Oracle’s patent infringement lawsuit will change Google forever

Invisible Shield for Apple iPhone 4!“Since Oracle sued Google over Android’s alleged infringements of Java IP, there’s been a lot of speculation about what Oracle really wants,” Joel West writes for Seeking Alpha. “Perhaps it’s just that under new management, Sun is no longer interested in open source (as in the death of OpenSolaris) or any other form of openness.”

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West writes, “But no matter what the motivations or how the case turns out, Google will be changed forever.”

“Google is being dragged kicking and screaming into the world of patents,” West writes. “Welcome, Larry and Sergei, to the mess that is our 21st century intellectual property system.”

Full article here.

29 Comments

  1. You have to paid for everything in this life, nothing is free.
    iPhone copy cats are going to pay they laziness and their users too because they never get the full functionality of the iphone and besides that, they will run out of support and updates.
    How does Android looks now? not so cheap right? just like the “cheap” windows computers.

  2. Think different and stop using other people sweat to craft your profit. They worked hard to develop it and should have some rewards. Too bad oracle is the one pushing for the sweat equity.

    Google- plan ahead and look for problems by spending time and some money on “innovation”! Try not to be too cheap like your “super phone.”

  3. Sun Won this same case against Microsoft. So the history is with Oracle. Google will loose and Android will likely be abandoned by Google shortly after they loose.
    Google has no stomach for loosing and then fixing their mistakes. With as ADD as Google is as a company, I surprised that they have kept their Android focus for as long as they have.

  4. Nice article, but he doesn’t truly understand Oracle’s intentions. Oracle absolutely believes in openness… BUT you have to follow the rules of openness by contributing back to that openness. Google stole it, changed it, closed it off, and profited from it. Daniel Eran Dilger talks about this on roughlydrafted.com

  5. Gee, just when I wondered what plans they (Jobs) had to stop Google from “killing the iPhone” this drops! I wish I was in Steve’s backyard garden a year or two back to have heard the conversation between billionaire buddys….Larry and Steve

  6. It’s important to realize why Google created Android and how they make money from it. Google doesn’t make money off Android itself, but rather makes money from services they can provide for the platform. In that regard, they make pretty much the same money for each Android based phone as they do off each iPhone.

    Where they benefit is that they have less competition from services that may be the default or exclusive on other platforms from competitors…specifically Microsoft.

    This is very significant when you consider the benefit for R&D as it pertains to Google versus Apple (or RIM, Nokia, etc…). For Apple, new advances in iOS as well as the hardware means selling more units, which means direct profit as well as indirect profit from services (apps, content, Mobile Me, etc…). However, for Google, it becomes less critical to further develop Android once they’ve achieved entrenchment in their dominance of the services they provide (maps, search, YouTube, etc…).

    It’s not entirely unlike Microsoft with developing Windows for the PC. Not enough people pay for Windows upgrades alone to make developing Windows a profitable business for Microsoft. Instead, Microsoft makes money on the licensing of Windows for new PCs being sold. While new versions of Windows influences new PC purchases, that’s far less direct of a connection and still doesn’t justify a huge R&D budget for Windows as compared to Apple which developing OS X (although Apple is incredibly more efficient and thus has a much lower R&D budget).

    You start adding patent issues, fragmentation, and all the other things that it takes to be a platform developer, and Google is going to find that this is going to be a lot harder than it initially thought, and at some point Google will go through its own XP/IE6 phase.

  7. Demon stated “Sun Won this same case against Microsoft. So the history is with Oracle. Google will loose and Android will likely be abandoned by Google shortly after they loose [sic].
    Google has no stomach for loosing [sic] and then fixing their mistakes. With as ADD as Google is as a company, I surprised that they have kept their Android focus for as long as they have.”

    Demon, your prediction cannot be more wrong. You are comparing apples and oranges. Microsoft proved that with enough money in the bank, even IP infringement and monopolistic practices can be done. Oracle isn’t going to stop Android, it just wants a cut of the action.

    And please, not to nitpick, but the word “loose” means something different than you think it does.

  8. I’ve thought from the start Android pretty much stole the Java syntax and killed the Java mobile momentum. I’ve always wonder who in Java camp is ballsy enough to stand up to the Gurglars.

  9. It’s funny how Google got all bent out of shape over that $199 K-mart slate over open-source software issues and NOW Google is being sued over the very same thing. Buahahahahahaaaa!!!

    I hate Google. They are sneaky.

  10. @alansky “.. I wish he’d learn to express himself a little more succinctly”

    DED is one of the very few people in tech writing who CAN make genuine sense of very technical subjects that leave other people floundering.

    Just my view.

  11. I’m so sick of Google (and Adobe) using the word “open” to benefit themselves while simultaneously creating proprietary systems.

    @Giles
    Start using DuckDuckGo and leave Google search behind. Very good search results without all the “Do (no) evil” nonsense of Google.

  12. Dalvik is a clean room version of a java-like language and virtual machine. Good luck Oracle finding anything that belongs to them. By the time this ends, Android will be up to version 18. Stupid patent trolls at Oracle. This won’t make an ounce of difference to the juggernaut that is Android.

  13. You want succinct?

    Dilger: “Google is nothing but a series of infringements snowballed together.”

    Page, Brin & Schmidt think Google’s now too big to have to obey the rules, just like all bullies. And they’ll whimper and sob when they get a licking, just like all bullies. It’s about time.

  14. Google got away with a hell of a lot (infringing intellectual property) in the early days, because it was done under the cloak of giving something away free to the whole world. Clever smokescreen – it was only ever about selling more ads and making themselves rich. Now that the Verizon net neutrality strategy has revealed their utter self serving greed in all its naked horror, they will never again be able to claim any “public good” in what they are doing.

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