Oracle's Mostly Denied Motion For JMOL on Fair Use, as text ~ pj Updated 2Xs

I thought you'd like to see the Oracle motion that the Hon. William Alsup denied Wednesday, after a couple of hours of oral argument. I see at least one person tweeting that the judge has ruled that APIs are not copyrightable. He hasn't ruled on that yet. This was something else. You can read about the judge's ruling here.

What he did rule on were two motions for judgment as a matter of law. If a party feels at any point that after hearing all the evidence, its case can be decided by the judge without a jury because no jury could reasonably find for the other party, it can file a motion asking for judgment as a matter of law. It's common to see that near or at the end of the presentation of evidence in a trial. That kind of motion is called a Rule 50(A) motion. Here, Oracle's motion, dated May 1st, was asking the judge to rule, among other things, that Oracle is entitled to judgment as a matter of law on Google’s fair use defense. It's that motion that was denied. Google's JMOL was also denied. The bigger question, whether APIs are even copyrightable, is still pending.

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