larrya

williamh said:

SpamSandwich said:

I believe that would be a clear violation of existing so-called free trade agreements. Russia (not to mention China) should be kicked out of the WTO.

I guess invading the Republic of Georgia and Ukraine would be violations of something too.  Isn't homosexuality still a crime there?  Doesn't seem like the Russian government is too worried about toothless agreements or boobs like John Kerry.  Maybe we should try another Russian reset button?  

Anyhow, when the EU wants to grab more money, we usually have some folks that say that Apple ought to pay their fair share.  Why doesn't Apple have to pay their fair share in Russia?  I know, it looks like a blatant cash grab, but Russian bureaucrats gotta eat too.  And take their trips to the French Riviera, Monaco, etc.  BMWs don't come cheap either.   Apple could solve this with a few well placed gifts.

josu said:

jameskatt2 said:

It makes even more sense to buy BMW. BMW is cheap at $60 Billion. It even makes a large profit which Tesla may never do. Apple likes profit. BMW already makes electric cars. And BMW can mass produce cars - Tesla cannot. Tesla' cars are flawed because it hasn't made cars for long. Tesla's bugs would drive perfectionistic Apple nuts  Apple can buy BMW with only 6 months of revenue. 

Better Subaru, is cheaper, well positioned to grow into a premium competitor if it wasn't for the derivative styling. With Ive leading the design team Subaru could go really for the premium market. Style wise it resembles the pre-Jobs Apple, but with record profits, sales and bulletproof reliability.

gatorguy said:

ericthehalfbee said:

Funny to see people complaining (various forums) about this (the Oracle lawyer publicly speaking details that were supposed to be confidential).

Yet when Samsung lawyers did the same with Apple (making a statement to the media that shouldn't have been made) it was OK.

Just shows that hypocrisy continues to reign supreme.

 ?? I don't recall anyone saying the Samsung instance was OK. Confidential should mean exactly that, don't you agree? 

Anyway, the important takeaway is that Google doesn't get rich from Android according to the leak. Of course the leak doesn't explain how the figure was arrived at AFAIK. I think articles like this one are guessing how Oracle arrived at it and the period covered, but not entirely certain. It would not shock me at all to find Oracle actually overstated it since it benefits them to do so. 

In any event I would not be surprised if Google would have made a different choice knowing what they do now. When the decision was made to use the API's as an organizer (that's the only code Oracle is claiming) it was Sun who controlled it. While they might not have been overjoyed at the way Google used Java they also at least publicly had no complaints about it and in fact congratulated them on Android, welcoming them to the Java platform. I imagine most code creators at the time did not believe a license was needed for API's. Some still don't believe they do. 

So a couple years go by and here comes Oracle to scoop up Sun. They have a different view on it, monetization plans for Java that Sun never intended when they created it.  In essence nothing was "stolen" from Oracle. When Sun created and owned it it Google's use was at least begrudgingly acceptable. (Mr guess is the relationship Schmidt had with them but it's just that, a guess). Oracle suspected they knew what they were buying even if Google did not. Smart guy. 

Had they anticipated that someone else might someday buy up the IP and more aggressively use it as a money-maker I believe Google would have taken a license to begin with whether they thought they needed one or not back in the day. Hindsight is 20-20. IMHO Google will end up paying a $B or more for their oversight, tho out-of-court would be my guess.