for software everywhere, because API copyright. (in future)

You're mixing both and asking why it would be bad for Google

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#45

Post by pintxo »

sjg007 wrote: post #27
mathraki wrote: post #9

Where are the expert witnesses in this case?? Do we really expect judges in their 60s and 70s to understand basics of coding in order to come to the right conclusion?? I put myself in their shoes, if I had never looked at a line of code I couldn't even start to imagine what an API vs real code is. I'd probably think it's some made up concept that Google is using to save money and circumvent the law.

To play devil's advocate: Architectural diagrams/design specifications for physical buildings are copyrightable. The implementation is obviously whatever the builder does. But in general, I think that is a pretty close analogy to APIs and implementation code. APIs also capture some sense of overall system design as well. So that may lend further credence to support copyrights.

Staying in this analogy, aren't APIs more like pictures or verbal descriptions of the facade of the building?

An API spec will not (necessarily) provide you with any internal implementation detail. Architectural diagrams/design specifications very likely will do.

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#47

Post by AnimalMuppet »

I thought that until I got to Google's closing remarks. They said that 1) the Federal Circuit didn't really do a de novo review like they said they did, and therefore that their overturning the jury didn't have the excuse that Oracle said it did, and 2) that Oracle was factually incorrect in several statements it made in the hearing. If those claims are accurate, Google is likely to at least win on fair use.

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#48

Post by tenebrisalietum »

mathraki wrote: post #9

Where are the expert witnesses in this case?? Do we really expect judges in their 60s and 70s to understand basics of coding in order to come to the right conclusion?? I put myself in their shoes, if I had never looked at a line of code I couldn't even start to imagine what an API vs real code is. I'd probably think it's some made up concept that Google is using to save money and circumvent the law.

Code is a repeatable (executable) list of instructions that can describe a process. Perform the instructions, execute the process.

Processes--and a good example is business processes like SOPs, etc.--have inputs and outputs.

An API is a name for that process, plus a description of the required inputs.

Can you copyright a name and a description of inputs for a process?

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#49

Post by gpm »

ardy42 wrote: post #18
mathraki wrote: post #9

Where are the expert witnesses in this case?? Do we really expect judges in their 60s and 70s to understand basics of coding in order to come to the right conclusion?? I put myself in their shoes, if I had never looked at a line of code I couldn't even start to imagine what an API vs real code is. I'd probably think it's some made up concept that Google is using to save money and circumvent the law.

> Where are the expert witnesses in this case?? In the trial court.

And in the amici briefs (though they're not called expert witnesses there)

Re: Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster for Google

#50

Post by ocdtrekkie »

garaetjjte wrote: post #29
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

APIs being copyrightable doesn't actually harm implementations of APIs that fall under fair use. (Fair use exemptions specifically apply to copyrighted things.) Interoperability is fair use. And things like something being non-commercial, such as a lot of open source software, is a major factor in determining whether or not usage is fair. Things like WINE or NES emulators or the like would fall very comfortably into…

>And things like something being non-commercial, such as a lot of open source software, is a major factor in determining whether or not usage is fair. Why it should? It would mean that implementing commercial Java runtime without Oracle license is not possible?

Whether usage is commercial or not is a big part of the first factor in the fair use test: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use#1._Purpose_and_charac...

You could arguably implement Java without a license from Oracle provided you were using the GPL, as OpenJDK is released under the JDK, and presumably includes the entire Java API. The problem for Google, of course, is OEMs would've balked at being forced to open source all of their proprietary modifications to Android.

Wikipedia says the OpenJDK was released in 2007, so Google could've legally used the Java API under GPL terms, but chose not to, and also chose not to pay for Java licensing.

Post reply on HN