Re:Google’s Supreme Court faceoff with Oracle was a disaster...
by imtringued on Friday October 09, 2020 @08:05AM
(#24729037)
>The idea that an API could legally be an "original work of authorship" makes a lot of sense; but the technical implications could indeed harm the industry overall.
It doesn't make sense because an API doesn't exist in the work. Copyrighting APIs is functionally useless because you can have multiple works with the same API without violating copyright through clean room designs. Therefore whatever protection you want should cover more than one work. Copyright only covers the works you create yourself. It doesn't cover works that other people create even when they are directly inspired by your works. We have patent law for this.
Not exactly; an API can be completely re-implemented from scratch and still be compatible. If it was just about the API code, there wouldn't even be a case.
The idea that an API could legally be an "original work of authorship" makes a lot of sense; but the technical implications could indeed harm the industry overall.
Essentially what this means is: I build a system, you're not allowed to build a compatible system. Yet another reason why open source is the only way forward.