That's certainly going to be Google's strategy. The chances of Oracle receiving an injunction on this appear to be near zero. So Google will simply try to stretch this out for years. In the meantime Android will carry on business-as-usual. By the time the whole mess is sorted out, the whole mobile landscape will likely be much clearer and much more stable.

It's really a non-story from a practical strategic point of view for anyone involved (including application developers).

Im not so sure. there is a clear difference here. With SCO the majority opinion was that SCO are full of it and will loose. I don't think many people stopped using Linux as a result of the suit.

In contrast I can clearly envision a vendor deciding against building an Android based phone in fear of future royalty payments etc.

Some have already started calling this SCOracle. So yes, be prepared for a long protracted legal battle. The upside might be the end to software patents. The downside is years of legal maneuvering not to mention the death of Java.

I know a number of people who would not call the death of Java a downside.

The death of the JVM would most definitely be a downside.

Considering that if Oracle gets it's way, making a JVM type VM is going to be impossible without lawsuit. Those patents seem very broad.

As much as I would like to believe that this case could bring sufficient attention to the absurdity that is software patents that it would compel a remedy, I think it unlikely.

Frankly, this is likely to be regarded as business-as-usual outside of technology circles, and as long as large technology providers are extracting substantial revenue from their intellectual property in this fashion we can't expect much change.

Economics are, generally, the only real change agent.