Regardless, the CAFC has ruled -- twice -- that APIs are subject to copyright. The Supremes are likely to deny cert again, so that stands as the law of the land. You steal someone's API, you pay a penalty. Don't like it? Write your Congressman.
This only stands as law of the land when the plaintiff manages to include a patent claim (even a weak one that later gets thrown out) to force the case under the Federal Circuit's jurisdiction, as happened here. They don't normally hear copyright cases.
While I'm sure more such patent claims will get bundled with API copyright claims in the future where a plaintiff can credibly manage that, it's not otherwise the law of the land.
(An aside: I think the Federal Circuit may have considered aspects of Ninth Circuit precedent in this ruling, as they're supposed to do for non-patent issues from the Ninth Circuit. Even they might rule differently in cases from other circuits, maybe just making it the law of cases they handle from the Ninth Circuit with significant persuasive impact on how they'd rule on cases from other circuits.)
Eventually a normal Ninth (or other) Circuit panel will rule on this. They're not bound by the CAFC ruling, though they will undoubtedly consider it. As soon as one circuit rules otherwise, that will create a circuit split.
Eventually, the Supreme Court will want to resolve that circuit split and will grant cert, either changing this bad precedent even for cases that go to the Federal Circuit or truly making it the law of the land.
A Supreme Court ruling on this would only affect the current Oracle v Google case if it happens before this case is fully finalized, given the doctrine of res judicata. But it would help future cases, including between these parties about a different topic, as well as between Oracle and other companies about the Java API.
With all of that said, contacting representatives in Congress and Senate to make explicit that APIs aren't copyrightable would still be great, as would narrowing the CAFC's jurisdictions to patent claims (and its otherwise specialized areas) or eliminating it entirely.
As I understand the CAFC to work, subject matter jurisdiction only applies to determining whether CAFC can rule on a case. Once they so rule, that ruling is precedent throughout the land -- irrespective of whether the topic of their ruling fell within their subject-matter jurisdiction.
> irrespective of whether the topic of their ruling fell within their subject-matter jurisdiction.
The opposite. Binding only within their subject-matter jurisdiction.
Which is good, because this ruling is so broad it's essentially trying to argue there's no such thing as fair use (because plagiarists arent protected by fair use, and all copyright infringers are plagiarists, and fair use is inherently copyright infringement, therefore...)
