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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.

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Please provide a link or other citation | 104 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
The java language very likely CANNOT be licensed
Authored by: OmniGeek on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 11:42 AM EDT
The GPL is a license to use and reproduce a copyrighted work; as such, its reach
cannot extend beyond the scope of the underlying copyrights. Hence, Sun may have
*claimed* or *attempted* in its license to license the language itself, but
unless the language itself is proper subject matter for copyright, the license
cannot control the use of the language. The closest the license can get is to
control the use of the copyrighted source code of a specific implementation,
(and presumably the compiled object code that is a derived work therefrom, but
I'm a bit fuzzy on the fine legal distinctions there).

This, of course, is the underlying issue in this case, soon to be sensibly ruled
on by the Court, one fervently hopes.

---
My strength is as the strength of ten men, for I am wired to the eyeballs on
espresso.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

The java language is not what is being licensed
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 11:45 AM EDT
Mark, you missed the above commenter's point.

I'll phrase it as a question:

Where did you find that license? What does it (purport
to) cover?

I very much doubt you'll find any statement that says that
license applies to "the Java programming language". I'm
guessing you found it applied to an implementation of a JDK,
which is NOT the same thing as the "Java programming
language."

==

Your (and PJ's) continual mentions of GPL are rather
confusing for other reasons besides the above point. You're
supposed to be covering Oracle vs Google. Even though
Oracle/Sun released some libraries (including anything
copyrightable from an "API") under GPL, *Google didn't use
or copy those implementations*. Google does not get the
benefit (nor the restrictions) of the GPL in this case; the
GPL is simply not relevant.

I know you like to say that by releasing the libraries
under the GPL, Sun made them "free and open", but that's not
the same thing as "unrestricted" nor "public domain". (Just

ask Busybox.) Assume for the sake of argument that Oracle
has a copyright on "the APIs". Given that Google did not
use the GPL versions (on which Oracle would still have
copyright), Google would have to have some other license or
statutory (or equitable) permission. I only see three
remotely likely outcomes to (the copyright portion of) this
case:
1) "the API" is ruled uncopyrightable (abstraction, lack
of fixation, etc). Since Google didn't copyright anything
copyrightable (except those seven lines of code), there's no
infringement (except 7 lines).
2) Equitable estoppel. Sun's repeated public statements
that "Java is free to use", especially in the context of the
specific example of Harmony, estop them from separating the
"API" from the language years later.
3) Infringement. (And a new wave of copyright trolls
breaks forth upon the land.)

The GPL isn't relevant to any of those.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Please provide a link or other citation
Authored by: s65_sean on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 11:54 AM EDT
Mark, Please provide a link or other citation to support your claim that Sun
(and now Oracle) released the java programming language under the GPL. I know
that they released the openJDK under the GPL v2, but that is not the java
programming language, it is a developers toolkit that has various tools for
developing programs in the java language, but it is not the language itself.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

The java language is not what is being licensed
Authored by: jjs on Sunday, April 22 2012 @ 05:45 AM EDT
I thought Oracle agreed the language was free for everyone to use, it was the
APIs they claimed were copyrighted/GPL'd? Of course, part of the debate is how
much those APIs are separate from the language that everyone can use - or are
they required in order to use the language.

---
(Note IANAL, I don't play one on TV, etc, consult a practicing attorney, etc,
etc)

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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