Mon, Apr 5th 2021 9:37am — Mike Masnick It's taken over a decade, but the Supreme Court has finally said that Google's copying of the Sun Java API for Android was clearly fair use in a 6-2 ruling (Barrett did not take part since she was not on the Court when the case was heard). The background of this case is actually kind of important to understanding what just happened, so here's a quick(ish) recap. As you'll probably know, this case began in 2010 when Oracle, which had just taken over Sun, sued Google for patent infringement. The patent parts were quickly tossed out and what remained was what referred to as a "sideshow" to the main event: a question about whether APIs could be covered by copyright. Pretty much all historical evidence, including an important Supreme Court ruling from the 1990s, said no, interfaces are not covered by copyright.