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Jonathan's Testimony | 697 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Jonathan's Testimony
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 04:44 PM EDT
An editorial comment on the trial's merits when a yes/no to a
different question was what was asked. Judge thought he
wanted to say that line, somehow, so it was spring loaded to
be said.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jonathan's Testimony
Authored by: cricketjeff on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 04:46 PM EDT
Because, I assume, witnesses are supposed to give unambiguous answers and his
wasn't.

---
There is nothing in life that doesn't look better after a good cup of tea.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jonathan's Testimony
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 05:09 PM EDT
I think that he was saying that Jonathan Schwartz's comment about "We had
no grounds to sue" seemed to the judge to be a legal conclusion, and that
if Oracle had objected on the grounds that Mr. Schwartz is not a lawyer, that he
would have upheld the objection and struck the statement from the record, as he
was already ready and waiting to do just that, but there was no objection from
Oracle so he couldn't do anything.

In the US court system, the judge is not allowed to find for an objection that
was not raised, so even if one side's statement or argument or witnesses answer
is incorrect or is something that would be overturned if it was objected to, the
judge can't do anything unless the objection is actually raised by the opposing
side.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Spring Gun
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 05:16 PM EDT
Rather than me trying to explain it (IANAL), check out this famous case about the spring gun:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki /Katko_v._Briney

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Jonathan's Testimony
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 05:25 PM EDT

> What did he mean by the "spring gun" comment?

It _might_ be a reference to the testimony about 'Spring UK' which could yet
result in being a foot-gun.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

He answered a yes/no question with 'opinion'; Oracle failed to Object
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 05:43 PM EDT
Their loss.

It's now on record testimony.

It's also arguable that the statement of a CEO is not 'opinion'

From a personal point of view it would be opinion
From a CEO it is a statement of corporate policy.

This is why the words of a CEO are constrained with disclaimers, and to some
extent why CEOs are rewarded as such, as a CEO it is very difficult/impossible
to be an individual, you *are* in essence the Company that appointed you.

Salaried staff generally do not understand this and are mostly just jealous of
the $$$ and fail to understand why the Company 'owns' what they do.

Equally, the rest of the BoD don't get this either, but are in the privileged
position of being able to award themselves similar salaries/bonuses to the CEO
to make themselves feel better while they carry out their administrative duties
(Safra Catz: Bling!!)

Of course it then follows that elected representatives and their appointees
figure that if a piffling private/public company is rewarding its executives in
such a manner, it follows that if you are running a country/state you should be
equally or better rewarded.

Jonathan Schwartz is an old school CEO who cares about doing stuff right.

Most of the other players are nouveaux riches who are insecure enough to think
their $$ pile is not enough for them to be accepted by the 'established', or
there is another nouveaux who has made a considerably bigger $$$$ pile.

Power corrupts, and in fear of exercising your personal power you have allowed
the feckless to corrupt everything in the name of personal greed.

This is why there is a capitalist revolution on your doorstep.

Try to shoot all the CEOs on your way, they are not all bad.

IM(NS)HO


But this is politics and is disallowed here.


My apologies to PJ/Groklaw

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

spring gun
Authored by: IANALitj on Monday, May 07 2012 @ 05:46 PM EDT
Wikipedia has the first part of the story, the definition.

"A spring-gun is a gun, often a shotgun, rigged to fire when a string or
other triggering device is tripped by contact of sufficient force to
"spring" the trigger so that anyone stumbling over or treading on them
would discharge it and wound themselves.

"Spring-guns were formerly used as booby traps against poachers and
trespassers. Since 1827, spring-guns and all man-traps are illegal in England.
Spring-guns are sometimes used to trap animals."

The second part of the story is more interesting. When I was in law school,
some cases involving spring guns were used pedagogically. One aspect that I
remember as being interesting was that some contemporary landowners considered
this a reasonable protective measure. Other people considered it unreasonable
that the guns sometimes wound up shooting people whom the landowner would not
have been justified in shooting if he had been there in person. So there was
this legal tension. Also there would have been a social tension, with some
class distinctions between the landowning class and the poaching class entering
into the issue. Wikipedia reports the English legal conclusion, but the law
students got to see how this result was reached in a series of cases.

What the judge is saying here to these lawyers, all of whom presumably studied
those same cases, is that he recognizes a mantrap.

He is using terminology he learned in law school, just as people use sports
terminology far outside its proper realm. There is a little bit more than that
in his choicde of words. By using this arcane terminology for a mantrap, he is
reminding them that they should not try on him -- even in this jury trial --
tricks that they might be able to use on a jury. As someone we know says, he
did not fall off a turnip truck.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Having considered the comments
Authored by: Ian Al on Tuesday, May 08 2012 @ 02:02 AM EDT
It sounds to me that the judge is saying that the lawyers question was arranged
to set off that extended reply instead of the simple yes/no response.

I think the judge is generally concerned about witness coaching. He made the
comment 'Refers to spoon-feeding of expert witnesses. Both of you have done it'.

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Trick Question
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, May 08 2012 @ 02:44 PM EDT
To my mind, it's a trick question that cannot reasonably be answered yes or no.
As with the question "Have you stopped beating your wife?", answering
either "Yes" or "No" admits an implied fact.

It seems to me that the question was the "spring gun", not the answer
Schwartz gave.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

  • Trick Question - Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, May 08 2012 @ 05:09 PM EDT
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