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Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

supremecourt.gov

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Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#51

Post by curryst »

politelemon wrote: post #15
tyingq wrote: post #5

The HN discussion from 2016 (Jury finds for Google): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11781053 From 2018 (Oracle revives matter via appeal): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16688521 Edit: Fixed, had written "Jury finds for Oracle", which was NOT what happened in 2016. Argh.

I'm unfamiliar with the legal system (judicial system?). I had thought that the jury's findings were final. Am I understanding correctly that the case still went to the Supreme Court of the US, and now that court finds in favor of Google. What happens after this, more appeals or is this like a proper static const readonly final?

You understand correctly. The jury's decision isn't final (and I thought this was ruled on by a judge directly, instead of a jury, but I could be wrong). You can appeal pretty much any case to a higher court. I don't know the order, but it's not uncommon for cases to appeal to a higher court several times. I.e. a verdict is rendered in a county court; you don't like it, so you appeal to the state court. State court still doesn't give the decision you want, so you appeal to the Supreme Court.

It's worth noting that the higher court can reject your appeal. You're not entitled to be seen by the higher court, and if you can't come up with good grounds for why the lower court was wrong, the appeal will be rejected. The Supreme Court rejects a fair number of appeals (I think the majority of cases).

This is final though. There is no higher court than the Supreme Court to appeal to. At this point, the only reason it would change is if the laws change, or the Supreme Court reverses their decision later. It's extremely rare that they whole-hog reverse a precedent that they set, though.

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#52

Post by [deleted] »

jblz wrote: post #27

From the dissent: "In the 1990s, Oracle created a programming language called Java..." Sun Microsystems was acquired in 2010... I guess I should give Thomas the benefit of the doubt that he intended the statement to apply to Oracle's owned IP & not be a historical account of the language's creation and creators, but this rubbed me the wrong way.

[deleted]

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#53

Post by thedevelopnik »

politelemon wrote: post #15
tyingq wrote: post #5

The HN discussion from 2016 (Jury finds for Google): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11781053 From 2018 (Oracle revives matter via appeal): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16688521 Edit: Fixed, had written "Jury finds for Oracle", which was NOT what happened in 2016. Argh.

I'm unfamiliar with the legal system (judicial system?). I had thought that the jury's findings were final. Am I understanding correctly that the case still went to the Supreme Court of the US, and now that court finds in favor of Google. What happens after this, more appeals or is this like a proper static const readonly final?

The latter. Once the Supreme Court rules, that is the law of the land, unless Congress/President pass a new law substantially changing things, which could then have challenges go back through the judicial process.

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#55

Post by curt15 »

"The record also showed that Java SE’s copyright holder would benefit from the reimplementation of its interface into a different market....the jury also heard evidence that Sun foresaw a benefit from the broader use of the Java programming language in a new platform like Android, as it would further expand the network of Java-trained programmers...and because there are two markets at issue, programmers learning the Java language to work in one market (smartphones) are then able to bring those talents to the other market (laptops)."

The benefits of reimplementing APIs always flow both ways. I'm glad SCOTUS recognised this point.

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#56

Post by bryanlarsen »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #20
mrkstu wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. This case was an existential threat to multitudes of industries and the assumptions they were built on. The weird thing is it would of hurt Oracle as much as anyone. I have no clue how anyone w/any technical merit didn't understand that this was a footgun of the largest possible magnitude for them.

In my own mind, when CentOS died Oracle was saying you should move to "Oracle Unbreakable Linux"... which is a downstream clone of RHEL, just like CentOS was. Just one example of the hypocrisy.

Even more egregiously, Oracle's whole existence is based off of copying the SQL API from IBM.

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#57

Post by isanengineer »

politelemon wrote: post #15
tyingq wrote: post #5

The HN discussion from 2016 (Jury finds for Google): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11781053 From 2018 (Oracle revives matter via appeal): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16688521 Edit: Fixed, had written "Jury finds for Oracle", which was NOT what happened in 2016. Argh.

I'm unfamiliar with the legal system (judicial system?). I had thought that the jury's findings were final. Am I understanding correctly that the case still went to the Supreme Court of the US, and now that court finds in favor of Google. What happens after this, more appeals or is this like a proper static const readonly final?

I didn't understand that either, but I found a good explanation on page 2:

"The fair use question is a mixed question of fact and law. Reviewing courts should appropriately defer to the jury’s findings of underlying facts, but the ultimate question whether those facts amount to a fair use is a legal question for judges to decide de novo. This approach does not violate the Seventh Amendment’s prohibition on courts reexamining facts tried by a jury, because the ultimate question here is one of law, not fact. The “right of trial by jury” does not include the right to have a jury resolve a fair use defense."

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#58

Post by bogwog »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #22
esarbe wrote: post #6

I'm so relieved. This could have forced such dramatic changes in how we develop software. And any other decision would have been a crippling blow to FLOS software. Now if we only could get the SC to invalidate software patents in general.

This is a large scale defeat of the GPL and dual licensing, so I'm not sure how this could be anything but a sad day for sustainable open source development. If you're big enough and have enough lawyers, there's no reason to license software you want to build on.

> This is a large scale defeat of the GPL and dual licensing

Can you elaborate on that? What does this have to do with those thing?

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#59

Post by zzleeper »

jblz wrote: post #27

From the dissent: "In the 1990s, Oracle created a programming language called Java..." Sun Microsystems was acquired in 2010... I guess I should give Thomas the benefit of the doubt that he intended the statement to apply to Oracle's owned IP & not be a historical account of the language's creation and creators, but this rubbed me the wrong way.

Not surprised at all the Thomas and Alito are in that dissent..

Re: Google’s copying of the Java SE API was fair use [pdf]

#60

Post by tyingq »

caf wrote: post #45
tyingq wrote: post #5

The HN discussion from 2016 (Jury finds for Google): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11781053 From 2018 (Oracle revives matter via appeal): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16688521 Edit: Fixed, had written "Jury finds for Oracle", which was NOT what happened in 2016. Argh.

As both that thread title and the Supreme Court opinion say, the jury found in favour of Google. They were then overruled by the Federal Court, which has now in turn been overruled by the Supremes.

Edit: Heh, yep. I was blind to it, fixed, thank you!
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