
Oracle wants $9.3B for Google’s use of Java in Android - miralabs
http://www.computerworld.com/article/3048774/android/oracle-wants-93b-for-googles-use-of-java-in-android.html
======
iheartmemcache
I was thoroughly impressed with the judge who presided over the last ruling --
IIRC he went so far as to learn at least the basics of Java to the point where
I remember being impressed by the insight of the questions he posed. There are
subsets of law one can specialize in ranging from medical malpractice to
obscure patent litigation, but as far as I know there are no factors linking a
presiding judge to a specific specialty. I really think other judges should
follow the example he set and at least develop a core understanding in a
similar fashion.

Edit:
[http://www.cand.uscourts.gov/wha/oraclevgoogle](http://www.cand.uscourts.gov/wha/oraclevgoogle)
the original Alsup opinion

[http://regmedia.co.uk/2014/05/09/oracle_google_appeal_opinio...](http://regmedia.co.uk/2014/05/09/oracle_google_appeal_opinion.pdf)
The appeal opinion -- which, as it stands, rules that programming APIs are in
fact copyrightable.

(Also, look at the list of counsel -- heavy hitters, damn.)

    
    
      Oracle appeals from the portion of the final judgment entered against it, and Google 
      cross-appeals from the portion of that same judgment entered in favor of Oracle as to
      the rangeCheck code and eight decompiled files. Because we conclude that the declaring
      code and the structure, sequence, and organization of the API packages are entitled
      to copyright protection, we reverse the district court’s copyrightability determination
      with instructions to reinstate the jury’s infringement finding as to the 37 Java
      packages. Because the jury deadlocked on fair use, we remand for further consideration
      of Google’s fair use defense in light of this decision.

~~~
jpalomaki
On software like JDK, my feeling (without thinking too much) is that the API
is actually the most valuable part and the one that requires true expertise to
craft.

~~~
vetinari
Why do you think so?

The java.* API is not even that good (it is very verbose to achieve basic
things). The only reason to re-implement it is compatibility with existing,
third-party software using that API.

If you would come with API, that would be technically better, but doing the
same thing, do you think that everyone would rewrite all their libraries,
frameworks and apps? No way.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
That's the point. The API isn't valuable because of the creative expression
(the thing copyright protects), it's valuable because its functionality (the
thing copyright doesn't protect) is necessary for compatibility.

Oracle apparently bamboozled the Federal Circuit into deciding that something
called the "structure, sequence and organization" of the API should be
copyrightable. But of course nobody cares about that part -- the order doesn't
matter. You can sort the API into alphabetical order and strip out all the
comments and it would make no real difference to anybody. But here is Oracle
claiming that the copyrightable part is worth billions of dollars.

~~~
cwyers
If copying the APIs is only valuable for compatibility, why did Google do it?
Android isn't compatible with any Java apps.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
It's compatible with many Java libraries and IDEs etc. It isn't compatible
with Java apps because the UI framework has to be different on a phone.
Porting Java apps thereby requires changing only a minority of things rather
than everything.

It's like asking why you can write C programs on Windows even though it
doesn't provide an X server.

------
tyingq
FYI, Oracle is pushing this agenda to squeeze Java shops in other places as
well.

The tack they are taking is to define any computer that does "one specific
thing" as an embedded device and ask you for $300+ per "device", plus some
other lofty fees. ([http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/price-
lists/java-...](http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/price-lists/java-
embedded-price-list-1977272.pdf))

So, if you're using Java in a kiosk, ATM, media player, etc, they may be
coming for you.

My guess is that this just spawns a mass migration to OpenJDK, but perhaps
they trap enough Java shops that it's worth the effort?

~~~
jimbokun
My guess is this just spawns a mass migration away from Java altogether.

Not knowing when Oracle might decide to shake down your business is a massive
incentive to use anything else.

~~~
wahsd
Didn't I recently hear something about Google rebuilding Android to remove
Java? Or am I totally off?

~~~
rincebrain
That would likely cost much more than this extortion, and still wouldn't save
them.

~~~
piffey
More than 9 billion? Give 36,000 people $250,000 a year salary and you still
haven't hit 9.2 billion. Pretty sure they could get it done in a year with
36,000 people.

~~~
ArkyBeagle
37 women cannot have one baby in one week.

------
akadien
Oracle should pay Google for using Java in Android and keeping the language
somewhere around edge of hip and cool. I wonder how long it will be before
Google flips to Go or JavaScript for Android.

~~~
jinst8gmi
I don't think anyone has used "hip and cool" and "Java" in the same sentence
for at least 15 years (2001) and no amount of Android can fix that.

~~~
StavrosK
"Damn, that grotesque-looking android startled me and I spilled my cup of Java
all over my hip, fortunately it was cool so I didn't get burnt".

~~~
StavrosK
This reminds me of that contest where people had to get the phrase "I smoke
crack rocks" into a published academic paper, and the winner was something
like "we burnt iodine (I) solution to observe its corrosive effect on stone
and witnessed I smoke crack rocks".

------
jezclaremurugan
Will miss groklaw badly. Followed the previous time almost entirely on
groklaw.

~~~
rpgmaker
What is Pamela Jones doing nowadays? I understand her decision to shutdown
groklaw because of govt spying but I can't help but think that, overall, it
was a net loss for everyone involved.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Yeah. Government spying is like that.

I miss PJ and Groklaw, too.

------
ausjke
Google should have acquired Sun instead of buying dropcam/boston-
dynamics/motorola and such.

~~~
godzillabrennus
How amazing would that have been? Zfs might have helped the world move forward
a lot faster... Sigh...

Let's give Oracle 10 years from now to fade from relevance as yet another
fucked by cloud vendor and Google can then orchestrate a hostile takeover.

~~~
ausjke
To speed that up, just buy Postgresql and use that to smother both Oracle DB
and to some extent, mysql. Defence only helps that much, offence can do it a
lot faster on their own DB territory.

~~~
nickpsecurity
Better yet, buy EnterpriseDB that's actively targeting Oracle's market. Put a
bunch of money into expanding it with conversion tools from Oracle to not
Oracle API's it will use.

------
kaendfinger
Dart is a very viable alternative to Java already for Android. See
[https://flutter.io/](https://flutter.io/)

P.S. Dart actually has a Java-to-Dart converter hidden somewhere. I can't find
the link, but the static analyzer was ported from Java to Dart using it.
Perhaps they could expand that effort?

------
curt15
This case seems unusual in the fact that the code in question was already free
to use and fork under the terms of OpenJDK, so paying Oracle for a license was
not the only alternative. How would one calculate damages relative to the
scenario where Google simply used OpenJDK as they are doing now?

~~~
tyingq
Maybe Google is doing things that the "Classpath Exception" doesn't cover,
which would expose them to parts of of the GPL that don't work for them?

------
yyhhsj0521
Oracle has a legal department twice the size of its developing department

:-)

~~~
sokoloff
Related: [http://www.businessinsider.com/big-tech-org-
charts-2011-6](http://www.businessinsider.com/big-tech-org-charts-2011-6)

------
mr_overalls
C# is such a nice language, and Microsoft has been making such strides toward
openness and cross-platform with .NET lately.

Imagine if Microsoft granted Google a perpetual license to use C#.

~~~
jinst8gmi
Brainfuck probably has an equal chance of being selected as C#. The problem is
more that the APIs and all of the existing apps. Google can't just wake up one
morning and decide that everything will be now in language XYZ because there
are literally millions of apps for Android which have been written in Java
against Java APIs. C# would also be an unusual choice for a company that does
zero(?) C# work.

~~~
V-2
Now it's too late, but unlike Brainfuck, Google did consider C# as an option,
see my comment (sibling comment to yours)

------
geodel
I think replacement of Java in Android is coming slowly and likely without any
help from Android team.

Looking at gomobile and CLs on golang-dev etc I feel Go support in Android is
worked on by small focussed team rather than order from top management.

------
jorgecastillo
If this teaches us anything, is that you should avoid as hard as you can,
giving others rope, with which they can hang you. I avoid Java anywhere I can,
so for me, Java is only for mobile apps on Android.

I also invite anyone reading this comment, to read the following story, which
always comes to my mind in this sort of events:
[http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=MacBasic.txt](http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=MacBasic.txt)

------
hathym
That's the same amount they had thrown at Sun Microsystems.

~~~
protomyth
actually a bit more since Sun cost Oracle about $7.4B.

------
102030485868
I can't see this ending well for Oracle.

------
puppetmaster3
1\. Oracle's lawyers are idiots as they can't show it's same. For example run
apache http client jar on android and java. It's same. Idiots.

2\. If Oracle's dumb lawyers win, I'm happy. I get paid a salary to work. Why
should companies get code for free, why do they need me. Copying and violating
a license is bad. Even GPL and other code I write, respect the license.

3\. To summarize, would you want Google to violate GPL?

------
fpgeek
I really don't understand what Oracle's lawyers are thinking.

Yes, coming up with ever-more-creative theories about why Google owes Oracle
might have some tactical advantages, but any victory in court on those terms
would be pyrrhic.

It doesn't matter how many billions Google coughs up if the next phone call is
IBM demanding the company for using SQL.

Aren't Oracle's lawyers looking past the next move? Are they that confident
that their API arguments will lose? Do they really have that much faith in the
hairs they're splitting between Google's API reuse and Oracle's?

Or is their advice being colored by all the follow-on legal work there will be
because Oracle is going down this path?

------
sidcool
That might be legal but in my opinion not ethical.

------
bliti
I just wished google would use C++ for Android. It's does away with all this
nonsense. I'm looking forward to the day where I have to pay oracle for every
android app download I get even if the app is free...

------
brudgers
Recently:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11376439](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11376439)

------
Negative1
Could someone with a legal background please explain what Oracle would have to
prove to win this?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Disclaimer: I don't have a legal background.

If I understand correctly, Oracle would have to prove that Google's use of the
Java API did not fall under the fair use exception in copyright law.

That is, if I write something, you can't publish it as your own. That's
copyright. But there are exceptions within the law. One exception is fair use
(others are criticism, parody, and there may be more, but fair use is the one
in play in this case). Note that fair use was in the original trial, and the
jury deadlocked on whether that was a valid defense for Google.

Below here, my understanding is less solid. But I _think_ that one category of
fair use is interoperability. That is, if I have a copyright interface (like,
say, an API), you can copy that API in order to interface to something. To
what degree, and what the boundaries are, I'm not sure.

------
namelezz
Kotlin in Android looks promising.

~~~
jinst8gmi
Kotlin relies on the Java APIs and libs, so wouldn't really help.

------
criddell
What's the argument that Google should pay Oracle? Is there something in the
Java license?

Has Google's use of Java somehow damaged Oracle? Are they worse off now than
they would be if Android were built on a different technology?

------
signa11
afaik, the real issue is that the dalvik-vm is api compatible with
oracle(sun)-jvm. iirc, api is not 'copyrightable' which seems to suggest that
it might not be so good for oracle. but then again, cases like these depend a
lot on proficiency of presiding judges. wasn't there an earlier judge, who
learned some elementary programming while preparing for this case, and who
ended up favoring google...

~~~
pjmlp
If it were api compatible Java Android wouldn't be the second coming of J++,
where apparently thanks to some strange events it is ok for Google to fork
Java, break WORA where even many Java 6 libraries cannot run on Android, not
to mention about later versions, and some devs seem to think it is ok.

While with Microsoft everyone went out with their pitchforks.

Android Java is nothing more than Google's J++.

~~~
sangnoir
To refresh your memory: "The complaint charges Microsoft with trademark
infringement, false advertising, breach of contract, unfair competition,
interference with prospective economic advantage, and inducing breach of
contract."[1]

You probably know this, but Java-the-language is not the same as Java-the-
platform (VM); Google only uses the language bit, not the runtime. They
created their own runtime (Dalvik, and later ART) with its own bytecode
format. What Microsoft did was implement an intentionally-incompatible JVM,
hopefully you see the differences between Google and Microsoft's action (both
technical and the reasoning behind the actions)

Edit: changed quote from wikipedia to [1], added reference.

1.[http://www.javaworld.com/article/2077055/soa/what-does-
sun-s...](http://www.javaworld.com/article/2077055/soa/what-does-sun-s-
lawsuit-against-microsoft-mean-for-java-developers-.html)

~~~
pjmlp
I know pretty much what happened.

The fact is that Google forked all of it.

You cannot use anything besides a pseudo Java 6.5 (the language), because
there isn't support for all features available.

You cannot make use of the full Java SDK libraries, because Google's fork only
supports cherry picked portions of the JDK, to the point that people have
ported JDK classes to Android to close the gaps when porting Java code.

You cannot rely JVM features, because Dalvik/ART don't support everything that
it is possible in a certified JVM like invokedynamic or more updated JNI
versions.

The fact is that Google broke the Java eco-system, regardless how Google
fanboys want to paint the picture that Google != Microsoft.

They tried to screw Sun and take advantage of their economic misfortune.

Luckily I don't suffer from Google colored glasses.

~~~
coldtea
No Google "fanboy" (I actually hate the term, it's for immature 20 somethings
to use), but Google didn't break the Java ecosystem IMHO.

The created a whole new language that happens to be mostly based on Java, for
a very specific target OS where Java wasn't even available before.

The familiarity with Java is merely a bonus and boost for the adoption of
Android programming from Java devs. It's wasn't meant (and it isn't) a jab at
taking the Java development market (which is was Microsoft did -- going after
the same people using Sun's Java, and for the same environments they used it
in).

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
> The created a whole new language that happens to be mostly based on Java

That's the "extend" part of "embrace, extend, extinguish."

~~~
coldtea
Not in the old MS-SUN wars sense.

Extend implies extending an existing X product.

Google made their own runtime, NOT calling it X, and NOT targeting the same
platforms where Java was available. And of course this never had any impact on
regular Java itself -- so no extinguish part. Nobody stopped using Java on the
server or the client even, to use Google's version, because it's not offered
at all there.

Their language not only didn't target existing Java deployments, but it was
also created (and has always been constrained) for a new platform where Java
never existed, and for a usage domain where Java had negligible presence
(mobile development in post-iPhone smartphones).

And even if they HAD targeted normal Java deployments, it would have been
totally find, and not "embrace, extend, extinguish" if it wasn't called Java.
It would have been like MS' C#, not MS' altered Java.

If you don't pretend it's the same product (like MS did), then "embrace,
extend, extinguish" is exactly how evolution works in most cases, including
the natural one -- things get replicated and some crucial extra sauce is
added, and if it's good, then the old things wither.

In fact, in this sense (where you mimic another opponent) "embrace, extend,
extinguish" is exactly what projects like OpenOffice, Gnumeric, Gimp, etc
intended to do.

But, as said above, this, while also fine, is totally different to what Google
did.

------
nickpsecurity
Yet another reason I push updating the old Modula, Oberon, or Component Pascal
languages instead of using C# or Java. Both are controlled by scheming, money-
hungry companies that try to eliminate competition and innovation outside
their firms. Best not to be tied to such companies at all.

------
known
How the number $9.3 billion is derived?

~~~
tracker1
Reported earnings from Android, one would guess.. though as Google mentions,
this is likely _ALL_ they've earned from Android as a platform, nut _just_ the
impact of those specific methods.

