Copyright case a win for Google and fair use.
“The decision is a major win for competition and consumer choice in the information technology market,” said Charles Duan, a senior fellow for technology and innovation policy at the R Street Institute,
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Justice Stephen Breyer, writing for the majority, said that allowing Oracle to enforce a copyright on its code would harm the public by making it a “lock limiting the future creativity of new programs. Oracle alone would hold the key.”…
Oracle’s lawsuit accused Google of plagiarizing its Java software by copying 11,330 lines of computer code, as well as the way it is organized, to create Android and reap billions of dollars in revenue. Android, for which developers have created millions of applications, now powers more than 70% of the world’s mobile devices.
Google has said it did not copy a computer program but rather used elements of Java’s software code needed to operate a computer program or platform. Federal copyright law does not protect mere “methods of operation.” The companies also disputed whether Google made fair use of Oracle’s software code, making it permissible under the 1976 Copyright Act.