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Assuming the US court does end up ruling (even partially) in Oracle's favour, this would serve to make the U.S. an even less attractive location to start a star

Assuming the US court does end up ruling (even partially) in Oracle's favour, this would serve to make the U.S. an even less attractive location to start a startup than it already is due to current and proposed violations of basic human and civil rights by the government in order to protect content copyright holders (i.e. the interests represented by the MPAA and RIAA)[Citing Kim Dotcom/Megaupload, SOPA/PIPA/CISPA]. I postulate that this might result in a perfect storm of conditions that result in the shifting of the centre of gravity of the startup, and eventually wider entrepreneurial/financial worlds off American shores for the first time in more than a century, perhaps to Europe, due to a more conducive legislative environment, or, more intriguingly, to India or perhaps Brazil (assuming they get their governments in order). The advantages of the Silicon Valley ecosystem are still massive, but they would, in such circumstances, erode over a (not necessarily very long) period of time. Edit: The page appears to be down, so I've posted the full text on pastebin - http://pastebin.com/6G5vqLj5 http://pastebin.com/6G5vqLj5

ars 14y ago
The opposite could happen too. If you want to make sure your APIs are copyrighted then you would stay in the US. For example it would make it harder for someone to offer a drop in replacement for your cloud based service by replicating your APIs exactly. Personally I doubt APIs could be copyrighted, but some would find an advantage if they could.
- sohamsankaran 14y ago
  Right, but I suspect those who would find advantage would be the incumbent market leaders in their respective fields. The truly disruptive startups, the innovators, would be weighted down considerably by such legislation, since they might unknowingly replicate an obvious part of a copyrighted API. The situation would quickly spiral out of control. If that were the case, the copyright-ability of APIs might result in the stagnation of software development itself, in the absolute worst case, though I suspect, as I have previously stated, that people would get around that by relocating to more friendly legislative environments.
  - glesica 14y ago
    I think this is the bigger risk. Copyrights are even more numerous than patents and are potentially much more difficult to avoid infringing. You could infringe an API in a totally different industry and never know it, and there are so many of them that checking first would be basically pointless. At least with patents you can do some reasonable due-diligence (e.g. when building an audio codec, check for audio processing patents). You're not in the clear just by doing so (obviously, look at all the lawsuits) but it's at least some protection. API copyrights could end up being much more deadly IP landmines.
    - sohamsankaran 14y ago
      Add this to the fact that the U.S. legislature is considering making copyrights potentially infinite(edit: infinitely extendable) in length, and you have a recipe for total disaster.
      - grabeh 14y ago
        Do you have a source for that?
        btilly 14y ago
        They can't make copyrights infinite. But the last several decades have shown that they can extend copyright terms indefinitely. And, thanks to Disney's lobbying, will do so every time that it looks like Steamboat Willie is going to become public domain. (That's the first film that Mickey Mouse was in.)
    - Retric 14y ago
      Unlike patents, you can't accidentally infringe Copyright. You can have 3 photo's of a buss that look vary similar, but only 1 was infringing because it tried to recreate another picture.
      - MichaelGG 14y ago
- pavelkaroukin 14y ago
  I do not think it will work. If, just for example, Amazon decide to copyright their API and keep their business in USA for copyright protection, another company, who decides to replicate Amazon's API fully will just do it in Europe. Customers probably will not care, since it is internet. Only possible downside here - latency between USA and Europe.
  - grabeh 14y ago
    Although it should be borne in mind that the reciprocal protection of copyright works conferred by the Berne Convention should still technically apply meaning that, to use your example, Amazon could still take action against infringement of their API in whatever country was also a signatory to the Berne Convention.

ars 14y ago

The opposite could happen too. If you want to make sure your APIs are copyrighted then you would stay in the US. For example it would make it harder for someone to offer a drop in replacement for your cloud based service by replicating your APIs exactly. Personally I doubt APIs could be copyrighted, but some would find an advantage if they could.

sohamsankaran 14y ago
Right, but I suspect those who would find advantage would be the incumbent market leaders in their respective fields. The truly disruptive startups, the innovators, would be weighted down considerably by such legislation, since they might unknowingly replicate an obvious part of a copyrighted API. The situation would quickly spiral out of control. If that were the case, the copyright-ability of APIs might result in the stagnation of software development itself, in the absolute worst case, though I suspect, as I have previously stated, that people would get around that by relocating to more friendly legislative environments.
- glesica 14y ago
  I think this is the bigger risk. Copyrights are even more numerous than patents and are potentially much more difficult to avoid infringing. You could infringe an API in a totally different industry and never know it, and there are so many of them that checking first would be basically pointless. At least with patents you can do some reasonable due-diligence (e.g. when building an audio codec, check for audio processing patents). You're not in the clear just by doing so (obviously, look at all the lawsuits) but it's at least some protection. API copyrights could end up being much more deadly IP landmines.
  - sohamsankaran 14y ago
    Add this to the fact that the U.S. legislature is considering making copyrights potentially infinite(edit: infinitely extendable) in length, and you have a recipe for total disaster.
    - grabeh 14y ago
      Do you have a source for that?
      - btilly 14y ago
        They can't make copyrights infinite. But the last several decades have shown that they can extend copyright terms indefinitely. And, thanks to Disney's lobbying, will do so every time that it looks like Steamboat Willie is going to become public domain. (That's the first film that Mickey Mouse was in.)
  - Retric 14y ago
    Unlike patents, you can't accidentally infringe Copyright. You can have 3 photo's of a buss that look vary similar, but only 1 was infringing because it tried to recreate another picture.
    - MichaelGG 14y ago
pavelkaroukin 14y ago
I do not think it will work. If, just for example, Amazon decide to copyright their API and keep their business in USA for copyright protection, another company, who decides to replicate Amazon's API fully will just do it in Europe. Customers probably will not care, since it is internet. Only possible downside here - latency between USA and Europe.
- grabeh 14y ago
  Although it should be borne in mind that the reciprocal protection of copyright works conferred by the Berne Convention should still technically apply meaning that, to use your example, Amazon could still take action against infringement of their API in whatever country was also a signatory to the Berne Convention.