> justices should review a disastrous appellate court decision finding that application programming interfaces (APIs) are copyrightable

when the federal circuit originally ruled i read the ruling and walked away with a completely different understanding than the eff touts in their headlines

this whole farce hinges on fair use stead copyrights

in terms we understand :

  checkFairUse(GOOG_USE){
    FAIR_USE=[http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html]
    for (rule in FAIR_USE)
      for ( usage in GOOG_USE) )
        if ( usage < rule )
          use="fair"
        else
          use="unfair"
    if ( use == "fair" )
      return true
    else
      return false
  }
  
  GOOG_USE=[googSRC]
  if ( API_COPY == "left" || checkFairUse(GOOG_USE) )
    print("allow legal use") 
  else
    print("penalise")

so alsup says that even though API_COPY==undefined the statement still passes because he found GOOG_USE to be "fair", the federal circuit is saying GOOG_USE!="fair"

why does the eff consistently tout copyrightability of apis? this case has yet to rule on copyrights was alsup being clever attempting to end the suit quickly using the mature, uncontroversial fair use clause, or was it a spineless way to avoid making a ruling on the question that the tech community really wants: are apis copyrightable?

slightly off topic, this whole debacle just screams avoid java at all costs because if you write anything financially successful in the language oracle is going to drag you through courts