back to article Oracle sues Google over Java in Android

Oracle has mounted a no-holds-barred legal attack on Google's Android operating system in a lawsuit that accuses the internet giant of deliberately infringing patents and copyrights Oracle holds for the Java platform. In a complaint filed late on Thursday, 12 August, Oracle asked a federal court in Northern California to seize …

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  1. JaitcH
    Pint

    In other words: Share the Wealth, Google.

    I want to know why they didn't sue Google for also copying the letters O, L and E for use in their name.

    1. Jon Double Nice

      Hahaha

      dude, I totally have the letter 'O' in my name, and they used it twice!

      ..

      Step 3: Profit!

      1. Someone Else Silver badge
        Go

        Title?!?

        Ooooohh. Prior art...

    2. Allison Park

      Oracle's hate meter is rising

      Oracle will be to the Java community what SCO is to the Linux community.

      They are even using the same lawyer!!!! David Boies.

      He makes tens of millions and drove SCO out of business, maybe he will be just as successful with Oracle.

      We really need a Larry Ellison with devil horns icon to choose from....or maybe Leisure Suit Larry

      1. Jeff Power
        Troll

        @Allison Park

        Yes, but by being that to the Java community, they'll be loved by the everybody-else community, as Java is generally hated, except by those who love it.

      2. Rex Alfie Lee
        FAIL

        I thought Java had become at least partially OSS...

        Absolutely right - not that Oracle has ever been particularly "not a bunch of wankers" but now they've completely come out of the closet. "We're the fastest database" - no MySQL was but then they bought it. Now they are suing Google for using something that was supposed to be open for business as in OSS. Yes, they reek of SCO-type behaviour & I now hope they end up destitute.

        Not a big fan of Goggle at the moment either but this is crap!

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Been a long time coming...

    I can't believe that Sun allowed Google to get away with this in the first place.

    Oh, hold on, Andy Bechtolsheim gave some seed capital to the then unnamed company, and Eric, who led Java development for a while, is CEO.

    They were our friends, so all was cool. They aren't Larry's friends so the gloves are off.

  3. David 138

    pffft

    hopefully oracle will go bust soon and take java and their database. they are both awful

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Coat

      Oracle: The new SCO

      So they're suing Google for implementing Java.

      They forgot that save for a few classes, much of Java is open-source.

      It's like they're trying to stuff a genie back into the bottle.

      Now, normally I'd be apathetic towards Google as well (how dare they remove my Hitler Bunker Scene rant about how the local ISP monopoly has canceled plans on bringing in FIOS into my area!), but for this, if they're successful with Google, Nokia will be under the chopper next, and perhaps many other phones that does Java.

      And then they'd probably discontinue MySQL, sue Team MediaPortal and declare OpenSolaris illegal.

      That's it, I'm outta here. Taxi!

      1. John 73
        FAIL

        Patents != copyright

        Just because Java is Open Source doesn't mean that it can't be patent encumbered.

      2. David Given
        Thumb Up

        Oracle: the new SCO

        Hilariously, Oracle appear to have contracted Boies, Schiller & Flexner as their lawyers. You may recognise them from other epic court cases such as SCO vs. World...

        1. Rex Alfie Lee
          Joke

          Boies, Schiller & Flexner...

          Sounds like a really bad case. Hopefully there's an antibiotic to cure this disgusting disease. I'm sure it's one of those ongoing problems that leads to a protracted period of poor health & leads to financial ruin. One can only hope anyway.

    2. DrXym

      Java isn't awful at all

      Java the language and Java the VM are both excellent technologies. Absolutely nothing matches them for stability, breadth of support, portability, tools etc. That includes C# / .NET which although C# is arguably a better language simply isn't portable.

      The problem for Java is its stewards are extremely conservative and seem more interested in providing a stable platform for enterprise applications than addressing the needs of desktop apps and mobiles.

      I think what is likely to happen over time is that the JVM will continue to be used but apps are going to diversify and start being developed in the likes of Groovy / Scala / Jython etc. where they benefit from dynamic scripting, convention based development and more modern language features but can still benefit from the vast Java ecosystem which exists out there.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    bad move by oracle

    anyone else think oracle bought sun just so they could do stuff like this?

    they should be thanking google for helping promote the java platform, not suing them.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Stop

      OK, let's extend that logic...

      Right so can I have all those pictures you have on your phone of you family please? I just want you to thank me for promoting your life!

      No you don't any say in how I promote you, I just want to do it my way without any say from you.

      Alright if I manipulate your family pics on my grot site? I'm still promoting them and you should thank me for it!

      Personally I think Oracle are being scum but it's their property and they still have a say in how it's used and abused, whatever Google may think.

    2. Rex Alfie Lee
      Joke

      I wonder who the 4 against are?

      Perhaps Boies, Schiller & Flexner & Larry himself onboard as Anonymous Twats!

  5. Ian Yates
    Thumb Down

    I see

    Now Oracle's takeover makes more sense.

    I can't see how this is going to benefit the Java community in any positive way; this is just Oracle acting for their own self interest.

    I know, I know, they are a company and this is a product (albeit, reasonably open), but Java is a community (as is any development language), and Oracle should be thinking of their effects on that as much as any profits.

    Ah well, it's all MHO.

  6. Antidisestablishmentarianist
    Heart

    Go Oracle!!

    Whoop whoop!

    Get the fsuckers

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      YES! Go Oracle, go!

      I don't like patents but sometimes you have to fight back with what you have. Google is an evil empire. When are we getting the "evil Eric Schmidt" icon?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Big Brother

        Evil Eric Icon? In my Register?

        It's closer than you think.

      2. Stiggy

        I Agree

        Kinda...

        Go, Oracle. Just go.

        Away.

  7. iamapizza
    Thumb Down

    My first thought...

    This is why we can't have nice things.

    1. What Now
      Thumb Up

      @iamapizza

      Yes+++

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      The interesting question now becomes...

      What will we replace Java with? The freedom's gone from this language, let's find something else. And don't get started on the IcedTea/OpenJDK implementation, it's not compatible enough and too compatible by far.

      1. Iceman

        Nice little snake in title.

        Try python.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Never understood why google didn't buy sun

    Given how much google uses java and the knowledge and people sun possessed in the real time, jit and general vm capabilities, I never understood why google did not jut buy sun. Philosophically sun is much more aligned to goggle rather than oracle.

    1. alain williams Silver badge

      Maybe Oracle wants Google to buy part of Sun

      If Google bought Java off Oracle it would relieve it of something that it doesn't want.

      Watch Oracle next hit HP or IBM with some hardware patents law suit - and get them to buy the remains of Sun hardware to make the law suit go away.

      Oracle could then slowly strangle mysql and eliminate that as a competitor.

      1. Stephen Bungay

        Strangle MySQL?

        Me thinks not. A GPLd application is going to be impossible to kill, too many people have a vested interest in it AND the freedom to continue developing it.

      2. TheGlobalMind

        Oracle wishes it had something on IBM

        Sorry for Oracle but IBM kills them on the hardware. Hell IBM for a long time was the fab for some of Sun's gear.

        The real shame is that IBM should have kept their boot in it and bought Sun. This suit would never happen in that case as IBM has it's own self interest in seeing Java prosper.

        Oracle on the other hand is interested in killing off anything it didn't come up with.

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        MySQL going?

        I think not. Oracle probably needs something to counter DB2 Community Edition in the shallow end of the market and with MySQL they've got it already, with a lively community as an added bonus. They would be silly to ditch it. Not that that has ever stopped anyone... :-)

  9. Chris Miller
    Thumb Up

    Fight, fight!

    Cue "my lawyer's more expensive than your lawyer" battle - is it very wrong of me to hope that both sides lose?

    Opens giant economy tub of popcorn and settles back in seat.

    1. breakfast Silver badge
      Thumb Down

      Yes

      Actually it is very wrong of you because if both sides lose that means that the lawyers win.

      A strange game. The only winning move is not to play

      1. Chris Miller
        Unhappy

        First rule of litigation

        The lawyers *always* win.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Happy

          Yay

          Yay for lawyers always winning.

          More litigation please.

          [Employed by lawyers]

  10. pahjbo

    RIP Java

    Oracle buying Sun put Java on life support - this sort of thing is pulling the plug. Oracle should note that Sun suing Microsoft was the beginning of the end of Sun also

  11. jonathan rowe
    Thumb Down

    look at the patents

    Look at the patents, they are generic enough to apply to just about any other language runtime. What utter bullshit.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    And anyone doubted Oracle was EVIL?

    Well first we know Oracle lies, it promised the European Competition Commision it would be a good steward for Java.

    Next I guess we can expect Oracle to sue world plus dog over MySQL.

    TIME TO STOP USING JAVA.

    It is pretty bad when you have to acknowledge that Microsoft is the better corporate citizen.

    Well it is good that C# is a marginally better language than Java, and that it learned from Zend and the AS400 to compile on first use, making it substantially more efficient than the hot spot compiling silliness in many versions of Java.

    It is really too bad you can not lock executives up for deceiving European regulators, it might make these companies acquisition promises worth the toilet paper they are written on.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Well, you can use Clojure then...

      > Calls for stopping to use Java

      > Proclaims that C# is a marginally better language than Java

      My face on the left

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Down

      wrong!

      Numpty

      The CLR dynamically compiles code as well, why is that? because dynamic compilation is faster in the long run than statically compiled code. It can inline code between modules/jars/assemblies, it can pass parameters through the registers, it can see how the code interacts and perform more effective compilation. Stick to RPG.

      1. Shakje
        Stop

        Re: wrong!

        It dynamically compiles, but it keeps hold of the compiled code in memory so that it doesn't have to compile it again. I.e. if you're doing a massive for loop with some repetitive crap in the middle it'll only compile the repetitive crap once during that process' lifetime, and then just calls the compiled code for every other iteration. Unless I'm very much mistaken, the JVM compiles every time it hits something.

        Once again, unless I'm very much mistaken, that makes you the numpty.

  13. maxki
    Troll

    wrong law suit

    If I was Oracle , I would sue the sun - I mean that bright shiny thing - and demand that it changes its name to something else.

    Hereby this idea is copyrighted , just in case Oracle decide to sue the sun.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      FAIL

      IP law 101

      sorry, you cannot copyright ideas.

      1. Rob Dobs
        Unhappy

        wrong

        You are morally right, you SHOULD not be able to copy ideas. However the US allows for patents on both Business processes and methods, and any story or work is an idea, and protected by copyright law.

        A business process or method (one click shopping) can be patented (AND WITHHELD form the rest of us) simply by filing the paperwork and paying the money. The process doesn't have to be made, or even work, just described.

        This is SO against what copyright and patents were intended for its sick.

        Time to start a Pirate Party in the US, and force a change in IP rules.

        DumbF&*Cks selling media don't realize the system is so gamed against the average person, that the average person feels morally righteous in stealing from these evil empires.

  14. TonyHoyle

    The end of java then

    Oracle have decided that java is a single vendor solution. No JVM except the Oracle JVM.

    Can't see the language surviving that.

    Of course with those patents c# is going to have a fight too (which is also a single vendor solution, but it never pretended to be anything else.. and the vendor is big enough to get away with it).

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      No

      the other JVM vendors have licensed Java so they are allowed to use the technology covered by the patents. The difference is that Google didn't license anything.

  15. RISC OS
    Stop

    Let me know ...

    ... in 10 years what the result of the case is.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Joke

      In 10 years...

      ...Oracle is in financial ruins having paid almost all money to the lawyers. They're delisted from NASDAQ and what remaining stock is sold as ORCL.PK for $0.08 a share and are under bankruptcy protection after remnants of Sun's former developers are granted rights to the patents in another case because they weren't transferred as part of the acquisition. Google is still waiting as Oracle files appeals regarding the Sun case's result. By this time, the lawyers are retired and living a life of luxury along the coast.

  16. Hieronymus Coward

    For the love of god...

    ...this is why software patents are bad.

    I can't say I am surprised at this. I would have been surprised if Oracle gave all the IP for Java to the community - that might have made me think differently about them... time to take a serious look at MySQL forks...

    1. Tigra 07
      FAIL

      Agreed completely

      In this day and age, software patenting is just patenting having fingers or being born with legs.

      It's anti competitive and serves only to protect a company's profit margin from anyone who might wish to offer a better/cheaper service.

      1. breakfast Silver badge

        Antiquated approach to the modern world

        I don't think sofware patenting is theoretically bad, but it should have no relationship to mechanical patents. A software patent should be it's own thing, very restricted and of a term that makes sense in the IT world- maybe 18 months, perhaps extendable to 3 years if the idea is exploited by the patentee within the initial period.

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