EU Court Rules APIs, Programming Languages Not Copyrightable 215
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samzenpus
from the free-code dept.
from the free-code dept.
itwbennett writes "The European Court of Justice ruled on Wednesday that the functionality of a computer program and the programming language it is written in cannot be protected by copyright. In its ruling on a case brought by SAS Institute against World Programming Limited (WPL), the court said that 'the purchaser of a license for a program is entitled, as a rule, to observe, study or test its functioning so as to determine the ideas and principles which underlie that program.'"
It's now a free for all for all file fomats! Yeah! (Score:5, Interesting)
Interesting that computer "the format of data files" are not copyrightable!
"the Court holds that neither the functionality of a computer program nor the programming language and the format of data files used in a computer program in order to exploit certain of its functions constitute a form of expression. Accordingly, they do not enjoy copyright protection."
Very interesting.
Re:Read the decision (Score:4, Interesting)
Were this applied to the Oracle-Google Java case, I think this basically says the EU would rule in Google's favour.
Re:It's now a free for all for all file fomats! Ye (Score:5, Interesting)
It's kind of always been like this though. Compatibility and data interchange have always been protected. Without that protection, people would be unable to move their data into other formats and legally, a vendor could kill a customer's access to their own data by discontinuing their software. Those things just can't be allowed.
What's "new" here is that it has been challenged in court and has been affirmed.
Now what interferes with some of that are software patents...
9 lines were copied (Score:3, Interesting)
A grand total of 9 lines were copied, and as soon as they were identified they were removed from the Android sources. Furthermore, that RangeCheck function was so trivial that any Java beginner could have written it (this was stated in court testimony), so Oracle would get no substantive damages even if the jury denied the fair use defence for those 9 lines.
So yes, I have to agree with the parent that Oracle would lose in EU. They are likely to lose the copyright suit even in California.
Re:Strangely Relevant to Oracle vs. Google? (Score:5, Interesting)
This seems strangely relevant to the Oracle vs. Google case that's going on right now over Android and its usage of Java APIs. Does anyone know how much of a coincidence this EU court ruling is, that it occurs in such close proximity to its US analogue?
100% coincidence.
Also the judge has instructed the jury to deliberate assuming that the structure, sequence and organisation of the API is copyrightable; They're to determine given if the APIs are sufficiently similar, comparing all 166 Java packages not just the 33 accused,)and if so, if Google has infringed and whether or not they're use is allowed under fair use.
The Judge has not said that APIs can be copyrighted. He reserves that decision for himself, and will only be forced to make such a decision if the jury finds that Google has infringed (assuming the SSO of an API is copyrightable). Since the jury is already deliberating in the Oracle v Google case no new evidence will be presented to them. Although US copyright laws are different than EU law, the Judge knows that his decision could have huge impacts on the software market.
I like Judge Alsup, he's smart. He only has to decide if Google's found to be infringing... Furthermore I think he's begun to understand the absurdity of Oracles claims:
Judge: Question about specification. Your description made it sound like a black box with something inside. You have input on that side and output on that side, and the spec says what the inputs gotta be, and the outputs gotta be, and the implementation is what's in the black box.
Owen Astrachan: That is a very good explanation. I like that explanation.
[Judge smiles]
- Reported Transcript [groklaw.net]
In the black box analogy the API would be like Google and Oracle both labeling their volume knobs the same name and making clockwise rotation increase the volume... It sounds intuitive that if Google's black box has all the same placement and functions and labels as an Oracle box that they coppied the SSO of the Interface (API) -- However, they must have done so in order to provide interoperability, and courts have made exceptions for such use in the past. As long as the operation manual (code comments) are sufficiently dissimilar I can't see where Oracle has a copyright case. Their patent case is another story.
This EU ruling is interesting to me as a software developer... My fellow game devs are dispersed globally. In the near future we'll be selecting a home base of operations. If the APIs are found copyrightable in the US, but not EU, we may opt to have our base of operations outside the US. (we may do so any way for patent concern reasons -- Fix the damn copyright and patent system USA, it's HURTING your business)
Re:It's now a free for all for all file fomats! Ye (Score:4, Interesting)
It would be sufficient to legally download and install a single instance of the JRE to obtain a license according to the court. The defendant in the case didn't buy a license to the API either, just installed a single instance of SAS' program which he obtained legally.