10 ms·

Google (Potentially) Blows the Door Off Oracle's Copyright Claims

192 points by grellas 14y ago

ohashi 14y ago
In English please?
- lomegor 14y ago
  Google is claiming that they didn't copyright each of the 37 API separately, and as such that they don't claim ownership of them, thusly, Google can copy them. FTA: "The determination of this issue in favor of Google will either (a) result in the dismissal of the copyright claims or (b) provide the support for Google's de minimis and fair use copying defenses."
- grellas 14y ago
  Copyright protects expressive works in tangible form. So, a computer language can't be protected because it is an abstraction. But the source code for any implementation of that language can. Here, Oracle is not claiming a copyright in the Java language, nor is it claiming that Google copied any source code (except very insubstantial elements). Oracle claims that the API is protected by copyright and that Google infringed various API elements by copying the structure, etc. in spite of its having done so through a clean-room development. Therefore, Oracle's ultimate copyright claims in the case all turn on its assertion that it can sue upon only a a subset (the API pieces) of the overall copyrighted work (Java) and not the whole work. The other important piece of the analysis is as follows: copyright protection applies automatically as a work is created and takes a tangible means of expression; however, you cannot sue for infringement of a copyright work unless it is registered as a federal copyright with the Copyright Office. The Google motion contends that Oracle registered the entire work (Java) and not any subset of that work. Oracle claims it was registered as a "collective work" and that this gives it the right to sue on a component part of the work only. In its motion, Google says that the work was not registered as a collective work and that Oracle therefore can't - as a matter of law - sue over a component piece only. The motion turns on technical issues but they are ones that would seem to be verifiable one way or the other and thereafter tested under the legal standards just summarized. If the Java registration fails to meet the test, the Oracle loses on its copyright claims as a matter of law (meaning the judge tosses it and it doesn't even go to the jury). This is truly a bombshell and appears to have caught the Oracle attorneys completely off stride. We will see what happens.
  - jamroom 14y ago
    I'm probably misunderstanding this, but wouldn't this open the door to allowing someone to copy just portions of a copyrighted work if the work is only copyrighted as a "whole"? Would this require a company (or individual) to copyright every sub system in a larger system? I'm certain I am overlooking something as that seems an unreasonable burden.
    - cheald 14y ago
      The issue here is that Oracle can't assert copyright on the individual pieces because they didn't write them. They were contributed by others. Oracles only copyright is on the work as a whole. To that end, you could go ahead and copy pieces of the copyrighted work, but you would still be subject to lawsuits by the people that wrote the original individual piece. You just wouldn't be subject to lawsuits by Oracle. It's still infringement, but Oracle isn't the infringed party.
      - jamroom 14y ago
        Thank you - that makes sense. I must have glossed over the part that the 37 API's in question were not copyrighted by Oracle. Thanks!
        telcodud 14y ago
        Actually, 37 packages are in question. See https://twitter.com/#!/CalebGarling/status/195596382982258691 https://twitter.com/#!/CalebGarling/status/19559638298225869...
      - seldo 14y ago
        I was unaware that the APIs were contributed by others. Do you have any idea who might be some of the (theoretical) copyright holders of the individual APIs?
        foamdino 14y ago
        There is significant code in the Java libraries that was first written by people outside of Sun/Oracle. Back in the Java5 days some APIs provided by Java were simply javax.something wrapped around org.apache code.
- Natsu 14y ago
  Last Monday, Oracle's lawyers said something that was not true according to their own copyright registration documents. So they're going to be left with either pathetically weak claims of copyright infringement or nothing at all, because most of their arguments were based on a falsehood. This judge in particular hates that sort of thing. TL;DR Oracle shot themselves in the foot. Their claims of copyright infringement are dead or dying.
- peeters 14y ago
  Here's my take. Google has a list of things that they think can be decreed by the judge rather than the jury as a matter of law, given the evidence presented. 1) You can't claim ownership of the idea (the APIs) rather than the creative writing (the implementation). 2) The API declarations are not copyrightable for the same reason that you can't copyright a short phrase, like "Mary shears sheep." Furthermore, Google needed to be precise in copying the signatures, since changing would lead to incompatibility (with both the programmer's assumptions and their existing Java code). 3) The stuff that Google copied verbatim (or close to verbatim) was negligible. The ONLY thing that Google copied that was actually distributed on a phone was a 9-line function called rangeCheck() that any novice could write. It was only included because Josh Bloch used it when writing an alternative sorting method that he thought would eventually be merged into the Arrays class (where it would have direct access to the original method). Everything else is test classes and a couple of comments. As part of this argument, Google tries to argue that the infringements are negligible with regards to the "work as a whole," which they argue is all of J2SE 5 (as that is how Oracle registered the copyright). I don't think this argument stands up. Oracle cites plenty of previous copyright cases where the judge has considered less than the overarching work as the "work as a whole" (for example, a defendant tried to argue that the article they had copied verbatim from a magazine was a small piece of the work as a whole (the magazine itself), but the judge considered the article itself to be a work. In this case it was still determined that the article was used under fair use provisions however). 4) Google's documentation of the APIs doesn't infringe. First, they are similar in substance because they are talking about the same idea. Programmers have common terminology and ways of talking about ideas (in this case, what a method/class does) that become more similar when you consider the fact they are trying to be succinct and unambiguous. Second, they are similar in organization because they use the Javadoc tool, which automatically generates docs from comments attached to the API declarations themselves. In other words, if the APIs are not seen as infringing, then neither can the Javadoc structure. They should not be considered a separate act of infringement. 5 and 6 were less interesting to me and were more about Google trying to get off on a technicality, so I don't summarize them here.
  - taligent 14y ago
    Sorry but I disagree with most of that. An API is hardly just a bunch of short phrases that all programmers use as common parlance. That's That's why Software Architects as a sub-profession exist. Because it requires skill and talent to construct a cohesive, consistent yet technically implementable API. People that actually work against APIs every day know this.
kodablah 14y ago
Even without this matter of law, Jonathon Schwartz (Sun CEO at time of Android development/release) is doing a very good job of blowing the door off of Oracle's case [1]. All Oracle can do now is say that the CEO at the time doesn't shape legal policy (ha). [1] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426122828498 http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426122828498
moomin 14y ago
I'm sure this would be a great result for Google, but it would kick the question of whether APIs were copyrightable into the long grass.
- jlawer 14y ago
  If APIs were copyrightable there would be no Wintel machines... IBM would have killed Compaq for daring to build a clean room BIOS. Logically I can't see why an API should get copyright protections. By its definition it is a interface, and the moment you start allowing restrictions on implementing an interface your killing competition. It seems that in almost ever other field fair use has decided that whatever is required for compatibility is not copyrightable. That said my beliefs and the law can at times be completely different things...
  - fromhet 14y ago
    Isn't it the same with the software patents they have in the US?
  - taligent 14y ago
    I don't see why existing anti-competition laws would suddenly disappear if an API was copyrightable ? And your argument about Wintel machines is actually backwards. Because if APIs were copyrightable there would be MORE competition in that circumstance. Due to less standards. I am actually in favour of having standards organisations take a greater role in pushing real standards rather than de-facto ones.
    - regularfry 14y ago
      The best standards are those which have been taken from real-world implementations. In other words, the way you get a good standard is to ratify a de facto one.
- tadfisher 14y ago
  For another example, part of Android's userspace runtime (Bionic) is a direct copy of the Linux headers made by automated source-scraping tools. If APIs were copyrightable, this would be a GPL violation (as others have asserted [1]). Moreover, all userspace programs that use this information (by linking against glibc) would be considered derivative of the Linux kernel. All userspace programs that link against Windows' C/C++ runtime would be derivative works of the NT kernel. And so on. Linus himself has asserted that the copying of such APIs is considered "normal use" and that such programs are not considered derivative works [2]. [1] http://www.fosspatents.com/2011/03/googles-android-faces-serious-linux.html http://www.fosspatents.com/2011/03/googles-android-faces-ser... [2] http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20110322014831856 http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20110322014831...
chicagobob 14y ago
Don't forget that Groklaw is quite slanted in Google's favor just like FOSS Patents is slanted against Google. To get a balance you need to read both (well actually even more sources).
- Steko 14y ago
  This. Perusing the comments at Groklaw where everyone is so confident this is the smoking gun that will end Oracle's case reminds me of this bit from Jonathan Chait about people who get their news from hyperpartisan sources: "It must be like being following the state-controlled media in a totalitarian country. First you read that our brave troops are marching toward the enemy capital and will soon complete a glorious victory. Then, after a while, there's no glorious victory, but you start reading about how our brave troops are inflicting heavy losses on the enemy as they courageously defend the motherland." http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/fred-barnes-again-sees-glorious-peoples-victory-hand http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/fred-barnes-again-see...
  - Natsu 14y ago
    While this will not end the case, the fact that Oracle tried to base many of its arguments on something that was not, in fact, true according to their own copyright registrations will utterly destroy the arguments that rely upon that misrepresentation. So they're going to be in a difficult position trying to salvage their copyright claims. They might manage to do something, but they've got a pretty weak hand here. They wanted to rush this trial and all they did was to trip themselves up.
    - Steko 14y ago
      I think you've bought into the hype here prematurely. The odds that this issue will be in any way significant to the outcome of this case seem low. Did you read Oracle's reply[1] or just the caricature at the original link? "Google argues that the entire Java platform is necessarily the “work as a whole” because that is what was registered with the Copyright Office. Courts have soundly rejected that argument.. As explained in Los Angeles Times v. Free Republic, supra: Defendants contend that plaintiffs' “work” is the entire daily newspaper because their copyright registration covers the paper as a whole rather than any particular article. Thus, they assert, copying an individual article constitutes reproduction of only a small portion of the entire work. This proposition is not supported by the case law. See Texaco, supra, 60 F.3d at 925-26 (copying an entire article from a journal where the copyright registration covered the journal as a whole constituted a copying of the entire work); Hustler Magazine, supra, 796 F.2d at 1155 (finding that “[a] creative work does not deserve less copyright protection just because it is part of a composite work” and holding that the copying of a one-page parody from a 154-page magazine constituted a copying of the entire work); Netcom On-Line II, supra, 923 F.Supp. at 1247 (“although many of Hubbard's lectures, policy statements, and course packets are collected into larger volumes, and registered as a whole, they may still constitute separate works for the purposes of this factor”); Lerma, supra, 1996 WL 633131 at *9 (“we find that the Works at issue in this case are combined in ‘collections' and that each subpart must be considered a ‘single work’ for the purposes of fair use analysis”)." [1] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426075025438#986 http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426075025438#9...
Roboprog 14y ago
Even if Oracle wins, they may lose. Imagine if: Google looses the right to use the Java API in Android. Google makes a conversion tool to convert the Android API to another API / VM format. (maybe based on Parrot???) "" releases an ANSI / ISO spec for an improved high level language (not just a C++ replacement like Go), and makes the spec open to encourage "safe" adoption. "" provides reference implementations for mobile (Android) and server (GAE) type uses. "" creates a subsidiary to sell and support the SDK to encourage corporate adoption. I'm not exactly sure how this last step supports their core business, other than making sure there is a talent pool available. But as long as I'm dreaming... THAT is a result I'd like to see. Send Java off to the old programming languages retirement home, where it can sit and trade war stories with Visual BASIC and dBASE.
- OzzyB 14y ago
  But you're forgetting one very important aspect in all this: The Developers It's not a question of whether one particular language is better, or more "hip", than another; or whether Google could simply run-off and create it's own new language or repurpose someother language instead of Java. It's the developers Google is after, since it's the developers that will create the value (apps) for their marketplace and give them the competitive advantage over other smartphones & platforms. There are a ton of Java (and its variants like AS3) developers out there, and Google wanted to launch and gain traction in its new platform with as little friction as possible. If Google had launched Android as a Golang SDK, do you really think the uptick in new developers coding for Android would have been that great? Edit: Yep, AS3 isn't Java.
  - raverbashing 14y ago
    AS3 is not Java, but rather Javascript http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ActionScript#ActionScript_3.0 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ActionScript#ActionScript_3.0
    - mas1n 14y ago
      Technically ActionScript is ECMAScript which JavaScript and AS3 are both dialects of. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript
narrator 14y ago
If Google wins, what's to prevent them from creating a server side JVM that's better than Oracle's? It would be quite cool if they created a server side fork of dalvik that could run thousands of isolated instances at the same time.
sad_panda 14y ago
There seem to be more than just a few pro-Oracle people on this thread. Why?

192 points by grellas 14y ago

ohashi 14y ago

In English please?

lomegor 14y ago
Google is claiming that they didn't copyright each of the 37 API separately, and as such that they don't claim ownership of them, thusly, Google can copy them. FTA: "The determination of this issue in favor of Google will either (a) result in the dismissal of the copyright claims or (b) provide the support for Google's de minimis and fair use copying defenses."
grellas 14y ago
Copyright protects expressive works in tangible form. So, a computer language can't be protected because it is an abstraction. But the source code for any implementation of that language can. Here, Oracle is not claiming a copyright in the Java language, nor is it claiming that Google copied any source code (except very insubstantial elements). Oracle claims that the API is protected by copyright and that Google infringed various API elements by copying the structure, etc. in spite of its having done so through a clean-room development. Therefore, Oracle's ultimate copyright claims in the case all turn on its assertion that it can sue upon only a a subset (the API pieces) of the overall copyrighted work (Java) and not the whole work. The other important piece of the analysis is as follows: copyright protection applies automatically as a work is created and takes a tangible means of expression; however, you cannot sue for infringement of a copyright work unless it is registered as a federal copyright with the Copyright Office. The Google motion contends that Oracle registered the entire work (Java) and not any subset of that work. Oracle claims it was registered as a "collective work" and that this gives it the right to sue on a component part of the work only. In its motion, Google says that the work was not registered as a collective work and that Oracle therefore can't - as a matter of law - sue over a component piece only. The motion turns on technical issues but they are ones that would seem to be verifiable one way or the other and thereafter tested under the legal standards just summarized. If the Java registration fails to meet the test, the Oracle loses on its copyright claims as a matter of law (meaning the judge tosses it and it doesn't even go to the jury). This is truly a bombshell and appears to have caught the Oracle attorneys completely off stride. We will see what happens.
- jamroom 14y ago
  I'm probably misunderstanding this, but wouldn't this open the door to allowing someone to copy just portions of a copyrighted work if the work is only copyrighted as a "whole"? Would this require a company (or individual) to copyright every sub system in a larger system? I'm certain I am overlooking something as that seems an unreasonable burden.
  - cheald 14y ago
    The issue here is that Oracle can't assert copyright on the individual pieces because they didn't write them. They were contributed by others. Oracles only copyright is on the work as a whole. To that end, you could go ahead and copy pieces of the copyrighted work, but you would still be subject to lawsuits by the people that wrote the original individual piece. You just wouldn't be subject to lawsuits by Oracle. It's still infringement, but Oracle isn't the infringed party.
    - jamroom 14y ago
      Thank you - that makes sense. I must have glossed over the part that the 37 API's in question were not copyrighted by Oracle. Thanks!
      - telcodud 14y ago
        Actually, 37 packages are in question. See https://twitter.com/#!/CalebGarling/status/195596382982258691 https://twitter.com/#!/CalebGarling/status/19559638298225869...
    - seldo 14y ago
      I was unaware that the APIs were contributed by others. Do you have any idea who might be some of the (theoretical) copyright holders of the individual APIs?
      - foamdino 14y ago
        There is significant code in the Java libraries that was first written by people outside of Sun/Oracle. Back in the Java5 days some APIs provided by Java were simply javax.something wrapped around org.apache code.
Natsu 14y ago
Last Monday, Oracle's lawyers said something that was not true according to their own copyright registration documents. So they're going to be left with either pathetically weak claims of copyright infringement or nothing at all, because most of their arguments were based on a falsehood. This judge in particular hates that sort of thing. TL;DR Oracle shot themselves in the foot. Their claims of copyright infringement are dead or dying.
peeters 14y ago
Here's my take. Google has a list of things that they think can be decreed by the judge rather than the jury as a matter of law, given the evidence presented. 1) You can't claim ownership of the idea (the APIs) rather than the creative writing (the implementation). 2) The API declarations are not copyrightable for the same reason that you can't copyright a short phrase, like "Mary shears sheep." Furthermore, Google needed to be precise in copying the signatures, since changing would lead to incompatibility (with both the programmer's assumptions and their existing Java code). 3) The stuff that Google copied verbatim (or close to verbatim) was negligible. The ONLY thing that Google copied that was actually distributed on a phone was a 9-line function called rangeCheck() that any novice could write. It was only included because Josh Bloch used it when writing an alternative sorting method that he thought would eventually be merged into the Arrays class (where it would have direct access to the original method). Everything else is test classes and a couple of comments. As part of this argument, Google tries to argue that the infringements are negligible with regards to the "work as a whole," which they argue is all of J2SE 5 (as that is how Oracle registered the copyright). I don't think this argument stands up. Oracle cites plenty of previous copyright cases where the judge has considered less than the overarching work as the "work as a whole" (for example, a defendant tried to argue that the article they had copied verbatim from a magazine was a small piece of the work as a whole (the magazine itself), but the judge considered the article itself to be a work. In this case it was still determined that the article was used under fair use provisions however). 4) Google's documentation of the APIs doesn't infringe. First, they are similar in substance because they are talking about the same idea. Programmers have common terminology and ways of talking about ideas (in this case, what a method/class does) that become more similar when you consider the fact they are trying to be succinct and unambiguous. Second, they are similar in organization because they use the Javadoc tool, which automatically generates docs from comments attached to the API declarations themselves. In other words, if the APIs are not seen as infringing, then neither can the Javadoc structure. They should not be considered a separate act of infringement. 5 and 6 were less interesting to me and were more about Google trying to get off on a technicality, so I don't summarize them here.
- taligent 14y ago
  Sorry but I disagree with most of that. An API is hardly just a bunch of short phrases that all programmers use as common parlance. That's That's why Software Architects as a sub-profession exist. Because it requires skill and talent to construct a cohesive, consistent yet technically implementable API. People that actually work against APIs every day know this.

kodablah 14y ago

Even without this matter of law, Jonathon Schwartz (Sun CEO at time of Android development/release) is doing a very good job of blowing the door off of Oracle's case [1]. All Oracle can do now is say that the CEO at the time doesn't shape legal policy (ha). [1] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426122828498 http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426122828498

moomin 14y ago

I'm sure this would be a great result for Google, but it would kick the question of whether APIs were copyrightable into the long grass.

jlawer 14y ago
If APIs were copyrightable there would be no Wintel machines... IBM would have killed Compaq for daring to build a clean room BIOS. Logically I can't see why an API should get copyright protections. By its definition it is a interface, and the moment you start allowing restrictions on implementing an interface your killing competition. It seems that in almost ever other field fair use has decided that whatever is required for compatibility is not copyrightable. That said my beliefs and the law can at times be completely different things...
- fromhet 14y ago
  Isn't it the same with the software patents they have in the US?
- taligent 14y ago
  I don't see why existing anti-competition laws would suddenly disappear if an API was copyrightable ? And your argument about Wintel machines is actually backwards. Because if APIs were copyrightable there would be MORE competition in that circumstance. Due to less standards. I am actually in favour of having standards organisations take a greater role in pushing real standards rather than de-facto ones.
  - regularfry 14y ago
    The best standards are those which have been taken from real-world implementations. In other words, the way you get a good standard is to ratify a de facto one.
tadfisher 14y ago
For another example, part of Android's userspace runtime (Bionic) is a direct copy of the Linux headers made by automated source-scraping tools. If APIs were copyrightable, this would be a GPL violation (as others have asserted [1]). Moreover, all userspace programs that use this information (by linking against glibc) would be considered derivative of the Linux kernel. All userspace programs that link against Windows' C/C++ runtime would be derivative works of the NT kernel. And so on. Linus himself has asserted that the copying of such APIs is considered "normal use" and that such programs are not considered derivative works [2]. [1] http://www.fosspatents.com/2011/03/googles-android-faces-serious-linux.html http://www.fosspatents.com/2011/03/googles-android-faces-ser... [2] http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20110322014831856 http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20110322014831...

chicagobob 14y ago

Don't forget that Groklaw is quite slanted in Google's favor just like FOSS Patents is slanted against Google. To get a balance you need to read both (well actually even more sources).

Steko 14y ago
This. Perusing the comments at Groklaw where everyone is so confident this is the smoking gun that will end Oracle's case reminds me of this bit from Jonathan Chait about people who get their news from hyperpartisan sources: "It must be like being following the state-controlled media in a totalitarian country. First you read that our brave troops are marching toward the enemy capital and will soon complete a glorious victory. Then, after a while, there's no glorious victory, but you start reading about how our brave troops are inflicting heavy losses on the enemy as they courageously defend the motherland." http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/fred-barnes-again-sees-glorious-peoples-victory-hand http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/fred-barnes-again-see...
- Natsu 14y ago
  While this will not end the case, the fact that Oracle tried to base many of its arguments on something that was not, in fact, true according to their own copyright registrations will utterly destroy the arguments that rely upon that misrepresentation. So they're going to be in a difficult position trying to salvage their copyright claims. They might manage to do something, but they've got a pretty weak hand here. They wanted to rush this trial and all they did was to trip themselves up.
  - Steko 14y ago
    I think you've bought into the hype here prematurely. The odds that this issue will be in any way significant to the outcome of this case seem low. Did you read Oracle's reply[1] or just the caricature at the original link? "Google argues that the entire Java platform is necessarily the “work as a whole” because that is what was registered with the Copyright Office. Courts have soundly rejected that argument.. As explained in Los Angeles Times v. Free Republic, supra: Defendants contend that plaintiffs' “work” is the entire daily newspaper because their copyright registration covers the paper as a whole rather than any particular article. Thus, they assert, copying an individual article constitutes reproduction of only a small portion of the entire work. This proposition is not supported by the case law. See Texaco, supra, 60 F.3d at 925-26 (copying an entire article from a journal where the copyright registration covered the journal as a whole constituted a copying of the entire work); Hustler Magazine, supra, 796 F.2d at 1155 (finding that “[a] creative work does not deserve less copyright protection just because it is part of a composite work” and holding that the copying of a one-page parody from a 154-page magazine constituted a copying of the entire work); Netcom On-Line II, supra, 923 F.Supp. at 1247 (“although many of Hubbard's lectures, policy statements, and course packets are collected into larger volumes, and registered as a whole, they may still constitute separate works for the purposes of this factor”); Lerma, supra, 1996 WL 633131 at *9 (“we find that the Works at issue in this case are combined in ‘collections' and that each subpart must be considered a ‘single work’ for the purposes of fair use analysis”)." [1] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426075025438#986 http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120426075025438#9...

Roboprog 14y ago

Even if Oracle wins, they may lose. Imagine if: Google looses the right to use the Java API in Android. Google makes a conversion tool to convert the Android API to another API / VM format. (maybe based on Parrot???) "" releases an ANSI / ISO spec for an improved high level language (not just a C++ replacement like Go), and makes the spec open to encourage "safe" adoption. "" provides reference implementations for mobile (Android) and server (GAE) type uses. "" creates a subsidiary to sell and support the SDK to encourage corporate adoption. I'm not exactly sure how this last step supports their core business, other than making sure there is a talent pool available. But as long as I'm dreaming... THAT is a result I'd like to see. Send Java off to the old programming languages retirement home, where it can sit and trade war stories with Visual BASIC and dBASE.

OzzyB 14y ago
But you're forgetting one very important aspect in all this: The Developers It's not a question of whether one particular language is better, or more "hip", than another; or whether Google could simply run-off and create it's own new language or repurpose someother language instead of Java. It's the developers Google is after, since it's the developers that will create the value (apps) for their marketplace and give them the competitive advantage over other smartphones & platforms. There are a ton of Java (and its variants like AS3) developers out there, and Google wanted to launch and gain traction in its new platform with as little friction as possible. If Google had launched Android as a Golang SDK, do you really think the uptick in new developers coding for Android would have been that great? Edit: Yep, AS3 isn't Java.
- raverbashing 14y ago
  AS3 is not Java, but rather Javascript http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ActionScript#ActionScript_3.0 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ActionScript#ActionScript_3.0
  - mas1n 14y ago
    Technically ActionScript is ECMAScript which JavaScript and AS3 are both dialects of. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript

narrator 14y ago

If Google wins, what's to prevent them from creating a server side JVM that's better than Oracle's? It would be quite cool if they created a server side fork of dalvik that could run thousands of isolated instances at the same time.

sad_panda 14y ago

There seem to be more than just a few pro-Oracle people on this thread. Why?