Oracle Asks Judge To Throw Out Java/Google Verdict...Again (siliconvalley.com) 122
Just when you thought the six-year, $9 billion lawsuit was over, an anonymous reader quotes this report from the Bay Area Newsgroup:
Oracle has asked a judge -- again -- to throw out the verdict that found Google rightfully helped itself to Oracle programming code to create the Android operating system... A judge already rejected a bid in May by Oracle to get the verdict thrown out. But the software and cloud company hasn't given up. On July 6, Oracle filed a motion in San Francisco U.S. District Court again asking the same judge, William Alsup, to toss the verdict.
The company cited case law suggesting use is not legal if the user "exclusively acquires conspicuous financial rewards'' from its use of the copyrighted material. Google, said Oracle, has earned more than $42 billion from Android. "Google's financial rewards are as 'conspicuous' as they come, and unprecedented in the case law," Oracle's filing said. Oracle wants the judge to adhere to the narrower and more traditional applications of fair use, "for example, when it is 'criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching ... scholarship, or research.'"
The company cited case law suggesting use is not legal if the user "exclusively acquires conspicuous financial rewards'' from its use of the copyrighted material. Google, said Oracle, has earned more than $42 billion from Android. "Google's financial rewards are as 'conspicuous' as they come, and unprecedented in the case law," Oracle's filing said. Oracle wants the judge to adhere to the narrower and more traditional applications of fair use, "for example, when it is 'criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching ... scholarship, or research.'"
cry babies (Score:1)
yea they stole java google steals everything. Get over and move on.
NUKE ORACLE (Score:2)
Put Ellison's head on a pike, at the Redwood Shores city limits.
Seriously, this should have been done in the 90's.
Re: NUKE ORACLE (Score:4, Insightful)
We were too busy watching SCO go bankrupt. Now we can watch oracle.
Re: (Score:1)
We were too busy watching SCO go bankrupt.
I'm still trying to figure out what that means. I mean, has anybody lost their house yet? Even with all of this, a simple divorce proceeding would be much more devastating to any particular individual involved in the case.
Re: (Score:2)
We were too busy watching SCO go bankrupt.
I'm still trying to figure out what that means. I mean, has anybody lost their house yet? Even with all of this, a simple divorce proceeding would be much more devastating to any particular individual involved in the case.
Watching this game by Ellison is like watching exaggerating Donald Trump. And watching Jealousy and greed manifest itself.
Re: (Score:1)
It's a show. Who doesn't act differently when the cameras are on? Afterwards, they are off to the dinner party with the wives. Does anybody really believe in this faux antipathy?
Re: (Score:2)
It's not going to happen, until companies stop purchasing their product and Enterprises with OracleDB ditch it to save $$$ on the licensing
Re: (Score:2)
Be careful with making absolute statements. Oracle has done a few things that seem to be worthwhile. Oracle has given in to pressure from outside groups. I don't like Oracle at all, but they can sometimes be reasoned with. Not much, but some, anyway. As I recall, SCO couldn't be reasoned with at all, on any issue. So, no, Oracle is not the most useless ever. I don't care to research historical companies that might have been worse than either Oracle or SCO, but I would guess that they can be found. Y
Re: NUKE ORACLE (Score:1)
Please stop referring to Oracle as a person. The execs are Ellison, Cats, Hurd are dirtbags. Don't let them off the hook by calling them oracle.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't care to research historical companies that might have been worse than either Oracle or SCO, but I would guess that they can be found. You and I are simply unaware of them because they didn't affect us.
Here's a couple:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
I've never wanted to stay in a conversation with an Oracle salesman long enough to ask that.
Re: (Score:1)
Oracle's one redeeming quality seems to be their honesty. I've wondered if I asked an Oracle salesman, "You're going to screw me over, aren't you?" if they would answer yes.
I've never wanted to stay in a conversation with an Oracle salesman long enough to ask that.
That's like saying you like a criminal because he's very honest about mugging you in the first place.
Oracle are scum, second only to Microsoft. They deserve being killed by IBM, oh the irony if only it were possible.
Re: (Score:2)
Being Oracle, they'd probably have a special price list for those kinds of services, with a business group built around ancillary services like STD testing, condom and lube suppliers, etc.
Mwhahaha !! (Score:2)
exclusively acquires conspicuous financial rewards
hehe .. sniff hehe ..
Court motions are not news (Score:4, Insightful)
Filing a court motion is not news. Appealing a ruling is not news. They are pro forma. It would be more newsworthy if they didn't happen.
Re: (Score:1)
No one cares what you think.
Re: (Score:2)
You cared enough to reply. So it must have been pretty important to you.
Re: (Score:1)
This judge seems biased. How can a company make $42 billion off someone else's work and claim it's "fair use"? That's nonsense and legal BS to avoid paying what they owe.
You're begging the question. It would be more accurate to say they didn't make their money off of someone else's work, but merely shared some names with someone else's work, and that's why it was fair use. They made their money off the rest of the code.
Re:Court motions are not news (Score:5, Insightful)
Oracle didn't do any work on Java. Sun did. Sun invested a lot of time and money into Java, then ultimately, turned it over to outside developers. Sun still held "title" to Java, I suppose, but they did little to nothing to "protect" their copyright. Open sourced, freely distributed, outside developers encouraged to develop, and tacit consent given to use Java however the hell you want to use it.
Let's put this in perspective. You make something, and you allow all your neighbors to use that something. Let's say it's a water park. All the kids in town come to your place to play in the water. After a few years, I come along, and offer you some money for your water park, and you take the money. With the water park safely in my possession, I start suing all the families in town for using the water park.
Does that scenario make ANY sense to you? I sure as hell hope not.
In my most honest opinion, Oracle has no claim to anything that has been done with Java. If, and only if, Oracle develops some new aspect of Java, then Oracle will have full right and title to those newly explored aspects of Java. At least until someone reverse engineers it, and reproduces the results with different code.
Re: Court motions are not news (Score:5, Informative)
Sure, but you don't get to sue people for accessing the lake before you owned the property. If they built a nice path with the blessing of the previous owner, you may not even have the right to block their future access.
Re: (Score:2)
I believe there was this exact situation where a previous owner had a path thru their private property to the beach in northern california. They sold the land and the new owner put in a gate blocking access. New owner had to remove the gate under court order under some legal argument. The law has so many but's at this point it really boils down to shopping for a judge. The Oracle's and Google's have infinite resources to keep shopping.
Re: (Score:3)
I believe there was this exact situation where a previous owner had a path thru their private property to the beach in northern california. They sold the land and the new owner put in a gate blocking access. New owner had to remove the gate under court order under some legal argument.
It's called a public easement, and it doesn't require any judge shopping to get it recognized. It has precedents in English common law (on which US law is based and on which it depends) dating back four or five hundred years.
Re: (Score:2)
In Oregon after 7 years of use, the property line moves! If you argue they don't have access, the court will have to find that they own it, not you. Arguing shared access, that it is an easement, becomes the only way not to lose the shared portion!
Re:Court motions are not news (Score:4, Insightful)
Sun still held "title" to Java, I suppose, but they did little to nothing to "protect" their copyright.
you don't need to protect a copyright, you're getting confused with trademark, which does need to be defended to some degree.
Does that scenario make ANY sense to you? I sure as hell hope not.
It really didn't!
Re: (Score:2)
you don't need to protect a copyright, you're getting confused with trademark, which does need to be defended to some degree.
No, I think that's what he meant:
If you try to claim copyright over a city phone book you've compiled. Then your only protection is to keep that phone book a trade secret, not give out a copy to everyone you can find. I suppose you could argue that the phone book was photocopied and everything down to the font you used is identical, but of course, that argument becomes moot once the copier just hires a bunch of typists to retype all the phone numbers into his own slightly different phone book.
Re:Court motions are not news (Score:4, Informative)
Your argument falls down because public facts aren't copyrightable.
Also copyright has nothing to do with if you give something away and does not require anyone to keep anything a secret. You don't give away a copyright, you give away a copy which was within your right to do as you see fit. It's right there in the title "copyright", you retain the rights to decide how copies are produced.
I took a photo of an oil refinery once. It was a nice big panorama. I published it on my website in full resolution for all to see and enjoy. I was contacted by the refinery who wanted to use the photo for all internal publications. I said sure and handed over the original files. I happily gave those to the employees too. Then they printed off and framed 100 of these at a vendor presentation without asking me. All good I'm fine with that. 3 months later I found it on the website of an EPCM contractor. I sent them a strongly worded letter that they were using copyrighted work in a commercial setting without license or permission from the copyright owner. That got taken down very quickly.
You see copyright owners don't need to give express permission for each use but can always reserve the right to do so. Just because something is out there doesn't mean it's free of copyright.
Re: (Score:2)
Please look up the definition of derivative work.
Re: (Score:2)
And Google's argument is that the API definition (function signatures) constitute public knowledge (the phone number, if you will, for the functionality).
Re: (Score:2)
Of course. My reply had nothing to do with Google and was only addressing the GP's flawed example and understanding of copyright in his example.
Re: (Score:2)
And Google's argument is that the API definition (function signatures) constitute public knowledge (the phone number, if you will, for the functionality).
I don't think they ever made that argument, actually; at least, I don't remember seeing it anywhere.
Re: (Score:2)
So to fit your analogy, the story wou
Re: (Score:2)
Yes to be clear I was only countering the GP's example not tying it back to the Oracle case which has some very different principles at play.
Re: (Score:2)
Sun gave away Java to be used for free by anyone, and Oracle (as inheritors of the copyright) raised objections when it was being used later in time. Not only that, but they wanted to be paid retroactively for its use during the time Sun was allowing everyone to use it for free.
This is misunderstanding the situation.....Sun gave away Java for zero dollars, but it wasn't unencumbered: you had to follow one of the many licenses. Google could have chosen the GPL, and they wouldn't have had a problem. In fact, recently they did switch to the GPL.
Re: (Score:2)
Jesus Christ - it is YOU who is bizzare. You don't understand the difference between buying a company, and owning slaves? And, you want to shit on everything. Bizarre is an appropriate word for you.
Re: (Score:2)
While I agree in principle. What Oracle has is the *rights* to Java, including the legal interests inhereted when it brought Sun.
Which isnt to say that Oracles behavior is anything less than reprehensible, but they do have a legal right to have their case heard, even if , as we all hope, the judge fines their claims nonsensical.
Re: (Score:3)
Let's put this in perspective.
A better way would be to use an access road as an example. The API is a way to access the thing. Access was given away. The law says you can't just close an access road.
Re: (Score:2)
Sorry, but your argument is flawed in a number of ways. It doesn't matter if Oracle or Sun originally did the work; it is Oracle's property that they paid for. They also didn't open source it in a "public domain" or even BSD perspective; they retained ownership to their property and continued to license it for commercial gain.
That doesn't make Oracle right in this case though.
The bottom line is that APIs are necessary for interoperability. They are not patentable; they are not trademarkable; and, as the
Java should be paying the C people (Score:2, Interesting)
Java copied the data type names from C and other terminology and syntax.
Which is more than just the api, but they stole that too. Java mimicks C in the same use of expressions, assignments, curly braces and the semi-colon.
If we are going to retroactivately put a copyright on API, we need to do it all the way down from the top of the stack of turtles and not cherry pick only what Oracle wants, but what also by that interpretation that Oracle stole too.
Re: Court motions are not news (Score:1)
Oracle, the company most likely to make you .... (Score:5, Funny)
....feel that M$, SCO and Apple aren't such a bad bunch after all
Re: (Score:1)
That depends on which pope you're referring to. Some popes made Bond villains look as evil as Scrooge McDuck
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
the actual Inquisition (which still exists under another name) was actually fairly benign
Lies
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Oracle, the company most likely to make you .. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If APIs are copyrightable, probably most of it. APIs being copyrightable changes the entire shape of the licensing influence. This wouldn't have any effect on the use of software licensed with BSD or MIT, but GPL is different.
Traditional interpretation has said that APIs weren't copyrightable, but if they are then source code to interface with GPL code would also need to be GPL.
Re: (Score:2)
The SCOTUS has always defined what is copyrightable very broadly. In the example of a phone book, they have always said that the facts aren't copyrightable but the presentation is; the question then come down to, the functional parts are fair use even to the extent that the gray area may or may not reach them in a particular case. This is the same thing they're doing with computer cases. The amount of copying that is necessary for interoperation between devices will be almost always be "fair," regardless of
Re: (Score:1, Insightful)
"everybody has to write new APIs, or come up with a completely new and properly open source set of APIs that do not infringe on any of the thousands to millions of APIs currently copyrighted" Sounds like a good reason to start innovating instead of copying or demanding the free use of someone else's work. Don't want to pay to use someone else's technology? Nothing is stopping you from developing your own solutions. And this battle over Java is a perfect example of wasting money on lawyers instead of puttin
Re: Given how much that would bite themselves... (Score:1)
If we as a society have to always reinvent the wheel in order to drive to the store, you'll get your wish to go back to the stone age. The only difference will be the brutes will all have law degrees.
Re: (Score:2)
Everybody writes a new API; the person publishing the API, and the person using it too.
What goes around, might comer around... (Score:4, Interesting)
Oracle wants the judge to adhere to the narrower and more traditional applications of fair use, "for example, when it is 'criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching ... scholarship, or research.'"
Oracle better watch what they ask for. A greedy company this size, I imagine they have some questionable skeletons in their closet - somewhere. Setting a precedent like this might come back to bite them on the ass. [Of course, that would be delicious for the rest of us.]
Re: (Score:2)
Oracle helped itself to IBM's 'structured query language' API many decades ago.
Re: (Score:2)
That's what I was thinking. Oracle are playing an amazingly stupid game, because if they get the ruling they want I can see IBM coming after them for a *LOT* more money over this. I would be wanting hundreds of billions of dollars if I where IBM.
Spin article? (Score:2, Insightful)
"Google rightfully helped itself to Oracle programming code"... no, the court found that the APIs definitions do not constitute code. Which is absolutely right.
The few lines of actual code that were the same (you know, code, the stuff that converts to machine code that runs on the processor), was so insignificant as to be nothing.
Oracle have lied, spun, deceived, all the way through this. If the judge/jury had found any different then Oracle would own Dalvik, the VM written separately by a different group o
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Oh dear. It's clear that you didn't comprehend the parent's point in the slightest before responding, since you didn't respect the standard meanings of "declaration" and "definition" in your reply. Those are terms which haven't changed for decades in Computer Science. You would know that if you were in the discipline.
From your sloppiness, I suspect that you're not a programmer of any kind at all, but quite likely another lawyer using the words of CompSci without actually understanding them, and hence you
This skit sounds familiar (Score:5, Funny)
Oracle: None shall pass.
Google: Now stand aside worthy adversary.
Oracle: 'Tis but a scratch.
Google: A scratch? Your arm's off.
Oracle: I've had worse.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
No, he understood it clearly enough and decided not to flip copyright to make API's copyrightable.... which among other things would have meant that WABI, Oracle's clone of Windows API, would have infringed, as would many of Oracles own products. That was the right decision, and is the status quo.
This new claim from them "that Google's rewards are conspicuous, ergo not fair use" relating to the 20 or so lines of similar code (as opposed to APIs) isn't even true in fact.
Android costs $0, phone makers can use
Re: (Score:1)
No, he understood it clearly enough and decided not to flip copyright to make API's copyrightable
I'm not sure what you are saying here, the sentence isn't very clear.
Re: (Score:1)
By limiting his decision to the question of fair use and not ruling on whether or not an API is copyrightable, he kept the scope of the case appropriately narrow and limited. He dealt entirely within existing case law without challenging the previous opinion - that APIs are copyrightable.
Re: (Score:2)
Did you mean the *possessive*? Geez, don't have a cow, man.
Re: (Score:2)
Did you sleep all the fucking way through school, or what?
I did make it far enough that I learned that English is an open language, with no authorities or rules; merely Style Guides, for example the one that said class required. Punctuation is eternally disputed and controversial.
Also, your use of capitalization does not follow any of the mainstream style guides, and is quite likely to be controversial in itself. Additionally, your complaint leaves itself not well established as there are both standard and non-standard uses of "it's" in the source.
It's like oracle has been possessed by Caldera (Score:1)
Copyrightable? (Score:1)
Calling IBM and others (Score:2)
never! (Score:1)
Ellerson has enough money (Score:1)
Its the new world (Score:2)
Its the new world. Apparently its become OK to ingonre all facts, keep living in denial and asking for repeated do-overs until you get the outcome you want.
Gun controllers, radical feminists, climate-change deniers and Brexit remainers all keep trying to do exactly the same thing.
What financial rewards? (Score:1)
Android is free and open source. The operating system isn't what makes the money.
Google makes money off the stuff that runs on top of the free operating system (which provides the APIs and runtimes, for free), not the operating system itself.
People are free to do what they like with that free operating system, just look at Amazon for example. They are not beholden to Google, they include and exclude what they require for themselves and that's fine. They don't pay Google a cent for that operating system t
Case Law (Score:2)
The company cited case law
"Case law" is not law. Individual interpretations of the law and the resulting decisions relating to specific cases are not law. Law is law.
Any lawyer trying to use "case law" as a basis for their argument should be disbarred as they clearly don't understand the difference between the legislative and judicial branches.