Oracle becomes SCO redux
<p>To the surprise of nobody who was actually familiar with the underlying law and precedent, the judge in the Oracle-vs.-Google mega-lawsuit ruled today that Oracle&#8217;s claim of copyright protection on the Java APIs <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2012/5/31/3055620/oracle-java-api-not-covered-copyright-law">is contrary to law</a>.</p>
<p>This means Oracle&#8217;s claims against Google are toast. Their best case is now that they&#8217;ll get $300K in statutory damages for two technical copyright violations, almost noise compared to what Oracle spent in legal fees.  The patent claims went just as thoroughly nowhere as I predicted back when the lawsuit was launched.</p>
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<p>In a previous post I speculated that this lawsuit might signal the beginning of the end of the patent wars, as business managers wake up to the fact that IP litigation is usually a spectacularly expensive way to accomplish nothing. Today&#8217;s ruling, though it&#8217;s about copyrights, increases these odds.  Here, as in the SCO lawsuit, copyright issues were pushed harder as what was initially a patent case failed.</p>
<p>My headline is admittedly a bit of an exaggeration; unlike SCO, Oracle still has a viable business to run.  But the history and outcome of this lawsuit &#8211; huge stakes, shifting claims, apocalyptic press coverage all leading to a spectacular and humiliating debacle &#8211; certainly recalls the SCO lawsuit.  It seems unlikely that many more of these will be required before corporate America gets the lesson.</p>
