This just in -
“he overall name tree, of course, has creative elements but it is also a precise command structure — a utilitarian and functional set of symbols, each to carry out a pre-assigned function. This command structure is a system or method of operation under Section 102(b) of the Copyright Act and, therefore, cannot be copyrighted. Duplication of the command structure is necessary for interoperability....
Contrary to Oracle, copyright law does not confer ownership over any and all ways to implement a function or specification, no matter how creative the copyrighted implementation or specification may be. The Act confers ownership only over the specific way in which the author wrote out his version. Others are free to write their own implementation to accomplish the identical function, for, importantly, ideas, concepts and functions cannot be monopolized by copyright.”
So there we have it - until an Appeals Court says otherwise, you can’t copyright APIs, and Google did NOT do anything wrong. Oracle was trying to take Copyright into an area where you have to get a patent.
If you want to protect and API - you either have to keep it a Trade Secret, or patent it. Copyright isn’t the vehicle for that protection.
Well, there you have it.
I’m developing a toolset right now for my own use.
I was going to expose APIs and sell them as a development toolket, but I won’t now, as it makes no sense financially. If I am able to start selling them and making any decent amount from them, a larger company could simply copycat the API and put far more money into marketing than I could and I’d be sunk.
I’ll only make applications available for sale. Any toolset that I develop and use to build those applications will be 100% proprietary and trade secret.
I don’t have a choice at this point, this knucklehead Judge can’t see what they’ve just done.
By the way this wording reads, sounds to me like if I make my own language that a copyright of a language would be indefensible.
Is not a language “a precise command structure — a utilitarian and functional set of symbols, each to carry out a pre-assigned function. This command structure is a system or method of operation under Section 102(b) of the Copyright Act and, therefore, cannot be copyrighted. Duplication of the command structure is necessary for interoperability....”
Hmmm... do you think a software language copyright is defensible given this ruling ?