« For decades prior to Oracle's lawsuit, most people in the software industry assumed that APIs couldn't be copyrighted. » Well, what were they supposed to ass

« For decades prior to Oracle's lawsuit, most people in the software industry assumed that APIs couldn't be copyrighted. » Well, what were they supposed to assume? It's shameful that it's been 40 years since computer programs were explicitly protected in the US under copyright law, and this remains an unsettled question. This situation is an extremely poor advertisement for the practice of passing vague laws and letting their boundaries be settled over time by court cases and precedent. It's painful to have to listen to lawyers argue by an analogy between function declarations and Harry Potter chapter titles.