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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:01 AM EDT |
[PJ:...In short, this trial is now a huge mess. The judge let
Oracle change its position on what kind of damages it wanted to elect at the
very last minute. And now the consequences begin to appear...]
I
say it's not illegal. Let Oracle have its shot. The judge indeed agrees:
-
Judge Alsup: I said, you can make your pitch to the jury.
This is being sprung on me... if you want to say to the jury that you're asking
for hundreds of millions of dollars for nine lines of code, you can do that if
you want. I'm not going to blurt out some ruling now. I took back what I said
yesterday: if you want to make out a case for infringer's profits based on nine
lines of code and seven files that aren't even part of the Android system, well,
that's an extremely weak proposition, but I can't tell you it's illegal as a
matter of law. It could be I'd be surprised by some statement in a decision
somewhere....(emphasis mine) [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: al_dunsmuir on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:14 AM EDT |
Please summarize in the Title box error->correction or s/error/correction/ to
make it easy for readers to scan the list to see what errors have already been
reported, and for Mark and PJ to see what needs to be corrected.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: al_dunsmuir on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:16 AM EDT |
Please post your off topic comments in this thread, using HTML (with appropriate
links) if you so desire.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: al_dunsmuir on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:17 AM EDT |
| Please place the title of the news pick in the comment tile. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: al_dunsmuir on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:18 AM EDT |
| Please post your contributions to the COMES database here, with thanks. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:36 AM EDT |
Google made a BIG mistake when they offered to settle with
Oracle. It just begs for the next company to sue them. I
don't care how much they thought they could lose, they need to
take a lesson from IBM. NEVER EVER SETTLE. It just sets you
up as an easy mark.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:51 AM EDT |
He made a big deal of this in court the other day. The Judge warned him it
wasn't a smart move and he went and did it anyway.
Does Oracle have some super-convoluted plan to hang an appeal off of this issue
somehow? Why would they not just take the $150,000 bone they were offered?
Maybe they were afraid of the bad PR of having their "billions" in
damages reduced to $150,000. But if the Judge grants this SJ motion, won't that
be just as bad for Oracle's PR? Or can they somehow spin it as a win on a
technicality for Google?[ Reply to This | # ]
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- The $150,000 bone ... - Authored by: webster on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:08 AM EDT
- No this was intentional strategy, manipulate the judge - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:19 AM EDT
- What was Boies thinking? - Authored by: jvillain on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:59 AM EDT
- His strategy is reasonable - Authored by: argee on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 03:57 PM EDT
- What was Boies thinking? - Authored by: athelas on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 05:27 PM EDT
- Judge Alsup could - sort of - grant it.... - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 09:42 PM EDT
- There is NO offer, only phase 3 ahead now. And then, Google's desire for a mistrial. - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 14 2012 @ 03:57 AM EDT
- He did the math. - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 14 2012 @ 01:54 PM EDT
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:03 AM EDT |
This is trial is becoming worse than the SCO trial. It
very obvious that the US "legal" system is totally incapable
of dealing with technical issues in lawsuits. None of the
key players have any ability or knowledge to understand what
are facts and what are not. They continue to make up things
that on their surface seem to make sense, but when viewed
through the eyes of those who do understand, the reality
of the their true ignorance and the obsurdity of the blatent
sham of their "truth seeking" is overwheling, and sickening.
It is like watching children arguing about the actions of
the characters in cartoon show.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:16 AM EDT |
Google knows this fragmentation is
harmful. Google itself imposes
terms requiring Android
users to refrain from fragmenting its APIs. (TX 749 at
8-
9 (Android Compatibility Definition Document).)
Interesting
that oracle decided to highlight this in
their motion the other day, because
Google do not in
fact - as far as can be told - enforce a compatibility test
on anyone unless they
are using the Android branding or claiming
compatibility (Indeed the license terms Google
distributes under wouldn't
allow them to require this for
redistribution.) Exactly what Sun's policy
And
situation was before
Oracle bought the company and attempted a history
rewrite, which leads to the
estoppel arguments.
The fact that Oracle
feel that they can rub the court's
nose
in this is interesting. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:29 AM EDT |
"sun engineers demonstrate law is an ass": this seems the best answer
to why 2 patents of bad programming won the most goofy patent contest at Sun,
and now have infested the legal system[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Glenn on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:33 AM EDT |
I did not read any posts concerning Judge overruling the jury on the de
minimus aspect of the infringement, so the question may already have been posed.
But it seems rather odd to me that the judge ruled that no reasonable jury could
come to that conclusion, yet he is allowing the jury's verdict on the other
issues to stand. Isn't this judicial cherry picking?
Glenn[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 11:41 AM EDT |
| Haven't we seen most of the text in that in a previous filing? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: TiddlyPom on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 12:04 PM EDT |
I presume that Oracle pray to God that there are no programmers in the jury
because anyone with any technical knowledge would realize that they have no case
at all.
To try and claim damages over some generic range checking code whose pattern has
been in the public domain for decades is ridiculous. Oracle knows that there is
no $$$ value in these bits of code. If there were 1000's of lines of non-GPL
licensed (or non-Apache licensed) proprietary code that Google had copied then
perhaps it would be a different matter - but there isn't. What they are trying
to do is to claw back control of code which has been clearly donated to the
public domain back to their own control and then claim damages for it.
If Oracle win this case then they will kill the Golden Goose that they are
trying to make money from. Oracle are already completely distrusted within the
open source community and if they do win then it will taint Java forever as
being proprietary technology.
They are in a no win situation whichever way this case goes. If they win - they
lose ultimately and the open source community (me included) will abandon Java
for other languages/technologies such as Ruby and Python). If they lose then
they lose face but Google and the open source community benefit enormously.
What possessed them to bring this case to court in the first place. I can only
assume it it Larry Ellison and his claims to control open source - "If an
open source product gets good enough, we'll simply take it." I don't think
so!
---
Support Software Freedom - use GPL licenced software like Linux and LibreOffice
instead of proprietary software like Microsoft Windows/Office or Apple OS/X[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 12:14 PM EDT |
I don't think anyone has mentioned this, but could rangeCheck be considered
purely functional? There are only a few ways to write such a routine, so even if
it was dot-for-dot copied, how protectable is it anyway?
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: sk43 on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 12:32 PM EDT |
"The same jury that found that Google did not infringe the seven files—a
finding that “NO REASONABLE JURY” could make (Dkt. No. 1123)—should not
determine Oracle’s damages for that same infringement."
If the Jury was not REASONABLE regarding the seven files, shouldn't we also
question its ability to reason regarding all the other questions that it
answered, including the ones where it found in Oracle's favor?
Or does Oracle have the right to cherry-pick which issues THIS Jury gets to
answer and which ones go to another one?[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: jbb on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 01:39 PM EDT |
On pdf page-4
of
Google's motion they
say:
The parties have met and conferred regarding
this Motion, and
have agreed that Oracle will file an Opposition by 10:00 PM on Sunday, May
13,
and that Google will waive its right to a Reply.
Wow! What an
interesting move in light of all the times BS&F and friends have played fast
and free with what they introduce in their replies and sur-replies and
sur-sur-repies, etc.
This indicates Google is confident Judge Alsup is up to
speed on the shenanigans and high-jinks that are part and parcel of the BS&F
experience. It is a very interesting tactic by Google because they are relying
on the judge to wade through and refute all the BS&F tricks that might be
hidden in Oracle's reply.
---
Our job is to remind ourselves that
there are more contexts
than the one we’re in now — the one that we think is reality.
-- Alan Kay [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 01:48 PM EDT |
There is a lot to be said about the art. 50 ruling. Everyone
is focusing why it is so wrong to google to overrule the
jury. In my opinion it is a blessing to google.
Whenever the damages part goes wrong for google, they have
an open door for an appeal. A door so open it might appear
as if it is craftfully designed for it. The problem for
Oracle is that the ruling is on their request, so it's only
Google who can appeal to it.
Looks like the judge hasn't got a grudge against Google and
is protecting Google against the risks of a jury trial by
making it possible for only Google to succesfully appeal any
verdict.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 02:04 PM EDT |
"in pickle of its own making. It was too clever by half,"
LOL. Is this New York state slang? Please comment.
Never heard it (small wonder...). I love it.
bjd
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 02:23 PM EDT |
| In the previous story, I posted
this comment explaining how symbolic references in Java .class files are not
contained in the instructions.
Google's witnesses have been
demonstrating in court that Dalvik bytecodes don't contain symbolic references,
either.
The '104 patent appears to describe an invention where the
symbolic reference is contained in the instruction; but neither Dalvik bytecodes
nor Java bytecodes actually works that way!
My theory is that when they were
coming up with this patent, the tech guys probably tried to describe what their
VM actually did, and the lawyers probably tried to broaden the patent as much as
possible (so they left out any details about the constant pool, etc). The
result seems to have been that they garbled their idea of the "invention" into
something different from what an actual Java VM does. I believe they may have
accidentally ended up with a patent that does not actually cover a Java VM! [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: webster on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 02:31 PM EDT |
.
... the emperor has no robes.
1. What a waste! What a worthless trial and waste of everyone's time and
resources.
2. The decisions that have been made by judge and jury are trivial, admitted
claims. Neither would have been worth an argument alone or together if they
were all that bothered Oracle about Android. Oracle seized upon them to make
the API arguments seem similarly obvious and intentional. The court seems to
have been dazzled by it all.
3. The court dawdles on the API decision. This is a decision that is trivially
easy to make: he can follow decades of programming practice and court precedent
and hold that they are not copyrightable; he could stake out a new precedent and
rule for Oracle that they are copyrightable on the merits. It is not rocket
science. He could have recused himself. He has demanded numerous briefings.
They have either not brought him up to snuff or he is looking for something
decisive. He has been given more than enough to be decisive by both sides
repeatedly. Some fear he may be grandstanding with this case. The big parties,
law firms, claims and attention have distracted him from the trivialities.
3. There are so many trivial reasons to make a judgment: the copyright
registrations, the damages, the functionality, API coding practice, the Open
Java Language, the necessity of the API along with free Java. The court has
ignored these simple trivial principles. The court's delay and indecisiveness
has aided Oracle. Even the "fair use" decision on API's that remains
is speculative because he won't issue the trivial three page order necessary to
resolve the issue.
4. Courts make decisions. It is a human institution. Talents vary. Even the
talented can have a bad day or case. Compare it to granting patents. The
process and institution have a momentum of their own. Like any bureaucracy they
will err on the side of complexity and maintaining their relevance and
involvement. Wouldn't litigating the last half century's API's create work for
all!
5. The court almost has to rule for API copyrightability now to justify having
had this trial at all. [Regrettable Rant 17.]
.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 03:44 PM EDT |
As noted several times, Oracle has some serious problems.
- Lack of
evidence of any copyright of infringed
material (984)
- Hoping most damages come from infringement of SSO
which google
wants to
retry (1105)
- Lack of evidence of damages to those parts which a jury
has
ruled that
Google has infringed (1125)
A solution to this would be to force a
retrial of all
phase 1
issues. Now, the motion here in 1126 does not exactly
ask
for a
phase 1 redo, but combined with Google's 1105, I think that
could
happen.
Google is arguing in 1105 that a Jury cannot only decide
half of a
question on the jury form. That the entire question must be
put
to the jury,
including the damages.
Oracle is arguing in 1126 that while the judge broke
the
question
into three parts, One jury must rule on the damages of ALL
parts
of the single infringement count raised by Oracle.
So while Oracle is not
explicitly asking for a retrial of
the jury
verdict in phase 1, Google's
argument in 1105 says that for
a jury
to rule on damages, that same jury must
find infringement,
thus
the possibly of a complete redo of phase 1.
I
view it almost like a two dimensional array, where
Google wants
to retry one
row of the array with a new jury, and Oracle
wants to
retry one column. But
if Oracle gets its wish to retry all
the
issues in that one column, then
Google is going to insist
upon a
complete redo of all the issues(columns) in
phase 1.
A redo that would allow Oracle to solve the problem
getting
evidence that it actually owns the items being infringed
into the
trial,
evidence that there are damages to the smaller parts
being
infringed, and of
course with that the ability to win
BILLIONs of
dollars! [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 06:22 PM EDT |
Oracle's latest request seems to be of the form "We're not going to get
enough money from this jury, so we want another jury", or alternatively
"We didn't manage to convince this jury, so we want a fresh attempt."
This behavior seems more akin to toddlers throwing their toys out of the 'pram
than the behavior of a professional legal team. I'm somewhat taken aback. Are
there no professional limits on legal practice to limit creative abuse of
process of this kind?
After all, if either side could just keep requesting a new jury then presumably
in due course a form of argument would be found to sway a verdict to one's side.
It doesn't seem reasonable due process to me though, if the process can be
rejected for a reason that does not differ significantly from "We
lost".
Surely a jury's findings have a value and cannot be thrown aside on a whim? A
whim couched in legal terminology is still a whim, and I'm sure that the judge
can detect this, since we can.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 07:20 PM EDT |
If oracle are not going for statutory damages, and are legally barred from
presenting evidence on infringers profits (due to the shenanigans with their
damages reports), it looks to me (IANAL) like they have zero possibility of any
damages unless there is a legal ruling in their favour somewhere.
Is that right? And if so, is this weak position a strategy to manipulate the
judge
into ruling something for them to try to salvage the beelions instead of getting
the statutory pittance.
Alternatively is is something to do with the chance of the injunction they are
seeking being
affected by the type of damages? I have no idea how this works?[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:03 PM EDT |
I think I may safely say that the Honorable William Alsup is now
getting his PhD in Boies Schiller & Flexner.
A Piled higher
and Deeper in BSF causes all sorts of visuals that I really don't want to think
about. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 13 2012 @ 10:52 PM EDT |
If the judge rules that APIs are not copyrightable:
- Google's
motion for a mistrial because jury was hung on
fair use of APIs becomes moot
(about nothing, so doesn't
matter).
- Oracle's arguments based on the
need for a second jury
to determine guilt on the API issue goes away too,
rendering
their Saturday night motion almost without any
argument.
- The industry at large is happy.
If the judge
rules that APIs are copyrightable:
- Google insists on a mistrial
and a new jury.
- Oracle insists that the damages phase will be done by
the new jury too.
- The entire software industry is set back 40 to 50
years,
to a time before common cross-vendor APIs existed.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: BitOBear on Monday, May 14 2012 @ 03:53 AM EDT |
Google wanted, and made, an free-as-in-beer platform. That is, it cost them
money to make but they give it away.
Dalvik is from Apache Harmony, and they gave it away.
So at no point is there any "profit" from the production of Android
because it is given away.
Google's business model is to sell advertisements on any system that will let
them in. When the main players (Apple via iPhone and Microsoft via Windows)
didn't let Google in, they created and gave away a platform that -would- let
them in.
I have an Android phone. I don't click on ads and I have bought exactly one App
for it so that I could get some features, but as a side effect the one App I
have bought doesn't show me Ads any more at all. That App was not bought through
the Google Market/Play thingy. After years in computer science I am a Zen Grand
Master of not seeing things. (Aside: this is a _necessary_ skill since you may
be helping someone with spreadsheets full of things like executive compensation
and all sorts of stuff you are happier to remain unaware of.)
HTC makes my phone and they have never paid Google for Android either, let alone
for my phone.
So I have never given Google one red cent for my use of an Android phone
directly or indirectly.
If this were a free television and BS&F were suing NBC for shares of their
Ad revenue because GE gave me a free television it would already be thrown out
for lack of standing.
Google didn't even _give_ Android to HTC, HTC came in and _took_ Android from
Google's free and public repository. And it likely didn't take millions of
units, it took the code once or twice per version no doubt. The individual HTC
programmers then got their working copies from a central repository at HTC no
doubt.
So number of copies distributed? Less than ten per manufacturer per version.
Charge per copy? $0.
Profit per copy? (less than) $0. (Making Android was a pure cost-center
operation so the ceiling of the amount is $0 "profit")
Total Profit? $0 times N distribution events >>= $0.
Oracle, your share of the $0 profits is .... $0
[ Reply to This | # ]
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