Newsweek - USA (2019-06-07)

36 NEWSWEEK.COM
Court intellectual property rulings Recent Supreme on technology

Stutz. “You would not only have to persuade consum-ers to switch, but you’d have to persuade developers to learn an entirely new vocabulary for the new platform.”What Google did, according to the computer TECHNOLOGY

scientists, “is a long-standing, ubiquitous practice that has been essential to realizing fundamental advances in computing” and “has spurred historic innovation across the software industry for decades.”claims that the 37 Java declarations it copied are, in effect, just non-expressive tools that are not copy-rightable at all. They just activate the implementing code. Google compares the declarations to a comput-Google, now part of the Alphabet consortium,

acopyrightable, the keyboard is not.activates the underlying word-processing program—Microsoft Word, say—actions were still justified under the judge-made “fair use” doctrine, which sometimes excuses copying that if the declarations are copyrightable, it contends, its er keyboard. W pops up on your screen. WAlternatively, Google has a fallback argument. Even hen you tap the A key, it mechanically that then sees to it that a letter hile Microsoft Word is

(Under this doctrine, for instance, book or film critics promotes creative expression or other societal goals. can quote short passages from the copyrighted works in their reviews, which themselves then constitute valuable new copyrightable works.)Court, but on each occasion the Federal Circuit court camGoogle won both arguments in the U.S. District e to Oracle’s rescue. First, U.S. District

Judge Wturned that verdict too, in 2018, ruling for Oracle California ruled in 2012 that the Java declarations fair use defense. The Federal Circuit then overreversed that in 2014, sending the case back to a and ordering the case sent back to another jury for were not copyrightable. The Federal Circuit court jury to consider the fair use question.Then, in 2016, the jury ruled for Google on its illiam Alsup of the Northern District of -

calculation of damages.mSolicitor General Noel Francisco. On April 29, the ight hinge on the recomWhether the Supreme Court takes the case mendation of U.S.

office is expected to provide them in either mid-and Google are expected to discuss the case with his office in June, in separate meetings, according to a cess. That was after the Federal Circuit’s first rul-Supreme Court asked him for his views, and his September or early December. Lawyers for Oracle source familiar with the situation.Supreme Court to hear this case but without suc-Google tried once before, in 2015, to get the

decided. At that point, the government opposed able—ing—that the Java declarations were copyright-but before the fair use question had been DWKLV6HQDWH-XGLFLDU\WR&RXW$ERYH2IɿFHVSDFHLQVLGH*RRJOHSOH[*RRJOHŠVFRUSRUDWHKHDGTXDUWHUV^6 V&RW+LVRKHDULQKLKROLFLWRUHRXJVPPLOSLYHWKH6XSUHPHUIDOIɿWGOODJKE WWHHFHLVH[SHFWHGUVLQ0D\RHDHFRQZKCO*HQHUDO)UDQFLVFRUFRDE IPPWKHWQɿUPHKFDVHHSHQ ITULGDWDWW?LLRRQQ

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