Oracle and Google To Finally Enter Courtroom 175
Fluffeh writes "After around 900 motions and filings, not to mention a timeline of two years, Google and Oracle are finally putting their case before a jury which will be selected on Monday. While Oracle originally sued for billions, the possible damages have come down to a more reasonable $30-something million (the details vary depending on if you ask Google or Oracle). However, the sides are still far apart. Oracle's proposal was a minimum, not a maximum, and Oracle has asked for a tripling of damages because of the 'willful and deliberate nature of Google's infringement.' For ongoing royalties from future sales, Google has proposed payment of just over one-half of one percent of revenue if patent infringement is proven, but Oracle wants more. Beyond financial damages, Oracle has asked for a permanent order preventing Google from continuing to infringe the patents and copyrights. The case is planned to start on Monday afternoon, after jury selection or Tuesday at the latest."
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:3, Informative)
Seriously dude. Oracles remedy seems to involve killing davlik. That means no java on the android. Its a scorched earth aproach to IP litigation, and you better hope oracle fails on that.
Yes, I noticed the scorched earth approach. However, there may be a ray of hope against that approach. Because Java is a standard [if only de facto], Oracle may be compelled to offer a license under FRAND [fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory] terms. Google's offer of 1/2 of 1% is in the FRAND ballpark for a mass market item.
In the Apple/Moto fight in Germany, Moto got an injunction against Apple for infringing some Moto patents. They got the injunction because Apple had not negotiated in good faith [stalling for five years]. However, latest ruling appears that Apple might reverse this on the FRAND argument.
Gone into mourning for the death of the sun (Score:4, Informative)
To be fair, I'm not sure this sort of endless litigation is necessarily caused by patents, it's more a result of the legal system we have, and the perverse incentives for lawyers to keep themselves in work. Jarndyce v Jarndyce [gutenberg.org] is a good place to start for an example of this which doesn't involve patents.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:3, Informative)
Android is ... literally a lifeline keeping java alive
As an enterprise infrastructure technologist, I can tell you that Java is very much alive. With or without Android, it is not going anywhere anytime soon.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:1, Informative)
python could easily replace new development
you're a bit late for april 1st.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:3, Informative)
Not going to happen. Android platform is BIG. And it works quite OK, actually.
Python is not going to cut it. It's interpreted (i.e. 'too slow') and has miserable multithreading. Dalvik VM is by now JIT-compiled with decent multi-threading. Besides, Python is a dynamic language and they are a pain for complex apps.
Go isn't going to cut it either because it's a purely compiled language.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:4, Informative)
Yup.
Java is huge in the kind of stuff that doesn't make the news very often.
More importantly, a lot of these systems are so large that "switching to .NET" isn't really a practical option.
Even if all Java development ceased tommorow.. I suspect Java would still be around for a long, long time. Java could become the next COBOL!
Java is also huge in the kind of stuff that does make the news. It's either the #1 or #2 most used programming language for applications, depending on what you try to measure.
The reason why switching to .NET isn't practical doesn't have anything to do with size. There is nothing preventing anyone from developing a Java-to-CLR compiler (google says http://www.janetdev.org/ [janetdev.org] but I haven't tried it), and writing any new parts of your application in some other CLR language. I think the biggest hurdle would be switching the IT infrastructure to windows and then being committed to sticking with that choice for ever.
By the way, if you think all COBOL development has ceased, you are wrong.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oracle Java isn't open source.
Straight from wikipedia:
On November 13, 2006, Sun released much of Java as free and open source software, (FOSS), under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). On May 8, 2007, Sun finished the process, making all of Java's core code available under free software/open-source distribution terms, aside from a small portion of code to which Sun did not hold the copyright.
Re:This really is a bizare course of action for Or (Score:4, Informative)
They can argue FRAND in that case because Moto has actually signed a bunch of disclaimers [slashdot.org] when they submit their patents to the standard org. I very much doubt you can argue FRAND on a random technology by claiming that it is a "de facto standard".
Fair enough. That doesn't mean Google won't try [and may be successful]. This may be strengthened slightly by Sun's previous two separate attempts to submit Java as a standard to JTC1 and ECMA.
Oracle is playing a dangerous game [for themselves] on several fronts.
The reason that Java became popular was the "write-once-run-anywhere" [WORA] and that Oracle [nee Sun] would provide access for any platform. If Oracle wins, this collapses and many independent developers would see the need to reconsider their strategy in light of the fact that Oracle [on a whim] could deny access to a platform that is the developer's primary market.
The implications go far beyond Google. If Oracle wins, this would imperil not just Google, but telcos, handset makers, and tens of thousands of software developers. Legalities aside, the court will be aware of the potential widespread economic chaos that might ensue and temper its judgement accordingly. The court might refuse the injunction and compel Oracle to offer a license [Google might have to pay the $30M damages + license fees but it would be free to pursue Dalvik/Android]
Further, if Oracle prevails, the federal government might view Oracle as a "sole source supplier". In other words, no government contract would be able to use Java in it. For example, because Apple is considered to be a sole source supplier, the FDA will not approve any medical system that uses Apple/Mac technology. That's why you always see PC's (or Sun's) at your local doctor's office. Or, if Java has found its way into certain gov't systems, the federal gov't may seize/nullify the patents under national security grounds.
Also, I believe Google has filed with the USPTO for a reexamination on the patents, arguing they are obvious or there is prior art, etc. Personally, I'm not currently up on what patents are being asserted. But, as a computer engineer, I'm hard pressed to see what could patentable in the JVM as machine architecture simulators/emulators have been around since the 1960's.
In the 1980's, when [AT&T] Unix was the only variant around, they were controlling it and didn't want a formal standard. That's how POSIX came about. Using [court tested] "clean room" techniques, they were able to come up with a standard that gave rise to other implementations (e.g. minux and linux). That's why linux is called POSIX-compliant and not Unix-compliant. This could happen for Java (HP had a clean room Java implementation for embedded systems in the 90's).
In the late 1990's when Microsoft was creating a Windows specific variant of Java [mainly to eviscerate Java], Sun took them to court and got a preliminary injunction. The appeal [which MS won] was that the punishment did not fit the crime. In other words, a breach of contract should not be punished by means of an injunction. No doubt this ruling will be cited in the current case.
Google didn't clean room the Dalvik JVM for the same purpose as MS. The Sun/Java JVM assumes, more or less, a fairly powerful machine (e.g. a PC/Mac/mainframe, etc.). It is too slow/bloated for "low power" (e.g. CPU speed, memory, disk space) handset/tablet. Likewise for the Java Runtime Environment (JRE). It's meant to be a one-size-fits-all kitchen sink approach. Way too big to fit on a small nimble device, yet it would need additional handset specific classes and the generic classes that have no use in a handset would need to be trimmed.
Weaning off Java might be as herculean a task as the U.S. converting to the metric system. At worst, Google might have to call it something other than "Java". But, end users kn