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> If this ruling passes the Supreme Court, you can't anymore in the context of software. This is simply and totally untrue; it is nothing but uninformed panic.
by pron 7y ago
> If this ruling passes the Supreme Court, you can't anymore in the context of software.
This is simply and totally untrue; it is nothing but uninformed panic. If you think otherwise, please point me to what makes you think that. In any event, a protocol is not a copyrightable work regardless of the result of this case, for reasons that have nothing at all to do with the discussion about the copyrightability of code APIs. Code APIs satisfy the basic necessary conditions for copyright, and there is debate over more nuanced ones. Protocols, like REST APIs, don't even satisfy the first requirement of copyright law -- they are not a work fixed in any tangible medium -- so they are completely irrelevant. Again, programs are copyrighted, algorithms are not -- even if the algorithms contain some fixed strings in them. If you don't understand that distinction, there is really no point in going further.
> I really don't understand your outright refusal to read the ruling or even the damn wiki page.
I have read pretty much everything written about this case, and the actual rulings. But understanding the basic tenets of copyright law is necessary in order to make sense of what you read.
The question of SSO is, once a work is copyrighted, is its SSO protected similarly to translation? For example, Harry Potter is copyrighted; if I copy the basic structure from Harry Potter is that an infringement? That's the subject of the discussion, which takes as a given that software is copyrighted. In the case of protocols -- like in the case of algorithms -- there is no work from the perspective of copyright law, so questions of what transformations of the work could constitute infringement are irrelevant.
I think that many people don't understand that copyright works like a two-stage process. First there needs to be a work satisfying some requirement to which copyright applies; second, once such a work exists, different kinds of deriving other works from it are determined to be infringing or not. This court case is about the second part, as it is recognized that software is a copyrighted work, and all discussions about the second step (like SSO) are under the assumption that the first step is OK. Protocols and algorithms don't even pass the first step, so any discusssion about the second does not concern them.
- monocasa 7y agoExample: I decide to to cleanroom reimplement Google's search REST API. Google hits me with a lawsuit for violating the SSO of the REST API as implemented by the Google Web Services executable and source. Any protocol worth protecting will have a tangible expression they can point to whether it be code or documentation. The need for a tangible expression doesn't make a practical difference in the de facto copyright of the REST API. You keep using literary examples even though SSO treats software differently. I will be ignoring any literary allusions from now on, please use actual case law about software.
- pron 7y ago> Google hits me with a lawsuit for violating the SSO of the REST API as implemented by the Google Web Services executable and source. No, it doesn't work like that, just as if you implement an algorithm that's at the core of another program (without deriving your code from that other program) you don't infringe on the other program's copyright. > Any protocol worth protecting will have a tangible expression they can point to whether it be code or documentation. I don't know how to explain it any better than I have, so I'll mention yet again that your point applies to algorithms, and yet they are not copyrightable. If you have a paper describing an algorithm, the paper is copyrighted, but the algorithm it describes is not. If you copy or translate the paper you may be in violation of its copyright; if you implement the algorithm described -- you are not. Same goes for recipe books, by the way. If you copy the recipe you could be in violation; if you implement it -- i.e. cook according to it -- you are not. That the program is a fixed expression that manifests the algorithm or protocol is irrelevant. You are not allowed to infringe on the program's copyright, but the protocol or algorithm it describes are not copyrighted to begin with. > please use actual case law about software. Protocols are not software. SSO is irrelevant to them. Their relationship to software is the same as that of algorithms to software, and SSO doesn't apply to algorithms either, because they are not copyrighted works. Any argument you'd like to make why this case has any bearing on protocols would also need to be compatible with the fact that programs are copyrighted while algorithms are not. If you make an argument that would also cover algorithms you can know you've made a wrong turn somewhere.
- monocasa 7y agoNeither my example nor the facts of Oracle v Google are dependent on copying of algorithms due to both being clean room reimplementations with the minimum verbatim copying needed for API compatibility. Since you obviously aren't interested in a good faith discussion that doesn't involve you adding strawmen, I shall bid you good day.
- pron 7y agoI think you intentionally misunderstand my point or we're completely talking past each other. This case isn't about protocols just as much as it isn't about algorithms. The only relationship between this case and protocols is that in recent years some have taken to calling them APIs. No matter what the result of this case is, it will have no effect on protocols, just as it will have no effect on algorithms, or on bananas. From the perspective of copyright laws, these things are completely different categories, no matter what mental connections you can draw between them. I only bring up algorithm to help you understand that even though algorithms and programs have a similar relationship to that between protocols and code APIs, copyright law is not concerned with algorithms although it is with programs, so that same connection between protocols and code APIs is equally irrelevant to copyright law. But if you're not able to understand why programs are copyrighted but not algorithms, you won't be able to understand why code APIs could possibly be copyrighted but definitely not protocols.