Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

[Posted March 27, 2018 by corbet]

Techdirt reports that the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) has resurrected Oracle's copyright claim against Google for its use of the Java APIs in Android. "Honestly, the most concerning part of the whole thing is how much of a mess CAFC has made of the whole process. The court ruled correctly originally that APIs are not subject to copyright. CAFC threw that out and ordered the court to have a jury determine the fair use question. The jury found it to be fair use, and even though CAFC had ordered the issue be heard by a jury, it now says 'meh, we disagree with the jury.' That's... bizarre."

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 27, 2018 19:22 UTC (Tue) by jonsmirl (guest, #7874) [Link] (11 responses)

My concern with this comes from copyright being automatic and lasting 150 years or so. If Oracle succeeds in changing the 75 years of history where everyone believed that APIs were free to copy, utter chaos in the computer industry is gong to ensue. That's because if Oracle APIs are copyright, then every other API in the industry is also copyright. Since the industry is only 75 years old none of the copyrights could have expired. Thousand of entities will suddenly discover they own something they did not think they owned, and for sure they are going to employ legions of lawyer to try and collect license fees from people who cloned those APIs believing it was safe to do so.

Patents are a bad enough curse on the software industry, if APIs suddenly and retroactively switch to needing licenses the entire industry could collapse from the legal turmoil.

Alsop got it right the fist time. APIs are functional and they should not be subject to copyright. That is the ruling in the EU also.

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 27, 2018 19:36 UTC (Tue) by clopez (guest, #66009) [Link] (2 responses)

Indeed. Im waiting for Caldera to come back from its ashes to sue Redhat, Google or Apple for using the POSIX API. Its going to be fun (to not say depressing)

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 28, 2018 12:16 UTC (Wed) by xav (guest, #18536) [Link] (1 responses)

> Indeed. Im waiting for Caldera to come back from its ashes to sue Redhat, Google or Apple

... or Oracle :)

> for using the POSIX API. Its going to be fun (to not say depressing)

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 28, 2018 14:39 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link]

Remember that Oracle itself is built around SQL invented by IBM.

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 27, 2018 22:39 UTC (Tue) by davidstrauss (guest, #85867) [Link] (7 responses)

> for sure they are going to employ legions of lawyer to try and collect license fees from people who cloned those APIs believing it was safe to do so

Such efforts wouldn't be that rewarding. If the company didn't expect that their APIs were protected by copyright, they wouldn't have registered the copyrights. Damages for unregistered copyright infringement are limited to actual damages [1].

Even actual damages would be difficult to calculate because there wouldn't be any history of licensing revenue. The plaintiff would have to resort to estimating a count of violations and a fair licensing price. Also, attorney's fees aren't recoverable in the actual damages scenario (see same source), so actual damages -- which are already quite limited -- would have to substantially exceed litigation expenses to make it worthwhile.

I'm not a lawyer, but I frequently work with software licensing.

[1] http://www.patent-trademark-law.com/copyright-articles/ca...

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 27, 2018 23:01 UTC (Tue) by davidstrauss (guest, #85867) [Link] (6 responses)

On further reading of the verdict, I'm more inclined to agree that this may open up Pandora's Box. It appears that the verdict treats the "declaring code" as the source of Oracle's copyright claim, and something like that is fairly likely to be registered (rather than documentation on the standards or APIs).

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 28, 2018 9:31 UTC (Wed) by anton (subscriber, #25547) [Link] (5 responses)

I think the main lever is not the damages that they can demand for past infringements, but the legal possibilities that the supposed copyright holder has for the future. In the present case Oracle could tax all Android phone makers, and maybe all app writers, and eventually all other industries where Java is used. That non-Oracle software represents an investment of billions of dollars, and if such a copyright actually exists in the USA, Oracle could make it mostly worthless there, if they wanted.

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 28, 2018 13:56 UTC (Wed) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (4 responses)

All being well, IBM will sue Oracle for its use of the SQL API, and then I think the shit will *really* hit the fan ... :-)

Cheers,
Wol

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 29, 2018 8:36 UTC (Thu) by shiftee (subscriber, #110711) [Link] (3 responses)

Perhaps the biggest Mexican standoff in history

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 30, 2018 11:27 UTC (Fri) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (2 responses)

How's this a Mexican Standoff?

If IBM win, Oracle are toast.

If IBM loses, we're back to the status quo ante (although if IBM don't include patents so it avoids the CAFC, it'll probably go to the Supreme Court as "a conflict between appeal courts").

Either way, Oracle loses, IBM is no worse off.

Cheers,
Wol

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 30, 2018 11:56 UTC (Fri) by shiftee (subscriber, #110711) [Link] (1 responses)

Until Intel sues IBM for using the x86 API. Then both of them are sued for using the POSIX API etc. etc. etc.

Appeals Court Overturns Google's Fair Use Victory For Java APIs (Techdirt)

Posted Mar 30, 2018 14:14 UTC (Fri) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link]

Intel couldn't sue IBM for use of x86 API. It used it in the past but under proper license and does not use it now.

Really, if this case would come to pass IBM would become the "endpoint" most likely: IBM did many things modern companies rave about when said companies didn't exist and their founders were in diapers!

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Mar 28, 2018 5:03 UTC (Wed) by bokr (guest, #58369) [Link] (5 responses)

A copyright on a blueprint gives you rights concerning the blueprint,
not the depicted plug.

I think if you want to control making plugs you need a patent,
and even there, control can be judged anti-competitive.

Didn't Amdahl prove the principle that there's a right to compete
by making plug-compatible equipment? (IBM mainframe compatibles in his case).

Weren't the telcos eventually denied the power to control what
was plugged into their jacks, other than electrical compatibility?

So Oracle has a copyright on a software blueprint that describes
an adaptor plug whose back side plugs into GNU libraries that
plug into the linux kernel. And they want to assert some kind of right
to prevent making compatible adaptor plugs and programs (java) that
plug into them?

I hope google takes them to the Supreme Court, and incidentally
forcefully reminds everyone that patents and copyrights were
explicitly intended "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts"
not to hinder it, as is the net effect of this kind of legal gaming.

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Mar 28, 2018 9:33 UTC (Wed) by pbonzini (subscriber, #60935) [Link] (1 responses)

Google had already taken them to the Supreme Court, but they preferred to have the fair use question resolved first.

In the long run this _might_ be the best outcome, especially given the Federal Circuit's track record with the Supreme Court isn't exactly something to be proud of.

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Apr 5, 2018 14:36 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> In the long run this _might_ be the best outcome, especially given the Federal Circuit's track record with the Supreme Court isn't exactly something to be proud of.

Even better if SCOTUS ruled that, all patent claims having been dropped before the initial verdict, the case should never have gone to Federal Circuit in the first place. Vacates all Federal rulings and kicks back to the District Court for further action ... :-)

Otherwise it means that anybody can slip a patent claim into a court case, abandon it, and then appeal to the Federal Circuit instead of the area Circuit.

Cheers,
Wol

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Mar 29, 2018 12:36 UTC (Thu) by AnimeLife (guest, #116014) [Link] (2 responses)

Yup and even if they are protected by licences / GPL on linux, in their own way they are doing wrong on windows.

But on the otherside, I think java apps are supposed to run on any platform and Android SDK / APKs exactly do the opposite, making them available only on one *commercial* platform controlled by one company. Did google invest any effort to make them compatible on other systems, atleast on GNU / Linux, provide alternate runtimes to run APKs on PCs or anything like that? NO. So, in my opinion this suits them.

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Mar 29, 2018 19:51 UTC (Thu) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (1 responses)

DAX runtime runs just fine on regular Linux. That's how you develop Android apps.

A copyrighted API spec is like copyrighted blueprint for an adaptor plug, ISTM

Posted Mar 29, 2018 22:24 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

Plus the whole point of the Android stuff is to provide the framework for Java to run on Android. Java won't run if somebody doesn't write a runtime to run it!

The Android stuff is simply a Java runtime and development kit optimised for the platform it's meant to run on, namely Android phones.

Cheers,
Wol