Apache e-mails, shown in court, say Android “ripped off” Oracle IP
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SAN FRANCISCO—Lawyers for Oracle Corporation summoned a hostile witness to the stand today here in federal court, revealing what they surely hope will be a “smoking gun” e-mail in their copyright infringement case against Google.
One big problem: the writer of that e-mail, Stefano Mazzocchi, didn’t work for Google at the time. Mazzocchi is one of three people who created the Apache Harmony program, which Google leaned on heavily when it created its Android mobile operating system.
The case began in 2010, when Oracle, which acquired Java when it purchased Sun Microsystems, sued Google for using Java APIs in Android. In 2012, a judge ruled that APIs can’t be copyrighted at all, but an appeals court disagreed. At the jury trial now underway, Oracle may seek up to $ 9 billion in damages, while Google is arguing that its use of the 37 APIs constitutes “fair use.”
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