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White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

arstechnica.com

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Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#61

Post by jMyles »

TallGuyShort wrote: post #17
rincebrain wrote: post #9

It's not obvious from the LWN article, but the reason it says "White House" is that lawyers from the DoJ have filed an Amicus Curiae ("Friend of the Court") brief informing them of their stance on the topic. [1] [2] [1] - http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/white-house-sides... [2] - http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/google...

Is the term "White House" often used to refer to anything within the executive branch? I have always assumed it meant the office of the President and perhaps his cabinet...

I've been exposed to or worked on a few style guides on this topic. I think pretty much universally, in US media, "White House" means elements of the executive branch outside the cabinet-level departments. So it includes the Executive Office of the President, the OMB, ONDCP, DoJ, etc.

It does not include law enforcement or intelligence agencies, nor cabinet-level departments. So "White House" does not mean FBI, DEA, Department of the Interior, etc. However, the term "Administration" or " Administration" does include these entities.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#62

Post by oldmanjay »

rodgerd wrote: post #27
nastygibbon wrote: post #6

Can someone give us an ELI5? Pros/Cons etc.

Con: all the BSDs and Linux are now owned by whoever most recently picked up the POSIX APIs. ReactOS and WINE are now illegal. SQL is the private property of IBM. Pro: I guess if you hate Google because you love Steve Jobs or something it looks like a win.

Quick question - do you feel the need to associate this to Apple because of your deep personal hatred for that company, or for your deep abiding love for Google?

Or was it neither, and you just like using rhetorical devices to bolster your weak points?

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#63

Post by rayiner »

sambeau wrote: post #19

"declaring code and the structure, sequence, and organization of the API packages are entitled to copyright protection." Would this apply to REST APIs too? Someone needs to explain to them that that would be like being able to copyright how files are organised in a drawer, how books are organised on shelves in a Library, how a book is indexed, how departments in a company are named, how streets are numbered, how camp…

There is a museum in Philadelphia (the Barnes Foundation), which houses a collection meticulously arranged by Albert Barnes over the course of his life. I think that arrangement is itself a work of art entitled to copyright protection.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#64

Post by higherpurpose »

sambeau wrote: post #19

"declaring code and the structure, sequence, and organization of the API packages are entitled to copyright protection." Would this apply to REST APIs too? Someone needs to explain to them that that would be like being able to copyright how files are organised in a drawer, how books are organised on shelves in a Library, how a book is indexed, how departments in a company are named, how streets are numbered, how camp…

I think they did use that explanation at the Appeals Court, which was actually the one that didn't buy it and overturned Alsup's ruling:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140509/10133727178/appea...

Mike's opinion today:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150526/16550931121/obama...

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#65

Post by btilly »

Entirely predictable.

Obama's VP was one of the strongest supporters of all things copyright in Congress during his legislative career. Obama's administration has clearly been on the side of Hollywood etc as well. Given that fact, on any issue you can depend on this administration to come down on the side of the strongest and most expansive possible interpretation of what should be covered by copyright.

In this conflict, Oracle wants copyright to cover more things. Google wants it to only cover what it has historically covered. Therefore this administration will back Oracle.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#66

Post by suprgeek »

A Stunningly bad idea if this were ever to stand. A really idiotic move by the Whitehouse - increasing the scope of the Copyright law is probably the last thing people thought of with the whole "Hope & Change" thing.

Something like WINE would be in a whole mess of trouble not to mention that a decision of such magnitude would enrich the Lawyers and decimate the Software industry.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#67

Post by pron »

sambeau wrote: post #19

"declaring code and the structure, sequence, and organization of the API packages are entitled to copyright protection." Would this apply to REST APIs too? Someone needs to explain to them that that would be like being able to copyright how files are organised in a drawer, how books are organised on shelves in a Library, how a book is indexed, how departments in a company are named, how streets are numbered, how camp…

> Would this apply to REST APIs too?

I wouldn't think so. REST APIs are just called APIs, but they're really communication protocols. As those don't have a fixed description (i.e. you can describe the same protocol in different words) -- unlike APIs -- they are not copyrightable.

For good or bad, APIs aren't just a description of how to do something. They are fixed. If you write down how files should be organized in a drawer, then that specific text might be copyrightable; the method itself isn't. APIs (though not protocols) are both a description and a fixed text.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#68

Post by higherpurpose »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #12

On the one hand, this would have serious implications for compatible FOSS reimplementations of proprietary APIs, such as Wine, libc, emulators, etc. On the other hand, this would make it far easier to enforce copyleft licenses like the GPL. I'm one of the people who provided text and examples filed in the EFF's amicus brief against, and on balance I'm not a fan of stricter copyright like this, but it's interesting to…

So it will be used 99% negatively and 1% positively. That doesn't sound like a great outcome to me.

Also, killing FOSS reimplementations of proprietary APIs is exactly why Microsoft filed a briefing in favor of Oracle the last time Oracle won at the CAFC. That and also the fact that Microsoft hates Google much more than Google hates Microsoft behind the scenes, which is why it keeps extorting Android OEMs and wants Oracle to win in this case.

Re: White House Sides with Oracle, Tells Supreme Court APIs Are Copyrightable

#70

Post by gknoy »

dunstad wrote: post #45
bch wrote: post #5

s/^\([a-zA-Z_]*\)(\(.*\))$/ggl_\1(\2)/ ?? This ruling sounds horrible... very curious to hear point-of-view of people who think otherwise. Edit: my regexp joke is mangled by markup, but who cares ? Edit: fixed regexp display (not that it affects joke).

I don't know if I'm failing to read regexes or failing to see the humor. Can someone explain/kill the joke for me?

I believe it's basically a suggestion that one replaces each `foo` or `bar` API call with a prefix, e.g. `ggl_foo`, `ggl_bar`. I expect that doing so would get one slapped (literally or figuratively?) by a judge for being a wiseass.
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