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You have put the finger exactly on the things that I have found objectionable in the jury instru | 451 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Jury Deadlock
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 03 2012 @ 07:38 PM EDT
Thanks - I am glad I am not on that jury. It is VERY
difficult following on Twitter. It seems the reporters only
catch just a small portion of what is really going on.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jury Deadlock
Authored by: Tkilgore on Thursday, May 03 2012 @ 08:56 PM EDT
PJ,

You have put the finger exactly on the things that I have found objectionable in
the jury instructions. I guess we will have to see what actually happens, but
indeed those jury instructions do practically order the jury to find Google
guilty of copyright violation.

Indeed, the judge has ordered the jury to assume that APIs and SSO are
copyrightable. And indeed you are correct that, not being versed in the law, the
jurors will very likely assume that they are because the judge said so.

Not only this. but also:

The jury has been told that Google needed a license in writing from Sun -- for
that which Google took from Apache Harmony and presumably in full accord with
the Apache license. The judge has already gotten a question about that from the
jury, asking for clarification. I am not surprised, frankly. But the judge would
not answer the question. Well, Google has no such license in writing and never
claimed that it did, only that it did not need one for several reasons which
came out in testimony but are ignored when the judge has instructed the jury
that Google did too need a written license.

As I said yesterday, if the jury follows the instructions of the judge without
attempting to apply common sense -- and the jury has been ordered to avoid the
application of common sense -- then the jury has no option but to find Google to
be guilty, guilty, guilty. The jury has been left with no other option by those
instructions. As I said yesterday in a post with a similar topic, the situation
reminds me of what a juror said after the Chicago Seven trial, "guilty as
charged by the judge."

Frankly, I am amazed by this situation. I agree that the judge seems like a very
intelligent man, a careful man, informed about the issues, and runs a tight ship
in the courtroom. Others have explained here that he is concerned about
"judicial economy" and the "inevitable appeal." But in the
attempt to serve these two ends he has been too clever by half, has fallen off
the other side of the chair, and has botched the trial beyond belief. How
exactly can it serve the cause of justice or mitigate the "unavoidable
appeals" if the jury has been given such never-never-land instructions as
the jury has actually been given, and then duly finds someone guilty by duly
following jury instructions which have ignored the realities upon which the case
was based, which fully came out in the testimony during the trial? What good
could it possibly do if the jury finds Google guilty of wholesale copyright
violation and then (which is still a possible outcome) the judge comes down and
decides that, "Oh, no. What the jury has found Google to have violated is
in fact not something which falls under copyright"?


[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jury Deadlock
Authored by: symbolset on Thursday, May 03 2012 @ 10:16 PM EDT

Even knowing what I know (which is a fair bit) I couldn't see how the jury could come to a fair verdict from what they've been given. And so I guess what it would come down to is that the plaintiff didn't prove their case.

It wouldn't surprise me if there's a juror in there that can't even figure out what the question is, let alone the answer.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

You have put the finger exactly on the things that I have found objectionable in the jury instru
Authored by: SilverWave on Friday, May 04 2012 @ 02:40 AM EDT
Seconded:

Poster later in thread:
"You have put the finger exactly on the things that I have found
objectionable in the jury instructions."

The instructions seem to paint Google as guilty by judge :-(

I don’t think that was his intention...

... but the road to hell is...

---
RMS: The 4 Freedoms
0 run the program for any purpose
1 study the source code and change it
2 make copies and distribute them
3 publish modified versions

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jury Deadlock
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 04 2012 @ 11:18 AM EDT
<blockquote>It's hardly surprising that they are confused.
For example, the judge tells them, Assume that
SSO is copyrightable. What message did that
send, even though he added that he'd actually
make that decision and they were to assume it
just for their deliberations.</blockquote>

PJ, I don't think that the judge even told the jury that he was going to decide
whether the SSO was protected by copyright. All he told the jury was that for
the purposes of their deliberations they were to assume that they are. He told
the lawyers, with the reporters present, that he would be deciding that for
himself later if he needed to, but I don't think that he told the jury. Maybe he
did tell the jury, and maybe I just missed it in all of the various reports, but
I don't remember seeing that.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jury Deadlock
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 04 2012 @ 02:28 PM EDT
"I think he goofed in not ruling on the APIs before
the case went to trial, because the poor jurors
can't possibly know where up is."

I totally agree! The only one here to blame is the Judge, by
not ruling on the API's before trial and telling the jury to
assume that SSO is copyrightable. Would it be grounds for
appeal?

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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