Jury Says Google Infringed On Oracle's Copyright

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It looks like the jury has come to a decision on the first part of the Google vs. Oracle trial. The jury has sided with Oracle so far but there is still more to come, including the third phase of the trial where they decided on damages.

A Northern California jury on Monday found that Google Inc infringed upon Oracle Corp's copyrights on the structure of part of the Java software programming language, in a high stakes trial over smartphone technology. However, the jury failed to decide after days of deliberation whether Google had the right to fair use of that copyrighted structure.
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the funny part is that this partial verdict can easily be blown out of the water by the Judge when he rules on the copyright-ability of APIs later (a matter of law ruling) and considering that the judge is aware of the ruling by the EU Court of Justice (the top court in euro-land) that APIs are ideas and can't be copyrighted...it's still in the air.

And from the transcripts, he does not like Oracle.


http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120507122749740#Update_7 said:
Oracle: Separate damage calculation.
Judge: Do you want all their profits?
Oracle: No, Your Honor.
Judge: This borders on the ridiculous. Now you are changing your tune (adding to the agreed-upon statutory damages). Based on 9 lines of copying out of 15 million? That would ge a big, big stretch.
...
Judge: Zero finding of liability so far. We will use the same briefing schedule. Brief tomorrow, responses by Thursday.
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All this nonsense over 9 lines of Java code. Google should have just obtained a fair use license back in 2006.
 
"Update 6: The judge has stated, pending judgment as a matter of law, that there is "zero finding of copyright liability" other than the 9 lines of code to which Oracle's damages report attributes no value.A good day for Google overall"

In contrast to the Headline.
 
Accursed said:
"Update 6: The judge has stated, pending judgment as a matter of law, that there is "zero finding of copyright liability" other than the 9 lines of code to which Oracle's damages report attributes no value.A good day for Google overall"

In contrast to the Headline.
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It was a decent day for Google. If the judge throws out copyright as law then Oracles entire copy write phase, all of what was just decided, is thrown out and only the patents come into play.

The potential is still there for a very bad day at Google though. Its not over. If they are copy writable and a second jury decides no on fair use then Google will still have a very big check to pay.
 
EU rulings are irrelevant in a US court system.

It's already well established law that API's are copyrightable...hence the judge being able to rule about something "as a matter of law"
 
It looks like the jury was deadlocked on the issue of fair-use in the Oracle vs. Google trial. How's that for a monkey wrench?

A federal jury failed to agree on a pivotal issue in Oracle's copyright-infringement case against Google, blunting the impact of its finding that Google relied on another company's technology to build its popular Android software for mobile devices. The impasse reached Monday in San Francisco hobbles Oracle Corp.'s attempt to extract hundreds of millions of dollars from Google on grounds that the search leader pirated parts of Android from Oracle's Java programming system.
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mope54 said:
EU rulings are irrelevant in a US court system.

It's already well established law that API's are copyrightable...hence the judge being able to rule about something "as a matter of law"
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while true, it doesn't mean that the judge won't weigh it when considering it himself.
He's already mentioned the EU CoJ (not just a small "regional court" but the EU's top court) ruling.
 
MoFoQ said:
while true, it doesn't mean that the judge won't weigh it when considering it himself.
He's already mentioned the EU CoJ (not just a small "regional court" but the EU's top court) ruling.
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That's true but he's bound by 9th circuit precedent. Unless he legislates from the bench he'll be precluded from using the EU decision in this case.

I think it's more interesting that people are promoting the EU decision as relevant when in all other matters those same people would be loath to submit to EU decisions.

Do people really want us to follow EU's lead? My take on it from comments elsewhere is that no the members of this forum would not want EU precedent to govern how we apply our laws in the US.
 
mope54 said:
That's true but he's bound by 9th circuit precedent. Unless he legislates from the bench he'll be precluded from using the EU decision in this case.

I think it's more interesting that people are promoting the EU decision as relevant when in all other matters those same people would be loath to submit to EU decisions.

Do people really want us to follow EU's lead? My take on it from comments elsewhere is that no the members of this forum would not want EU precedent to govern how we apply our laws in the US.
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Its all a double standard. People on this website get a hard on for anything Google.
 
The quicker Oracle dies the better off I'll be at work. They're one of the most outdated, backwards thinking companies, run by a compete dick. Remember what it stands for: One rich asshole called Larry Ellison.
 
JosiahBradley said:
The quicker Oracle dies the better off I'll be at work. They're one of the most outdated, backwards thinking companies, run by a compete dick. Remember what it stands for: One rich asshole called Larry Ellison.
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Oracle databases rock, dont be hatin.
 
All this means is that either the jury dosn't understand anything or the amount of bribes going out from Oracle and Google are about equal.
 
Cali3350 said:
Oracle databases rock, dont be hatin.
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I find SQL Management Studio to be far more user friendly than Oracle's browser-based database management tools.

Oracle's a pain in the ass to work with support-wise because of their strict hands-off policy. I can't tell you the number of times I get a "I'm sorry we can't look at/touch it because of policy" when asking them for help fixing a Primavera P6 issue.
 
It's sad to see Sun being reduced to suing over patents and copyright and getting their headquarters taken over by Facebook, lulz.
 
Azhar said:
I find SQL Management Studio to be far more user friendly than Oracle's browser-based database management tools.

Oracle's a pain in the ass to work with support-wise because of their strict hands-off policy. I can't tell you the number of times I get a "I'm sorry we can't look at/touch it because of policy" when asking them for help fixing a Primavera P6 issue.
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This. Oracle management is a over complex obfuscated pile that spawns arrogant, overspecialized DBAs like this guy: http://www.dba-oracle.com/t_how_to_become_an_oracle_dba.htm
 
mope54 said:
I think it's more interesting that people are promoting the EU decision as relevant when in all other matters those same people would be loath to submit to EU decisions.

Do people really want us to follow EU's lead? My take on it from comments elsewhere is that no the members of this forum would not want EU precedent to govern how we apply our laws in the US.
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Nah, most of us want to sit back and chant USA USA. We definitely want to be the leaders, but when we see an obvious flaw in our system and yet another country seems to be getting it right, why do you think it is so strange to point it out.

We all know EU law does not apply here, but sound logic is pretty universal. That is what we are hoping will be realized.
 
DocFaustus said:
Nah, most of us want to sit back and chant USA USA. We definitely want to be the leaders, but when we see an obvious flaw in our system and yet another country seems to be getting it right, why do you think it is so strange to point it out.

We all know EU law does not apply here, but sound logic is pretty universal. That is what we are hoping will be realized.
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So you're of the opinion that API's should not be copyrightable?

That's an interesting and fairly unique view. I'd like to hear your reasoning for why this position should be considered sound logic.
 
mope54 said:
So you're of the opinion that API's should not be copyrightable?

That's an interesting and fairly unique view. I'd like to hear your reasoning for why this position should be considered sound logic.
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Actually, I was taking offense to your insinuation that the reason we should ignore this because the idea came from the EU and not originally contemplated in the US. You were trying to make this an "us versus them" situation and then extend the BS further to infer that they must be wrong because specifically they are not us.

While I was trying to let the facts of your statement stand on its own. For this argument, I will accept your claim that it is my opinion that API's should not be copyright-able.

API stands for Application Programming Interface. Right there in the name is a definition of what it should do: Be the interface for programming to an application. In other words, the API defines how you talk with said application. That means it is part of the language. How could you possibly write an API as part of a language and then expect to hold copyright over everything written in that language?

Another way of thinking of an API is as a standard to be used to insure interoperability. Eg. If you give me x and y, I will return z. Well, if it is subject to copyright then it is not really a standard for others to use. So how can a standard be followed if by law you are not allowed to use it?
 
as for your first concern about me making a claim of us vs. them or right vs. wrong:
whether the EU is right or wrong is irrelevant to the issue that any and all resolutions in a non-US court have no application to a US case.

this has been and will likely always be the state of our law.

whether you or anyone else feels we *should* use european law to govern our laws is an opinion and rightly brought before Congress and/or other legislative bodies. The courts are not legislative bodies and are bound by US legal precedence.

you are arguing for a position that currently has no place in US legal jurisprudence and, frankly, is not applied in any other context. We certainly do not adhere to EU standards when it comes to death penalty, drug legislation, employees' rights, consumer rights, and a whole host of other legal precepts.

end of


as for your second point: copyrightable does not mean that others are not allowed to use something.

please adjust your premise and refine your position
 
mope54 said:
as for your first concern about me making a claim of us vs. them or right vs. wrong:
whether the EU is right or wrong is irrelevant to the issue that any and all resolutions in a non-US court have no application to a US case.

this has been and will likely always be the state of our law.

whether you or anyone else feels we *should* use european law to govern our laws is an opinion and rightly brought before Congress and/or other legislative bodies. The courts are not legislative bodies and are bound by US legal precedence.

you are arguing for a position that currently has no place in US legal jurisprudence and, frankly, is not applied in any other context. We certainly do not adhere to EU standards when it comes to death penalty, drug legislation, employees' rights, consumer rights, and a whole host of other legal precepts.

end of


as for your second point: copyrightable does not mean that others are not allowed to use something.

please adjust your premise and refine your position
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I am sorry, but you are failing hard a reading comprehension and moving the goal posts again. So much so that your entire argument has become circular

NOBODY has is saying that EU law has or should have jurisdiction in the united states. People are saying that one particular ruling they made seems to make sense. They are hoping we come up with a similar ruling. To quote my first post for you:

We all know EU law does not apply here, but sound logic is pretty universal. That is what we are hoping will be realized.
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I have made myself clear on all positions. Arguing with you has become like that Monty Python sketch where the guy simply says "no its not" to every statement. You need to put forth a counterpoint if you want this debate to continue.
 
DocFaustus said:
Ok I am gullible, you got me good. Well played. 10/10
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Books are copyrighted materials I hope you will agree. Yet that does not prevent people from reading them and, in limited circumstances, even reproducing and utilizing them without license.

We don't copyright the letters a-z but we protect the composite expression.
Simply because I refuse to protect all of my rights does not cede them to anyone else.

My published works are protected via copyright. If it comes to my attention that my work is being reproduced and disseminated to impoverished minority children in inner cities for free during their social studies courses it's *my* right to protect my assets as I see fit. Personally, that's one of my preferred audiences and if that came to be true I'd work with the violators some sort of limited use that was acceptable. If I found someone to be doing the same behavior in a Harvard course I would be more likely to respond negatively to that kind of misuse of my property.

As the property owner I am entitled to decide whether I want to protect my assets or not. That said, there are limited circumstances where even my wishes do not have to be adhered to when one uses my property.

That's the elaborated counter-point to your faulty premise that copyrighted material means that things can't be used and an implied critique that simply refusing to protect one's assets in one venue precludes that entity from protecting one's assets in another.


If you re-evaluate your premises you'll see that you're arguing against your own principle that API's are intended to ensure interoperability. Derivative works occur within that context but that principle would be pointless if we go so far as to say that one can take our work and create commercial endeavors from them that had nothing to do with the intent of the authors.

We don't see this kind of behavior with .net or winAPI. One can't take Steamworks, for example, and just rip it off. The API is intended for developers to create works for use *within* the Steam infrastructure...not depart from it.

MSFT tried this unsuccessful with Java and decided to settle with Sun.
I'm in line with industry standard whereas you're talking about a novel way of looking at API's and intellectual property, in general.

Now you may be right in your opinion. I'm not disputing that. But your desire a ruling along those lines would be out of line with 9th circuit precedence, which is the only thing the judge is legally allowed to contemplate in his judgement. historically when judges step out of their constraints, and it's only happened a few times at the supreme court level, it's generated copious amounts of controversy.

now, I happen to personally agree that we ought not to execute minor offenders. But that does not mean I necessarily believe the court was legally correct (or obligated) to rule that way based on the current world's opinion on the subject.

Similarly, one may hold the opinion that our ways of dealing with IP in the US are outdated and harmful. But that's a moral argument not "sound logic" (which was the claim put forth in this thread).
 
mope54 said:
Books are copyrighted materials I hope you will agree. Yet that does not prevent people from reading them and, in limited circumstances, even reproducing and utilizing them without license.
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Actually yes, it does prevent all of that stuff. Only by the owner's permission do you get to use it in the manner set forth. The right of the author is so strong that they had to make exceptions to the copyright law called "fair use".

We don't copyright the letters a-z but we protect the composite expression.
Simply because I refuse to protect all of my rights does not cede them to anyone else.
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Copyrighting APIs is like copyrighting A to Z. Or maybe if you are inclined you can say it like copyrighting how a sentence should be structured. Either way, you are copyrighting the language.

But you are still missing the entire point. According to the facts of the case, Google did not copy/paste the APIs. They rewrote them. If this was a book, you would have said they used their own words. So that means that Oracle is trying to make copyright cover ideas, and that is something more akin to patent law (we can save that debate for later). Only 9 lines were copied. Groklaw States: "Oracle's own expert, the judge pointed out in court, valued those 9 lines of code at zero. This is 9 lines out of millions."

Oracle is going against the generally accepted practices of developer communities on this one. The entire internet today is based off this, so much so, that this could inhibit all the interoperability you see today.

Maybe this wired article will better articulate the point I am trying to make. http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/05/oracle_clou/

PS. Thanks for correcting my spelling. Hopefully I haven't added too many more errors
 
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