[colug-432] copyright ...an API?

[William Yang]

Thanks, Chris, I am doing well; I hope you are, too.

I want to be clear that I'm not trying to take a position on the 
rightness or wrongness of intellectual property, the Google-Oracle case, 
or the contentious claims about API access and copyright.  I'm only 
trying to shed light on how one could claim a copyright on APIs within 
our existing system of laws, in response to Rick's question.

     -Bill

On 2016-05-12 22:24, Chris Embree wrote:
> Yeah, but you believe in "intellectual property" as tho it exists. ;)
>
> We've debated before and I'll just reiterate; IP is a faux legal 
> construct that pretends that a thought process is equal to "tangible 
> property" which leads to a debate about legal precedent.  Just because 
> a few, ignorant and/or paid off,  and/or misguided and/or malicious 
> judges decided something once, does not constitute proof, fact, or 
> guided decisions regarding cases like this.  I don't care that all the 
> layers agreed to this as a concept; it's malformed. $0.02
>
> I only had to explain in as much detail because I know you. ;)
>
> BTW, hope you're doing well.
>
> On Thu, May 12, 2016 at 10:08 PM, William Yang <wyang at gcfn.net 
> <mailto:wyang at gcfn.net>> wrote:
>
>     #include <std_disclaimer_i_am_not_a_lawyer.h>
>
>     I suspect it stems from copyright including the right to control
>     whether
>     someone's allowed to create a derivative work.
>
>     Using the API is being construed as derivative, as it relies
>     specifically on the creative expression of the API.  The layout and
>     design of the API is also being construed as creative and
>     expressive, in
>     that there are many other ways to say the same essential thing.
>
>     On 2016-05-10 18:12, Rick Hornsby wrote:
>     > I'm a little bit confused by the $9B Oracle-Google fight[1].  I
>     don't understand how using an API is a copyright violation, which
>     makes me think I'm missing some salient point here.  I'm not a fan
>     of Oracle, but Google is big enough to handle themselves so this
>     isn't an attempt to construct a defense of any bad behavior on
>     their part.
>     >
>     > If you build a java library, a ruby gem, or a perl module and
>     license it for open use as Sun (Oracle) has done with Java
>     (correct me if I'm wrong), how can you then turn around and sue me
>     for using the API exposed by your library/gem/module?  If the Java
>     code itself was copyrighted, say like a DLL from Microsoft might
>     be, and I blatantly rip that off from you, copy the code, and
>     include that copied library code in my own commercial product in
>     clear violation of a *copy*right -- that's different, no?
>     >
>     > To put it another way, if I make a hugely popular Windows
>     application (the horror...) that makes me a bajillion dollars and
>     it uses the APIs exposed by Windows, how does Microsoft sue me for
>     a copyright violation?
>     >
>     > [1]
>     http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/05/oracles-lawyer-grills-googles-eric-schmidt-on-the-nature-of-apis/
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