Google Beats Oracle in Biggest Programming Copyright Supreme Court Case Ever
“Ten years ago, Oracle argued that Google had infringed Oracle’s copyright, by copying the ‘structure, sequence, and organization’ of 37 Java application programming interfaces (APIs) into Android. Google replied that an API is like an alphabet or a grammar. They’re the fundamental elements used to create programs. Now, at long last, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has concluded what programmers had known all along: APIs can’t be strictly copyrighted. Fair use must play its part,” reports Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols for Between the Lines in ZD Net.
“Ironically, in the 90s, both Oracle and Sun, Java’s original owner, argued that software APIs shouldn’t be covered by copyright. That was then. This is now. For the last decade Oracle has been desperately trying to monetize its failed Sun purchase by attempting to squeeze $9-billion dollars out of Google’s use of Java APIs in Android.”
“After a long-delayed hearing on Oracle v. Google in October 2020, SCOTUS ruled on April 5 that Google could legally use Oracle’s Java API code when building Android.”
