decoration decoration
Stories

GROKLAW
When you want to know more...
decoration
For layout only
Home
Archives
Site Map
Search
About Groklaw
Awards
Legal Research
Timelines
ApplevSamsung
ApplevSamsung p.2
ArchiveExplorer
Autozone
Bilski
Cases
Cast: Lawyers
Comes v. MS
Contracts/Documents
Courts
DRM
Gordon v MS
GPL
Grokdoc
HTML How To
IPI v RH
IV v. Google
Legal Docs
Lodsys
MS Litigations
MSvB&N
News Picks
Novell v. MS
Novell-MS Deal
ODF/OOXML
OOXML Appeals
OraclevGoogle
Patents
ProjectMonterey
Psystar
Quote Database
Red Hat v SCO
Salus Book
SCEA v Hotz
SCO Appeals
SCO Bankruptcy
SCO Financials
SCO Overview
SCO v IBM
SCO v Novell
SCO:Soup2Nuts
SCOsource
Sean Daly
Software Patents
Switch to Linux
Transcripts
Unix Books

Gear

Groklaw Gear

Click here to send an email to the editor of this weblog.


You won't find me on Facebook


Donate

Donate Paypal


No Legal Advice

The information on Groklaw is not intended to constitute legal advice. While Mark is a lawyer and he has asked other lawyers and law students to contribute articles, all of these articles are offered to help educate, not to provide specific legal advice. They are not your lawyers.

Here's Groklaw's comments policy.


What's New

STORIES
No new stories

COMMENTS last 48 hrs
No new comments


Sponsors

Hosting:
hosted by ibiblio

On servers donated to ibiblio by AMD.

Webmaster
I have a bad feeling already... | 275 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
I have a bad feeling already...
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, April 30 2012 @ 09:25 PM EDT
After reading the summary statements and the jury instructions, my gut feeling
is that they will find that Google did copy the APIs. That is not necessarily a
bad thing because it will force the judge to make a decision on whether they can
be copyrighted in the first place. It may be uncomfortable for the judge but the
feeling I get is that he will probably say they are not.

Even if the judge decides against Google, they will be able to afford to appeal.
Imagine if Oracle had picked on someone smaller who did not have the resources
to properly defend themselves. Would you really want that case being the one to
set the precedent?

Having a definitive statement that APIs are no able to be copyrighted is a far
better outcome than having the jury decide that there was no copying and leaving
the situation in limbo.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

I have a bad feeling already...
Authored by: xtifr on Monday, April 30 2012 @ 11:00 PM EDT
Even if he does have to rule, it wouldn't really be "making law from the
bench", because that's pretty much already the law and precedent, and he'd
just be following. Oracle's claims that an API can be copyrightable pretty much
go against all precedent. Rejecting that would simply be adding to the body of
consistent case law on the matter.

But it probably would be easier for him if the jury moots the point.

---
Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, for it makes them soggy and hard to
light.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

I have a bad feeling already...
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, May 01 2012 @ 07:58 AM EDT
The judge is absolutely right in not wanting to make a ruling to serve as future

precedent, which is part of my problem. From his handling of the case so far, I

really want this to be the judge who *does* establish precedent. Even if he
rules
in a way I do not agree, he has been asking all the right technical questions to

demonstrate a real understanding of the problem. If he rules in an unfortunate

direction, I would trust that really is the way the law leans unless we can get

congress to change it - although naturally I hope the law leans against
copyrighting the foundations our industry has been built on these last 50 years

or so.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Groklaw © Copyright 2003-2013 Pamela Jones.
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners.
Comments are owned by the individual posters.

PJ's articles are licensed under a Creative Commons License. ( Details )