4 ms·

I wonder how a meaningful discussion about namespace trees and API spelling takes place at the Supreme Court considering the background of the justices.

by st1x7 6y ago

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
They're smart people and these are not hard concepts.
- kemonocode 6y ago
  It still requires domain-specific knowledge and there are vested interests from both sides. I'm afraid because the world has little to gain and much to lose from the outcome of this case.
  - seanhunter 6y ago
    These people are experts at getting up to speed on diverse topics and have amazing teams clerking for them and a huge bench of experts to call on. I'm sure the domain-specific knowledge will be fine although the vested interests will clearly be a problem. I have never been involved in a US Supreme Court case but back in 1999 or so I was asked to prep a barrister in the UK on the guts of TCP/IP. I literally jumped in a black cab at short notice with 6 or 7 volumes of W. Richard Stevens and spent an afternoon showing him and a few others from his chambers packet dumps and TCP state diagrams and drawing some diagrams of my own showing what a webserver, browser does, how caching works, etc. The next day using my information synthesized with some really archaic law about what is and isn't a document he issued his opinion about where particular actions occur (and therefore what legal jurisdictions apply) when someone does something on a website. It was extremely thoughtful and nuanced and literally a day earlier he didn't even know what a webpage was.
    - ocdtrekkie 6y ago
      This doesn't really surprise me. I think it's a bit of an ego-condition that the tech industry believes because only tech people understand technology that only tech people should be allowed to set policy on it. In reality, technology (and technology companies) mirror their predecessors in other industries. And often abuses of copyright or antitrust by tech companies really isn't much different than the actions of companies decades ago, just obscured by a layer of technology magic.
- Spivak 6y ago
  Especially since there's no actual "tech" in the discussion here. Since Oracle's claim is that Google's use of the Java APIs wasn't to provide compatibility to existing software written in Java but to have a familiar language for Java developers it becomes a novel but normal copyright case.
- binaryjay 6y ago
  >They're smart people and these are not hard concepts. I suggest you listen to the questions and responses of some of the justices because it's evident they have no idea of what code declarations are.
- stjohnswarts 6y ago
  Of course they are smart people but they are also quite backwards when it comes to technology and I doubt they would take the time to learn the real differences between APIs, code, algorithm implementations vs theory, etc. They will probably try to use a car analogy in their final arguments and rulings.
  - tyrex2017 6y ago
    as long as its not a horse..
simiones 6y ago
Do you wonder the same for an abortion hearing or a sanitation case? The court system can and must decide regulations on many things they are not personally experts in, and usually does so quite successfully.
- st1x7 6y ago
  No, I don't because I'm not an expert in those fields. To be clear, I'm not suggesting that they can't understand the subject matter or that they need to be experts in it, I'm just curious about how much technical detail is communicated and how.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    I would assume a great deal in what I imagine are the many expert witness reports that both sides have submitted. The one I helped write an expert witness report for a technology-related case, there was quite a bit of technical detail in it (although it was written so as to be intelligible to a non-specialist).
GoblinSlayer 6y ago
The book analogy in the linked article is a good example of an interface and should be understandable without background.

I wonder how a meaningful discussion about namespace trees and API spelling takes place at the Supreme Court considering the background of the justices.

by st1x7 6y ago

I wonder how a meaningful discussion about namespace trees and API spelling takes place at the Supreme Court considering the background of the justices.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago

They're smart people and these are not hard concepts.

kemonocode 6y ago
It still requires domain-specific knowledge and there are vested interests from both sides. I'm afraid because the world has little to gain and much to lose from the outcome of this case.
- seanhunter 6y ago
  These people are experts at getting up to speed on diverse topics and have amazing teams clerking for them and a huge bench of experts to call on. I'm sure the domain-specific knowledge will be fine although the vested interests will clearly be a problem. I have never been involved in a US Supreme Court case but back in 1999 or so I was asked to prep a barrister in the UK on the guts of TCP/IP. I literally jumped in a black cab at short notice with 6 or 7 volumes of W. Richard Stevens and spent an afternoon showing him and a few others from his chambers packet dumps and TCP state diagrams and drawing some diagrams of my own showing what a webserver, browser does, how caching works, etc. The next day using my information synthesized with some really archaic law about what is and isn't a document he issued his opinion about where particular actions occur (and therefore what legal jurisdictions apply) when someone does something on a website. It was extremely thoughtful and nuanced and literally a day earlier he didn't even know what a webpage was.
  - ocdtrekkie 6y ago
    This doesn't really surprise me. I think it's a bit of an ego-condition that the tech industry believes because only tech people understand technology that only tech people should be allowed to set policy on it. In reality, technology (and technology companies) mirror their predecessors in other industries. And often abuses of copyright or antitrust by tech companies really isn't much different than the actions of companies decades ago, just obscured by a layer of technology magic.
Spivak 6y ago
Especially since there's no actual "tech" in the discussion here. Since Oracle's claim is that Google's use of the Java APIs wasn't to provide compatibility to existing software written in Java but to have a familiar language for Java developers it becomes a novel but normal copyright case.
binaryjay 6y ago
>They're smart people and these are not hard concepts. I suggest you listen to the questions and responses of some of the justices because it's evident they have no idea of what code declarations are.
stjohnswarts 6y ago
Of course they are smart people but they are also quite backwards when it comes to technology and I doubt they would take the time to learn the real differences between APIs, code, algorithm implementations vs theory, etc. They will probably try to use a car analogy in their final arguments and rulings.
- tyrex2017 6y ago
  as long as its not a horse..

simiones 6y ago

Do you wonder the same for an abortion hearing or a sanitation case? The court system can and must decide regulations on many things they are not personally experts in, and usually does so quite successfully.

st1x7 6y ago
No, I don't because I'm not an expert in those fields. To be clear, I'm not suggesting that they can't understand the subject matter or that they need to be experts in it, I'm just curious about how much technical detail is communicated and how.
- ghaff 6y ago
  I would assume a great deal in what I imagine are the many expert witness reports that both sides have submitted. The one I helped write an expert witness report for a technology-related case, there was quite a bit of technical detail in it (although it was written so as to be intelligible to a non-specialist).

GoblinSlayer 6y ago

The book analogy in the linked article is a good example of an interface and should be understandable without background.