Has officially begun talks for the fight against the zika virus. But lawmakers left town for the memorial day recess with no progress toward a compromise. Michigan Governor Rick Snyder is looking to stop administrative investigations into how two state agencies handled flints Drinking Water crisis. The move by Governor Snyder follows warnings the investigations could hurt state and federal inquiries. Russia is including Maria Sharapova on its preliminary team for the summer olympics in rio, despite her provisional suspension for failing a drug test earlier this year. Global news 24 hours a day, powered by our 2,400 journalists in more than 150 news bureaus around the world from the bloomberg newsroom, im mark crumpton. Bloomberg west is next. Emily im emily chang, this is bloomberg west. Coming up google dodges a 9 , million bullet. A jury verdict wipes out the oracle claim. Biggest ride hailer, ft andhic alliance with ly others to take on uber. And the journalist who wrote the original story, outing peter thiel after thiel reveals he is indeed funding hulk hogans lawsuit against him. To our lead, a 9 billion sigh for google. The u. S. Jury has found that they did not need a license from the lawsuit that is dragged on since 2010. Oracle has been seeking what it thought it was a fair slice of the profit google has reaped for more than 3 billion activations of the android operating system. It marks one of the largest jury verdicts in u. S. History. But oracle is not giving up so , easily. Oracle General Council saying we strongly believe that google developed android by illegal illegally copying Java Technology to rush into the mobile market. We believe there are numerous grounds for appeal. Joining us now for more the impact of this case our editor , at large, cory johnson in new york, our Bloomberg Intelligence litigation analysts, matt larson and washington, and our guest host for the hour, dan rosensweig, who is fighting a sore throat. Thank you so much for sticking with us today. First of all what is your reaction to this verdict . Both did a spectacular job putting on a trial. It is surprising, proving fair use. They were looking through the files, the individual source code files. Hats off to google, they overcame adversity. Incrediblys diligent, they were going through all the evidence presented, looking through the files they were presented with that show the individual source code files. Google, their legal Team Presented the strongest case for the use of this java code developing android being permissible despite the fact , that its protected by copyright. Emily google actually started the case at eight disadvantage because the judge said google had infringed oracle copyright, so, cory, what does it mean for google . Cory the judge seemed to not really be on the side of oracle throughout the trial, it was pretty tough on oracle. I attended a couple of sessions of the first trial which was tossed out on appeal. Of course, oracle said theyre going to appeal this as well on a number of fronts. They have a lot of places to do that. Its a very interesting thing. During the trial we learned some interesting things of what went on behind the scenes. Yes there were negotiations , between larry elson and larry page, discussions about that, in the very early days, we are seeing in the picture, there was kind of hilarious comments, she approached one of the google people. They said, we are a new kind of company, we dont adhere to the old rules. She said to them, how about the golden rule, thou shalt not steal, thats an old rule. That got some laughs in the courtroom, even from the judge that didnt seem to favor oracle in this trial. Its an interesting case. One of the things we found during the trial, when oracle bought sun, they assigned a big dollar value to the java licenses and potential java uses. So people look at that deal and wonder why did they pay so much money for sun . Java was great value to them, was thought to have a great value for them, the value they expected to get out of java they may never get if they cant enforce the licenses and using this without a license. Emily this case could have spurred a lot more litigation. Oracle saying they will appeal. Dan, what is your take your . Either side could have one wpon. The whole point of open sources to be able to use it, so at the end of the day, i think its good for innovation and smaller companies, i think its good for investment capitol to be able to use existing technology and grow businesses out of it. You had oracle didnt build it, they bought it. Then they sued the company that used, the former c. E. O. Of it who actually helped build it. So there were a lot of elements in this where both sides could have come out the winner. At the end of the day, its good for Silicon Valley that we can use technology to build new companies. Emily what are the next steps here . Matt as alluded to in the conversation, oracle along the way has been leaving crumbs that it can come back to and file appeal. They took issue with the way that the jury was instructed on fair use. They filed various motions at different points in the trial itself where they asked the judge to rule in their favor as a matter of law saying there are , no facts under which google could possibly win. So now that the trial is over, oracle will dig all of those back up, ask the court to overturn the jury, which i dont think this judge is inclined to do. The judge was very complimentary of the jury, seemed to think highly of their efforts. The next stage is likely going to be a fairly extensive appeal to the federal circuit and potentially to the supreme court. Well see how it plays out. Were not looking at the end of this litigation by any stretch of the imagination. Emily quickly, cory, what does it mean for oracles future mobile ambitions, is it a huge blow . Cory i think it really is. You can see the dollar amounts they were going after here. They wanted to be able to use this case to enforce other infringements they see on the java patents. So i think this is a great disappointment to them. I also point out the movement of stock, as you know, i dont tend to believe in the stock market in the short term tells us a whole lot. In this case, the stock was only down a little, the street thought very little about not just the outcome, the positive outcome of this case for oracle, but also the positive valuation of java as a part of oracles business. Oracle may see a lot of value there, wall street did not. I think thats why you saw the stock not move much after hours. Emily cory, matt, dan, our guest host for the hour, youre sticking with me. Now, another story we are watching, has apple got its eye on the media content business . The apple executive in charge of itunes and apple music discussed in the meeting last year with time warners head of corporate strategy. Talks never proceeded to formal litigation, but media stocks including time warner and netflix saw their stocks rise on this news. With spendinghat high on content a deal with the , owner of hbo could help apple catch up as the iphone maker faces a future of slowing smartphone sales. Coming up, the real story behind venture capitalist peter thiel to back hulk hogan against the media. Journalistr from the who wrote the controversial posted that outed him. Emily billionaire investor and facebook board member peter feel reveals he has indeed been secretly funding lawsuits to take down gawker media including bank rolling a Defamation Case filed by former pro wrestler hulk hogan over a sex tape. The case resulted in a 140 million verdict and could threaten gawkers very existence. Wall street journal is reporting gawker is considering a sale. Thiel issued a statement to financially support hogans suit. He said that gawker built its business on humiliating people on sport. They said victims would be too intimidated or disgusted to attempt address for clear wrongs. Freedom of the press does not mean freedom to publish sex tapes without consent. Here are with me to discuss this, owen thomas, who wrote the original story for gawker in 2007, that quote outed peter as gay. He is Business Editor for the San Francisco chronicle. So owen, knowing that you know now, do you have any regrets about writing that story . Owen i have no regrets about writing that story. Emily why not . Owen i didnt out peter. He outed himself to a wide circle of people in Silicon Valley who took it upon themselves to say, this is ok for us to know. The unwashed masses should not know such a detail about one of our own. Emily just because he told people who know him, should it be public . Owen if its an open secret, why shouldnt you discuss it. It was in our mission. Also fundamentally as a gay man, i feel like emily yourself . Owen as a gay man myself, we need to live in a world where its ok to say that person is gay, im gay, where its not viewed as some kind of schoolyard taunt but as simply a , human fact about someone that is interesting. Interesting because not everyone is gay, we are a minority within the population, but it should be ok to discuss. Emily what are your thoughts on that . Dan its also ok not to be. Owen its ok not to be gay, i support your right. Dan i support yours. i think it shouldnt matter and were moving towards a world where it doesnt matter, thats a good thing. Owen if it doesnt matter, why not say it . Dan shouldnt a person be entitled to whom and when they say it if its their personal business, on this subject or any subject to be honest to you. Its not so much being gay or not gay. The question is shouldnt a , human being be able to determine how they want to express themselves, whether you agree or i agree. That is my issue with it. Owen absolutely, i think that to put it in this category of personal business, to kind of treat it as something other, to treat it as something that anyone anywhere should be ashamed of ever is to denigrate the status of gay people. Dan i dont know that he ever thought that he was ashamed of it. Owen i dont think he was. he is a very personal person dan like many people are. they should be able to determine when they say about themselves whatever they want to say, whether so i respect that i , like to live in a world where you live in where it shouldnt matter and shouldnt be a topic of conversation. Or should be a topic of owen conversation because its something you can freely discuss. Where we dont need to anymore. Dan emily when you published the story, did you and nick publish it in gawker, did you discuss it and debate it, was it an automatic yes, were doing this . Owen denton, the conversations were typically one way. He would give me a tip. I would run with my investigation, my reporting, my journalism to see if there was a story there. Thats typical between any editor and their boss of the editorial team. You get a possible story. You look into it, you determine what the story is that you want to write. This is a story i wanted to write. Emily nick just released a letter to peter saying this is indicative decadelong , campaign is quite out of proportion to the hurt you claim. Your plaintiffs lawyer has sued not just the company, but individual journalists. He told the new york times, i refuse to mean that journalism means massive pricy violations. Its because that i respect journalists, i do not believe they are endangered in fighting back against gawker. Owen the largest issue is should billionaires be able to dictate what is said about them. Do we want to live in a world where the subjects of coverage get approval over every single thing a journalist writes. If they dont like anything you write, are they going to fund some secret lawsuit . Are they going to use every tool at their disposal to stop you. Its not about whether thiel is gay or not. Its about, for example, the successes and failures of his hedge fund, its about his decisions as a facebook board member very early on in his life when it was a private company. All of these things were things were covered and things that thiel may not have wanted us to run. Does he get a veto on every single thing that a journalist does . Emily whats your thought on that . Gawker went hard on bill cosby before anyone else did. Hillary clinton and the emails, tom cruise and scientology, not just this one story. Dan owen does bill cosby get to determine what we write about him . Thats personal business, right . Dan i think we live if a world, these are all fair questions and so my point is this. You can see the perspective of the journalist, this is why they become journalists, this is what they believe in. I believe your intent is just as admirable as you describe it. I dont believe thats the intent of everybody. I do believe there is meanspirited and the american public, as evidenced by the election, by the way, would like consequences for journalists also. The fact that you write whatever you want whenever you want whether its true or not owen whoa, whoa. dan not you in particular. People put their own spin on it. People want consequences. This is an interesting question about whether or not how do journalists get consequences, how do prosecutors get consequences when they do wrong things . How do government officials get . Consequences now this is a consequences where theyre shooting back, saying if you want to do this emily should there be consequences for peter . How do you think facebook should handle this . Owen i think facebook is in a very tough position. Now peter thiel has been the earliest backer of the company. He is the one who said Mark Zuckerberg i believe in you, you , have something here, the first real money into that company. With that said, i find it very strange just from looking at , Silicon Valley for decades as have, for a venture capitalist to remain on the board this long in the companys life. He doesnt need to be on the board at this point. I think that has to be something emily boards are supposed to be people with diversity of . Opinion he certainly has that. He has it, not only from other dan people. Owen with the neutrality, it helps to have a trump delegate on the board, perhaps. Dan i think many of these are very fair questions. I think like most people, we care about what is in our best interest. So Mark Zuckerberg and the rest of the board gets to determine what good Corporate Governance is. Wall street can determine whether they support that. Owen facebook is structured that wall street does not really get a vote. Dan they knew that. they published all that so you knew all that before you invested it what they were entitled to do. Lets not say that wall street on gets a vote. emily one last question, owen, did you ever hear from peter around that time . Owen i never got anything on the record publicly, any kind of pushback or dissatisfaction. Emily interesting. Owen thomas, thank you for coming on, former reporter for gawker, San Francisco chronicle Business Editor now. Appreciate you joining us and hearing your side of the story. Dan, as always dan its a really interesting question. Emily with me for the hour. Now were going to dig into these themes further with grab ceo anthony tan later this hour and talk about how theyre taking on uber. Emily bidders continue to drop their name into yahoo s core asset. At t is also making a bid for the struggling web portal against verizon, long considered the frontrunner. What value do people see in the business . Dan is the former c. O. O. Of yahoo , current c. E. O. Of chegg making some big acquisitions, first on yahoo , there are reports that you are part of a group, your facilitating dan gilberts bid for yahoo , can you tell us anything about that . Dan im not facilitating anything. I think the story was accurate which is, i care a great deal about the company as do many , former yahoo s. When there are high quality people interested in understanding the business, were all happy to help them understand the business. Emily you are helping them understand the business . Dan this is a complicated business at a complicated time with lots of competitors and understanding the history of it is something a lot of people have asked me and other former yahoos. Im happy to help people understand about growing companies. Emily how do you think it has proceeded so far . Dan it has proceeded like you would expect. A lot of stories because nothing came out, a lot of leaks and a lot of stories around the leaks. Theyre doing exactly what theyre supposed to do. They have been transparent with the process. They have communicated. I think that the process will play out and i think well have a much better understanding sometime in july whether yahoo will be sold or not sold. Emily what do you make of at t getting in the game . Dan it doesnt surprise me. the number one competitor verizon has been in the game, loudly in the game. They have the same series of assets. Verizon has a leg up in the mobile advertising business having bought a. O. L. I think at ts relationship with peter is probably the part that helps drive this which is peters understanding of media, the people that work with peter used to work at yahoo , so its a very smart group of people taking a look at the asset and see if they can utilize it the same as yahoo is . Emily what about marisa meyer . What will her reputation be as she emerges from this . Dan a lot of what has been said has been remarkably unfair. Some of fair, thats the role you take on when youre the c. E. O. Of a public company. Emily what is fair and unfair . Dan what is unfair when they Start Publishing things about security and what the company spends on it. That doesnt matter for public investors to understand. She should not be under this kind of attack by anybody. Thats the story that should be written. Nobody chooses to write it. Why is the c. E. O. Under this kind of attack . Emily what do you think of the variety cover . Dan i dont want to be in her shoes for these reasons. Its that whole segment on what people can and cant write about you. Unfortunately, some of these things are fair game whether she likes it or not. At the end day, she is doing her job as a professional ceo. She is trying to build value, she has a strategy, she is executing on it. It is been determined that that strategy hasnt lived up to the potential she hoped. She said that. Theyre looking at what else to do next. Thats her role and responsibility. 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