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I think that this is absolutely right in principle. An API is tricky to get right and good one is definitely creative (it is a work of design) and there are man

I think that this is absolutely right in principle. An API is tricky to get right and good one is definitely creative (it is a work of design) and there are many copyright able things that are less worthy. The fair use/enforceability side of things is where the interesting questions lie and that is the place for a messy compromise to allow some forms of interoperability. I would be most in favour for attempts at drop in compatibility and actually find Google's incompatible embrace and extend commercial manoeuvre quite unsympathetic.

AnimalMuppet 12y ago
Yes, an API is tricky to get right, and a lot of work, and can have creativity in it. But not everything that meets those criteria are, legally, things that can be copyrighted. Until Oracle, nobody assumed that an API (as opposed to the text describing it) could be copyrighted, since it is legally settled that a single function declaration (that is, not implementation) cannot be copyrighted, and an API is just a collection of function declarations.