Today begins an eight-week jury trial at the U.S. District Court in San Francisco in the case of Google and Oracle on the infringement of Java patents and copyrights. According to U.S. District Judge William Alsup, this is the World Series of IP cases and only one winner will come out. 

The following was going on in recent years: Google bought Android Inc. in 2005. Android Inc. developed an operating system for mobile phones. With this take-over, Google made a move to enter the mobile communications market. Soon after, Google and Sun (later Oracle) started to discuss the possibilities of a Java licence for the Android operating system. Java is one of the most popular programming languages currently in use. Google and Sun failed to reach an agreement. Google publicly announced the development of Android, which included a Java-compatible virtual machine, in 2007. The first Android phone was released in 2008. In 2010, Oracle acquires Sun and hereby obtains the Java patents and copyrights. Oracle sued Google for the infringement of the patents and copyrights. 

U.S. Disctrict Court Judge Alsup asked Google and Oracle to take a firm stand on whether a computer language was copyrightable. Oracle states the U.S. Copyright Act protects computer programming languages that meet the originality requirement. According to Google, a given set of statements or instructions may be protected, but not the method of operation or system by which they are understood by the computer. A programming language is such a method of operation or system and is thus not copyrightable. 

In Europe, the Advocate General of the Court of Justice proposes to the Court of Justice in a pending case that a programming language cannot, as such, be protected by copyright, as it is the means which permits expression to be given, not the expression itself. The Court ruling will follow at a later date. The Advocate General’s opinion does not bind the Court.

FutureOfCopyright.com will keep you informed of the development of both cases. 

Read more about the Google and Oracle case on FutureOfCopyright.com: 

• US Court: Google requires license from Oracle to use Java

By: Marjolein van der Heide