Linked List: August 6, 2011

Saturday, 6 August 2011

Regarding That Oracle v. Google Lawsuit ★

Florian Mueller:

Judge Alsup — the federal judge presiding over this litigation — attaches a great deal of importance to that particular document. At a recent hearing, he essentially said that a good trial lawyer would just need that document “and the Magna Carta” (arguably the origin of common law) to win this case on Oracle’s behalf and have Google found to infringe Oracle’s rights willfully. The judge told Google that “you are going to be on the losing end of this document” with “profound implications for a permanent injunction”. Let me add that a finding of willful infringement would not only make an injunction much more likely than otherwise. It can also result in a tripling of whatever damages will be awarded. […]

It’s certainly remarkable that those two emails show a consistent attitude: the Android team basically says “let’s just infringe” whenever an intellectual property issue comes up. If they did this to Oracle, what about the intellectual property of other companies like Apple, Microsoft, eBay and Skyhook?

Shocking.

Rick Perry’s Campaign Slogan: ‘What Harm Could a Governor of Texas Do?’ ★

Andy Borowitz:

In throwing his hat into the ring, Gov. Perry explained his earlier reluctance to run: “I promised the people of Texas I would destroy the state by 2012, and now it looks like we’re on track to do that.”

Why Apple Doesn’t Talk, Vol. 2 ★

Another good piece from Matt Drance, this one on Google CLO David Drummond’s post on mobile patents:

Nobody was waiting for Google to say something; Google stood up and demanded we all listen. If you walk up to the microphone like that, you need to have your story straight. It would not have been hard to spend a little more time preparing an impassioned and credible statement that appealed to the reader.