Posted on 01/21/2011 7:07:20 PM PST by The Duke
Florian Mueller has been killing it these past few months with his analysis of various tech patent suits on his FOSSpatents blog, and today he's unearthed a pretty major bombshell: at least 43 Android source files that appear to have been directly copied from Java. That's a big deal, seeing as Oracle is currently suing Google for patent and copyright infringement in Android -- which isn't a hard case to prove when you've got 37 Android source files marked "PROPRIETARY / CONFIDENTIAL" and "DO NOT DISTRIBUTE" by Oracle / Sun and at least six more files in Froyo and Gingerbread that appear to have been decompiled from Java 2 Standard Edition and redistributed under the Apache open source license without permission. In simple terms? Google copied Oracle's Java code, pasted in a new license, and shipped it... (more at link)
(Excerpt) Read more at engadget.com ...
Maybe they can sell the code to SCOx (but not the copyrights)?
FYI
Ping for later
Ouch, does this affect honeycomb too? Hope not looking forward to the Motorola Xoom tablet and this may throw a monkey wrench into all that.
Could this be the reason for the huge management shake-up at Google today?
Then what the fog is “Open Source”, Larry?
Code theft is ubiquitous, but sometimes tough to catch. Tagging these modules was a brilliant act by the original Sun Java engineers.
Here's a sample of the code in question alongside decompiled Java code. This shows the inserted Apache license text:
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/69702407/1-AclEntryImpl-synopsis
Not good.
Someone better do a “clean room” implementation of those functions/classes ASAP. That way they can at least limit their liability going forward but...doesn’t look good.
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There is a followup story on Engadget making it sound like the original story is a nonstory. Me, I don’t know.
Hm. Maybe it would be best to wait until the dust settles. It not clear that the code in question was actually included in any shipped product.
It might be a factor, but I think the main reason is that a lot of the talented people at Google are leaving for other companies like Facebook. Google is trying to regain it's cool status.
Google makes 97% of its profits from advertising. Most of that is from ads on Google searches. But social media is where most of the attention is focused these days, and Google's attempts at social media have been dismal. Putting a younger man in charge may help to refocus the company on building social networks and then putting ads on those networks.
As I understand it, if Google want's to start putting younger people in charge they had better install some diaper-changing stations.
No wonder it works so well, compared to MicroSoft.
Open source has a lot of American talent behind it.
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