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Oracle v. Google: Appeals Court Rules That Google Violated Oracle's Copyrights
A federal appeals court has ruled against Google in the Oracle v. Google legal war over the use of Java in Android. However, the case could move to the Supreme Court, a full panel of the appeals court judges, or to a third trial in district court:
An appeals court said on Tuesday that Google violated copyright laws when it used Oracle's open-source Java software to build the Android platform in 2009.
Tuesday's ruling is the latest development in a topsy-turvy eight-year battle between Google (GOOG) and Oracle (ORCL).
Oracle first brought its case against Google in 2010, claiming that Android infringes two patents that Oracle holds on its Java software, a ubiquitous programming language powering everything from phones to websites.
In 2012, a jury determined that Java does not deserve protection under copyright law. Two years later, an appeals court overturned the ruling, raising the question of whether Google's use of Oracle's API violated copyright law.
A jury determined in 2016 that Google's use of Oracle's APIs was legal under the copyright law's fair use doctrine, which allows the free use of copyrighted material under specific circumstances. Oracle appealed the decision, and a judge took its side on Tuesday.
Also at Bloomberg and The Verge.
Federal Circuit Sends Oracle v. Google Back for Third Trial
A while back Oracle sued Google various aspects of their clean-room Java reimplementation and Google initially won that back in 2012. However, appeals have dragged the case out. At issue now is whether APIs can be restricted under copyright.
The Federal Circuit has ruled for a second time in Oracle v. Google, the software copyright lawsuit over Google's Android platform. The new decision reverses the district court yet again and sends the case back for a third trial to determine damages for Oracle. In the last trial, Oracle sought almost $9 billion in damages.
The litigation has been dragging on for about eight years now, bouncing up and down through appeals and two whole jury trials. [...]
Obviously, whether APIs can soon be restricted by copyright would defeat the purpose of an API as well as have severe repercussions for all software development occuring in the US.
From The Verge : Federal Circuit sends Oracle v. Google back for third trial.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:19PM (11 children)
When Android was built, Oracle didn't own Java. Sun owned Java. Sun invited the community at large to work with Java, and that community included Google among other corporate interests. It was well known that Sun invited people to experiment, to embrace and extend Java.
Oracle bought Sun, and Java, fully aware that the copyright had been "weakened". Historically, if a copyright isn't protected, the copyright becomes null and void. That's a fact of life. Sun was aware of that fact, just as they were aware that there were thriving opensource communities working with Java.
Oracle doesn't have a leg to stand on. They got what they paid for, they can't go back and claim more than what they got, years after the fact.
Who the hell do they think they are, SCO?
(Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:22PM (4 children)
SCO vs IBM is still alive. The SCO vs IBM lawsuit just passed its 15th anniversary earlier this month on Mar 6. The courts are now moving monumentally slowly on this case. Perhaps in the hope that SCO's trustee will simply give up because the case stinks so badly by now no judge wants to read 700 boxes of docket material.
Please check back on SCO's progress in one quarter of a galactic rotation.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:33PM (2 children)
Do you think SCO might sue Oracle for misappropriating SCO's business model?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:41PM
Patent infringement, maybe. You can patent business methods sadly. (I don't believe SCO actually owns any patents, and I was on Groklaw daily for ten years. It's been analyzed to death.)
SCO no longer has the resources to afford the filing fee with the court. At least according to what I remember from the only forum left that is dedicated to SCO. But it has since turned into an off topic troll fest. Mostly consumed by a gang pile on to one lone conservative. But that is the wrong word. It is a guy who is blindly, loyally, unflinchingly trump-can-do-no-wrong and has-no-faults kind of cult mentality. I would say troll, except that prior to politics beginning in 2016, the guy had been on that forum for a long time. I mean nobody is without faults and mistakes. Left nor right.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday March 28 2018, @07:39PM
+1 Funny 'cause that got an actual out-loud laugh out of me :) It would be hilarious, and entirely fitting, if that happened.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Wednesday March 28 2018, @08:52PM
Hopefully, Oracle's business will be just as plentiful and stable as SCO's after 15 years of lawsuits.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @07:13PM (1 child)
That's completely untrue. You are confusing copyright with patents. You can choose to defend, or not, you copyright as you see fit.
(Score: 5, Informative) by pipedwho on Wednesday March 28 2018, @08:15PM
Patents and copyrights can be defended at any time descriminately as the holder sees fit. It is trademarks that must be defended. This is because a trademark can be indefinitely held (as long as fees are paid), and protect from ‘market confusion’ and brand association, which are relative to public perception. If you don’t defend, the associations brand is weakened.
(Score: 4, Informative) by moondrake on Wednesday March 28 2018, @08:47PM (2 children)
>Historically, if a copyright isn't protected, the copyright becomes null and void.
No it does not.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday March 29 2018, @01:34AM (1 child)
Maybe I overstated the case.
Key words in that quote are "unless you take some kind of action". In the case of Sun and Java, Sun took positive steps to include a very wide community of developers. In effect, Sun granted certain rights to members of the community who wanted to use Java. Sun's actions aren't so clear cut as relicensing Java under the GPL, but it was pretty damned clear that Sun was granting permission to the public to use Java.
(Score: 2) by arcz on Thursday March 29 2018, @04:46PM
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday March 28 2018, @11:32PM
Trademarks get weakened if you don't defend them but I don't think that's the case for copyright.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:19PM (8 children)
Google didn't use Oracle's code. Google used Apache Harmony, which is a different open source Java implementation. Most of the work done on Apache Harmony was done by IBM. Once JDK become OpenJDK, there was no more need for Apache Harmony. But Google had already used Apache Harmony in Android.
It turns out IIRC (from back in the Groklaw daze) that there was a 9 line function in Harmony what was identical to Java, and probably came from Java source code. But that is de minimus, or some lawyer word like that.
Back when Android N came out, Google did switch to Oracle's Open JDK, which is GPL licensed, with the Classpath Exception. (Nutshell: linking your own Java code with the Open JDK merely as a runtime does not bring your program under the scope of the GPL. Only the copyright holder, Sun, later Oracle, is authorized to offer that Classpath Exception to the GPL along side the GPL.)
So now that Android is actually built on Open JDK, the real, official full blown JDK, what is Oracle complaining about? Isn't this what they wanted? Their original complaint was that Android had a subset of Apache Harmony.
What really upset Oracle is that they didn't get a huge payday. Sun used to offer Java under a license that had "field of use" restrictions. And this seems to be what Oracle want to pretend is still in force. The GPL doesn't have "field of use" restrictions. (eg, if you are building a phone, you must license a different Java edition, J2ME, or get a source code license like other parties, IBM, Red Hat, Azul, etc.)
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by BananaPhone on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:34PM (7 children)
Maybe they are suing for the original implementation of Android from when Sun owned Java. (!)
This is wrong, too.
Either way. APIs should not be copyright-able.
Only the implementation should.
(Score: 5, Informative) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:47PM (2 children)
Google never used Sun's Java. Google used Apache Harmony which is open source (Apache 2 license), and mostly written by IBM. So the actual lack of any copyright infringement is how Oracle morphed their case to claim that somehow in some bizzarro world APIs are copyrightable.
Agree about implementation and interface of APIs. Any APIs.
Other thoughts on Java are hear [soylentnews.org] (under best programming font).
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by BananaPhone on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:08PM (1 child)
So... Google got sued and LOST
for building the Android OS from an open source licensed Java implantation
by a company that didn't write that Java implantation?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @07:16PM
As Bester said: Nailed it in one Mr. Garibaldi.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Thursday March 29 2018, @11:02AM (3 children)
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday March 29 2018, @01:34PM (2 children)
I would say this about proprietary APIs.
If you have a secret API that you don't want anyone to use, then keep it to yourself. Don't publish it.
Of course, others can reverse engineer it. And probably will if there is a reason. (eg: hidden APIs in Windows)
If you're going to allow people to create independent implementations of your copyrighted API, then what is the purpose of the copyright?
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:17PM (1 child)
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday March 29 2018, @05:19PM
I absolutely don't have a problem with attribution and being sure that nobody else can falsely claim credit. But that doesn't seem to be the purpose of copyright.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Virindi on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:21PM (1 child)
The Federal Circuit is out of control. What use is the right to a civil jury trial if the court just keeps sending it back until they get the result they want?
The FC seems to be quite captured by the "all knowledge is someone's property" crowd. Even when SCOTUS tells them they are off the deep end, they seem to only narrow the result in the least possible way they can get away with (eg. Alice). It's too bad this crap is basically unstoppable because the pool of "experts" to nominate as judges are all people who are part of this cabal.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Wednesday March 28 2018, @05:25PM
Too bad someone smart like judge Alsup can't get involved with this. Oh, wait. He did already. The fed appeals court doesn't care.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:33PM (15 children)
I can't believe I'm reading this. I thought this was all settled
ages ago. Eight years??? Putting the concept of API copyright
back on the table? That would literally suck the brains out of
a lot of technology. Kill this walking-dead suit once and for all.
Chuck it into a volcano and be done.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by tangomargarine on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:47PM (9 children)
Oracle (One Rich Asshole Called Larry Ellison) is a very rich corporation, but they're suing for $9 billion in damages so they're willing to blow a lot of money on their team of ninja lawyers in order to win the case.
Google may be a bag of dicks as well, but at least they're taking the logical side on this one. One of the Sun employees who got acquired by Oracle and then quit compared [youtube.com] Oracle to a lawnmower: "You can't expect the lawnmower to have empathy. The lawnmower doesn't even know what empathy is."
Really seems like Oracle snuck into its competitor's building late one night and is busy burning it down around themselves. But they don't really create anything themselves, they just buy out other companies with successful products, so I guess they just don't care.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @08:25PM (7 children)
who makes Oracle's relational database / which successful database company did they acquire to get it?
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday March 28 2018, @08:50PM
Yes, that's the one fucking thing Larry Ellison has actually done from a productive standpoint with the business.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 3, Touché) by tibman on Wednesday March 28 2018, @11:44PM
MySQL : P
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:46AM (3 children)
They didn't acquire anyone to get that, they developed that from scratch, I think starting way back in the late 1970s or early 1980s. It's the whole reason Oracle became the company it is; it's their cash cow. It's much like Microsoft and Windows (except MS got a little springboard by acquiring QDOS and getting themselves a big IBM contract with that). You can even see it in their name, "Oracle" (the ancient Greek mythological figure that you'd ask to tell you your future--a SQL RDBMS you ask questions using a query language). They've had that name since the beginning.
Most highly successful companies have some product/service they've had since the beginning, and which was hugely successful, and from that (the "cash cow") they've been able to expand and buy up other stuff. There aren't that many companies where their original claim-to-fame is gone, and usually those companies are very old, and not tech companies.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday March 29 2018, @03:10PM (2 children)
So if by "from the beginning" you mean "5 years after they were founded," sure.
And the name allegedly comes from a CIA project codename, as the CIA was their first customer. So not only is Ellison a massive, gaping asshole for various other reasons; he also made his fortune by working for the national spying apparatus. [gizmodo.com] Nice.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Redundant) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 29 2018, @03:22PM (1 child)
So not only is Ellison a massive, gaping asshole for various other reasons; he also made his fortune by working for the national spying apparatus. Nice.
What's wrong with or assholish about that? Working for the national spying apparatus is working in the interests of the American voters. If you don't like it, you shouldn't vote for it, but voters consistently vote for it, so we can presume that it's what they want. They certainly don't make a big campaign issue out of and vote according to that issue, like they do with guns and abortion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 29 2018, @05:42PM
"but voters consistently vote for it, so we can presume that it's what they want."
don't be ridiculous
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday March 29 2018, @05:35AM
That it is successful is really absurd, but I agree it's true. The company I was working for once bought an Oracle license, and hired their recommended contractors to develop a rather simple database using it. After a year they didn't even have a working dialog box.
Now I don't really know that this is because their database is so bad. It may just be that Oracle certified developers are that bad. But it was really appallingly bad. But both groups got their money.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday March 28 2018, @11:41PM
They did quite a fine job of not creating Cover Oregon.
Oregon eventually gave up on it then started using healthcare.gov.
Several months after the... uh... "launch" of Cover Oregon I tried to use it for my own healthcare needs, but was informed that it only worked with Internet Explorer.
Last I heard Internet Explorer doesn't run on Mac OS X.
The state and oracle are now suing each other.
For a low, low consulting fee I could have provided expert advice on web application developers:
However they never asked for my expertise.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:50PM (4 children)
Putting the concept of API copyright back on the table? That would literally suck the brains out of a lot of technology.
In the US, yes. It would kill software development here, and with it much of the economy, since it's the biggest thing we're still really good at and export.
So if that happens, I'll be able to say that we got the government we deserve.
(Score: 2) by Virindi on Wednesday March 28 2018, @09:39PM (2 children)
It wouldn't kill things entirely. Instead there would be "API licenses", which would be used as a barrier to entry to make sure that only superbigco could sell software (or you, if you give 75% of your profit to them for the privilege). About the way DRM is already going with walled gardens.
We are practically already there. No change in the law required, and it applies everywhere on the planet.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:36AM (1 child)
It sounds like it'd make it pretty impossible to cost-effectively develop using FOSS software, which is extremely common for anything that doesn't involve Windows desktop software, and especially common in the embedded space, where Linux mainly rules supreme, aside from applications that require a real RTOS for performance/safety reasons. That means all that work will be going offshore.
Am I missing something?
(Score: 2) by Virindi on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:50AM
Silly. All that matters is "apps"! Everything else is passe.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Thursday March 29 2018, @01:03PM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:41PM (3 children)
Maybe it is Oracle's goal to kill Java by creating FUD on its own product. They probably lose money on it since they weren't able to sue everyone that used Java out of existence.
Pointless lawsuits on this can only result in the death of Java as a platform as everyone gets scared away from it. Maybe that is the goal, once they manage to kill Java they can point and cry "It's all Google's fault!"
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @06:51PM
Larry is 73.
...ok so he was only 65 when the first suit was filed.
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Wednesday March 28 2018, @09:00PM
Don't forget...
By proving that they are more interested in profiteering through lawsuits instead of developing good software Oracle is destroying their core business as well. Other than a few big companies with corporate wide licenses and existing installations, you never hear anyone using Oracle databases anymore.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 29 2018, @05:44PM
i'm probably not ever going to learn java, partly because of this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @09:30PM (3 children)
And should just fuck off.
Hopefully he falls off one of his yachts, hits his head and drowns, and his body is never found.
That, or aids.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @09:58PM (2 children)
When did Polio become too lame to wish upon others? If you wanna wish misery then go polio!
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 29 2018, @02:38AM (1 child)
Is polio really that bad to catch as an adult? Honestly, I don't know. It's a disease we seem to have mostly forgotten, except maybe much older people who still remember the times before Salk's vaccine was developed.
What about leprosy? Another disease we've mostly forgotten, I thought that one caused a lot of suffering for the afflicted one.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday March 29 2018, @05:41AM
More that half the suffering caused by leprosy (Hansen's disease) was due to social isolation. It wasn't nice, but the social treatment of the sufferers caused more than half the suffering. And depending on the century you could get called a leper because of a bad case of acne.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 28 2018, @09:39PM (3 children)
There isn't any software development occurring in the US. Development is outsourced to India where all software is made.
Sure there's the occasional idiot who tries to find paid work in the US. Those idiots starve to death unless they wise up and get a real job. Software is a dead profession.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday March 28 2018, @11:44PM (2 children)
That's news to me. [soggywizards.com]
Just today my next client accepted my bid for his work.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 29 2018, @01:22AM (1 child)
Oh look. It's another fake jobs board run by a lying dickhead.
Recruiters call me every single day to praise my skills and to tell me about FAKE JOBS.
They ask me why with my tech skills am I not working. I answer with a question: "WHY AREN'T YOU HIRING?"
Michael Dickhead Crawford, DO YOU KNOW HOW I KNOW YOU ARE A LIAR?
(Score: 3, Touché) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday March 29 2018, @01:41AM
Our customer service personnel will respond to your request in the order it was received.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by arcz on Thursday March 29 2018, @04:19PM