Posted on Oct 7, 2020
Google And Oracle's Decade-Long Copyright Battle Reaches Supreme Court
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Most of the world's smartphones run on Google's Android software. But did Google play fairly when it created that software?
That question is at the heart of a case being argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday. It's the culmination of a battle that started 10 years ago, when tech company Oracle first accused Google of illegally copying its code.
The code in question is about 11,000 lines, accounting for less than 0.1% of the 15 million lines that make up Android software. Google used parts of a software called Java, owned by Oracle, in those 11,000 lines — without paying any licensing fee. Now, Oracle says Google owes it nearly $9 billion in damages, given the ubiquity and success of Android.
"Google was essentially offering a competing product and using our software in that competing product and giving it away for free. So it's really hard to compete with that," Dorian Daley, Oracle's top lawyer, told NPR.
That question is at the heart of a case being argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday. It's the culmination of a battle that started 10 years ago, when tech company Oracle first accused Google of illegally copying its code.
The code in question is about 11,000 lines, accounting for less than 0.1% of the 15 million lines that make up Android software. Google used parts of a software called Java, owned by Oracle, in those 11,000 lines — without paying any licensing fee. Now, Oracle says Google owes it nearly $9 billion in damages, given the ubiquity and success of Android.
"Google was essentially offering a competing product and using our software in that competing product and giving it away for free. So it's really hard to compete with that," Dorian Daley, Oracle's top lawyer, told NPR.
Google And Oracle's Decade-Long Copyright Battle Reaches Supreme Court
Posted from npr.org
Google
iPhone
Cell Phones
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Posted 4 y ago
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This is going to be interesting since there are only 8 justices right now and I have a feeling this will be a 4-4 decision.
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Good share PO1 William "Chip" Nagel … Google v. Microsoft a bit like Rocky v. Apollo. Who's gonna prevail?? The SCOTUS will decide, news at 11 next summer. :)
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This is a large part of the reason Google has been moving away from Java and to Kotlin.
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