On February 19, the News Media Alliance filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in support of Oracle in the Google v. Oracle case. The case concerns Google’s unauthorized copying of parts of Oracle’s code when developing applications for Android. The Supreme Court will hear the case in March and wants the parties to address two questions: whether the code is copyrightable, and whether Google’s use constituted fair use. The lower U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in favor of Oracle on both of these questions, and the Supreme Court accepted Google’s appeal in November. The Alliance amicus brief focuses solely on the fair use question, challenging Google’s argument that its use of Oracle’s code was fair use under the current statutory standard. The brief contrasts Google’s actions in this case to their widespread and unauthorized use of news content without compensation for their own commercial purposes. Read the Alliance statement here and the full brief here.
Members of the News/Media Alliance staff have contributed to this post.
