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CoolHand [soylentnews.org] writes:

Gather round tech folks, it's time for an epic rematch between two industry giants. At stake is not just billions of dollars in copyright claims, but also a controversial legal concept that could roil the entire software industry.

It all begins on Monday in San Francisco, where Google GOOG and Oracle ORCL will joust in court for a second time over little bits of code used to build the Android operating system. Here's a Q&A in plain English about what you need to know about the case, including each side's strategy and possible outcomes.

Why are Google and Oracle in court?

The case is about intellectual property. It began six years ago when Oracle sued Google for using APIs tied to Java (more on this below) without permission. Google won at an initial trial in 2012 when a jury found the company didn't infringe Oracle's patents, and a judge concluded the APIs didn't qualify for copyright protection.

But in a ruling that shocked the tech community, an appeals court found in 2014 that Oracle's APIs were indeed covered by copyright. The ruling also kicked the case back to the lower court to determine whether Google's use of the APIs counted as a "fair use." Now, at this second trial, a jury will look at the fair use question.

How does "fair use" come into it?

Fair use is a part of copyright law that allows use of a work without the author's permission. Examples are parody sketches that use famous TV or movie characters, or a book review that quotes a section of a a novel. The Oracle-Google trial is unusual because you normally see fair use debates in the realm of media and the arts, not computer science.

Google and Oracle's $9.3 Billion Fair Use Fight Starts Today [fortune.com]

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