decoration decoration
Stories

GROKLAW
When you want to know more...
decoration
For layout only
Home
Archives
Site Map
Search
About Groklaw
Awards
Legal Research
Timelines
ApplevSamsung
ApplevSamsung p.2
ArchiveExplorer
Autozone
Bilski
Cases
Cast: Lawyers
Comes v. MS
Contracts/Documents
Courts
DRM
Gordon v MS
GPL
Grokdoc
HTML How To
IPI v RH
IV v. Google
Legal Docs
Lodsys
MS Litigations
MSvB&N
News Picks
Novell v. MS
Novell-MS Deal
ODF/OOXML
OOXML Appeals
OraclevGoogle
Patents
ProjectMonterey
Psystar
Quote Database
Red Hat v SCO
Salus Book
SCEA v Hotz
SCO Appeals
SCO Bankruptcy
SCO Financials
SCO Overview
SCO v IBM
SCO v Novell
SCO:Soup2Nuts
SCOsource
Sean Daly
Software Patents
Switch to Linux
Transcripts
Unix Books

Gear

Groklaw Gear

Click here to send an email to the editor of this weblog.


You won't find me on Facebook


Donate

Donate Paypal


No Legal Advice

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.

Here's Groklaw's comments policy.


What's New

STORIES
No new stories

COMMENTS last 48 hrs
No new comments


Sponsors

Hosting:
hosted by ibiblio

On servers donated to ibiblio by AMD.

Webmaster
A clever troll, for once.... | 249 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
A clever troll, for once....
Authored by: tiger99 on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 06:51 AM EDT
The first few sentences are correct, and it is an error to say that BSD code is not copyrighted. But then the final few sentences degenerate into pure trolling. There is no suggestion that you can drop BSD code directly into any OS. You always have to do some coding to make it fit, every programmer everywhere knows that, and there is no suggestion that it is not so in the article.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

misleading....
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 10:54 AM EDT

Your program is not an API.
Well, a lot of my programs are in Scheme and in fact, every function I add is an api element focused on the problem domain. Some are so general in use, such as a function that takes a function (Connection -> a), opens a connection to a database, performs the function, and closes the connection, gets put into a module that I "require" into other modules that define more specific behaviors.

I need a license to photocopy that origami book. I do not need a license to use the instructions in creating works. I do not need a license if I figure out different folds to a same result and write my instructional book.

No, the alternative to extending copyright to re-implementations of abstracted package, class, and function signatures is not patenting. Who could argue with a straight face that language development, technological advancement, and the nation's wealth has been hampered because copyrights on binaries and physical documentation are the tragically woeful extent of author/publisher rights? Frankly, waving patents as a boogeyman is a reach and undermines your argument.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

  • Error Apology - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 10:56 AM EDT
    • Error Apology - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 11:03 AM EDT
Copyright only protects creative expression fixed in a medium
Authored by: Ian Al on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 01:18 PM EDT
Copyright only protects creative expression fixed in a medium

Since API's are abstract ideas defining the functionality of the software
implementing the API definitions, they are not protected by copyright.

If the API is published as a text document (expression fixed in a medium) in a
form that a software writer can use, then nothing in it is protected by
copyright unless it is creative expression and after the following list has been
excluded (by 17 USC ยง 102. and case law)

Names, short phrases, functional descriptions, any idea, procedure, process,
system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the
form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such
work.

APIs (ABIs and all 'programming interfaces') are ephemeral, abstract ideas that
do not appear as computer instructions. Only the implementation code actually
exists.

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

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

misleading indeed
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 31 2013 @ 03:33 PM EDT
The "source code" to BSD sockets is copyrighted, as is all source
code. The API itself is not.

So if I copied the BSD code directly into my code, then used in it a manner
incompatible with the BSD license, I would be infringing, API or no. But if I
write my own code, following the specified API (as Google did), and use it per
the license and the specification, no infringement.

(My first thought was BSD is probably not the best example because their license
is so broad, but OTOH, it is a good example because despite the very broad
license, there can still be copyright infringment. You just have to know where
the copyright stops and the API begins.)

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Oracle was trying to claim copyright on the API names....
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, June 02 2013 @ 11:27 AM EDT
....and the namespace and object/class member hierarchy
structure.

Names and short texts which are used in header files for
reference are not copyrightable, and nor are object or
member names made up of ordered dot separated parts, or
comments which serve as references.

The analogy to this in the wider world is the fact that the
name "Coca Cola" is not copyrightable even though it is a
trademark. Therefore I can safely write an article which
says "Coca Cola rots your teeth - don't drink it" without
having to get express permission from the Coca Cola company
to use the word "Coca Cola" in the sentence.

Another example is that I can write safely use the
structured name "John Henry Smith" in the same way that I
can use the text java.io.System.out.println("Don't sue me"),
without being sued for simply using the name to refer to the
person or object.

Claiming copyright on those API references is just as absurd
as the wider world examples.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Groklaw © Copyright 2003-2013 Pamela Jones.
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners.
Comments are owned by the individual posters.

PJ's articles are licensed under a Creative Commons License. ( Details )