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Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

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Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#41
post #12

These are the statutory fair use factors the jury was required to consider (17 U.S.C. 107): (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential…

As to factor number 1, the purpose and character of the infringing use: In the 2 Live Crew / Pretty Woman case, the Supreme Court held that just because an infringing use is commercial, that doesn't automatically mean it's unfair (although it is indeed an important factor). [0]

As to factor number 2, the nature of the copyrighted work: For the last 20 years or so, courts have been backing away from the expansive approach of Whelan v. Jaslow and instead using a Computer Associates v. Altai "abstraction, filtration, comparison" analysis; in the end, courts typically hold that copyright protection for functional aspects of software is "thin." See, e.g., UC law professor (and MacArthur "genius grant" recipient) Pam Samuelson's 2013 review of the case law. [1]

From what I've read of the facts, number 3 -- the amount and substantiality of the portion used from the copyrighted work in relation to the work as a whole -- might have weighed heavily in Google's favor.

As to number 4, I didn't get a sense whether or not the evidence showed that Android has had a material adverse effect on the market for Java; that weighed heavily in the Supreme Court's thinking in the 2 Live Crew case.

[0] https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/510/569/case.htm...

[1] http://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent...

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#42
post #27
post #12

These are the statutory fair use factors the jury was required to consider (17 U.S.C. 107): (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential…

Agreed, it sounds like by the letter of the law Google's use was not "fair use", if you grant the assumption that APIs are copyrightable in the first place. What recourse does Oracle have now? Didn't the Supreme Court decline to take this issue up last time round? Does that mean this case is closed?

> What recourse does Oracle have now

Your parent already answered that question (although I don't blame you for not noticing):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_notwithstanding_verdi...

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#43
post #12

These are the statutory fair use factors the jury was required to consider (17 U.S.C. 107): (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential…

> there was no driving need to interoperate with a proprietary one

That's highly debatable - both the need for interoperability and the proprietary parts. Making the platform attractive to developers is a driving need making it interoperable is a byproduct of that. And Java was open sourced in 2007.

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#44

Hopefully soon we can stop focusing on legalities and get back to building cool stuff.

When's the last time Oracle has built "cool stuff"?

April 28th, 2016 according to vagrant on my Mac https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog

At least I think it is pretty cool (and very gracious of Oracle)

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#45

This is possibly my best-case scenario. APIs are copywriteable (so says the Supreme Court), and this seems reasonable, since some APIs really are very good and treating them like an artistic work has benefits. But implementing them is fair use, preserving the utility of APIs for compatibility. Great news!

The supreme court's refusal to hear a case is explicitly not a decision on the merits :)

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#46

This is possibly my best-case scenario. APIs are copywriteable (so says the Supreme Court), and this seems reasonable, since some APIs really are very good and treating them like an artistic work has benefits. But implementing them is fair use, preserving the utility of APIs for compatibility. Great news!

> APIs are copywriteable (so says the Supreme Court)

The Supreme Court denying cert is not an endorsement of a ruling. No precedent is set. They could completely disagree with the lower court's ruling but not take the case for any number of reasons: there's no split between circuits, so they want to let other opinions develop before taking on a subject, they don't believe the case details are a good test case for the subject (something the FSF argued was the case for this suit), etc.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/certiorari

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#47
post #18

Today is a sad day for Silicon Valley. Our legal process has demonstrated how incompetent it is when it comes to Technology IP protection.

Are you referring to Oracle's behavior? I would agree that while it's a glorious day, nonetheless the verdict is a chilling reminder of the abuse of IP.

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#48
post #40
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, it sounds like by the letter of the law Google's use was not "fair use", if you grant the assumption that APIs are copyrightable in the first place. What recourse does Oracle have now? Didn't the Supreme Court decline to take this issue up last time round? Does that mean this case is closed?

I wonder what would happen if they try the Supreme Court now.

Well they can't really 'try' the Supreme Court - the Court has to decide to take up the case. Oracle can't demand that they do so.

Re: Jury in Oracle v. Google finds in Google's favour

#49
post #32

Whew, Oracle's lawyers and blind greed doesn't get to destroy interoperability for the entire Tech Industry. But the fact that Oracle could get this close and spin deceit to a non-technical Jury to decide whether using API declarations from an OSS code-base would in some universe entitle them to a $9B payday, is frightening.

> But the fact that Oracle could get this close and spin deceit to a non-technical Jury to decide whether using API declarations from an OSS code-base would in some universe entitle them to a $9B payday, is frightening.

Yes this was really a close one. I am breathing a sigh of relief now.

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