JavaScript Trademark Update

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Perceptions of Oracle

  • Many commenters describe Oracle as a rent‑extracting, litigious “lawyer company” whose core business is enforcing IP and squeezing customers via audits and contracts.
  • Others push back, noting real technical contributions: Java/OpenJDK, JVM advances, GraalVM/GraalJS, MySQL 8, Helidon, and kernel work (XFS, btrfs).
  • There’s a recurring distinction between strong engineering pockets (e.g., compiler/GC research, some cloud orgs) and widely despised business/legal practices.
  • Several threads debate whether working for Oracle is an ethical red flag; some say yes, others argue that’s unfair to individual engineers.

JavaScript Trademark: Legality and Genericization

  • The mark originates from a 1990s Netscape–Sun deal: Netscape created the language, Sun licensed the “JavaScript” name to align it with Java applets. Oracle inherited this via acquiring Sun.
  • Deno’s challenge focused on alleged fraud in Oracle’s renewal (using Node.js screenshots as “specimen of use”). TTAB held that bad specimens alone don’t prove fraud; you must show intent to deceive and lack of actual use.
  • Some argue Oracle does have “use in commerce” (e.g., GraalJS, database-embedded JavaScript), so outright cancellation on non‑use is difficult.
  • Others emphasize that “JavaScript” is now a generic term for the language and ecosystem, not an Oracle brand, and see genericization (mark becoming the common name with no good generic alternative) as the stronger argument.

Rename vs. Fight for “JavaScript”

  • One camp says: stop wasting energy, the official name is ECMAScript anyway; or adopt a new community name such as “JS” or “WebScript.”
  • “ECMAScript” is widely viewed as bureaucratic and ugly; “WebScript” gets serious support as matching WebAssembly/WebGPU/WebWorkers and implicitly bundling JS + Web APIs.
  • Others resist renaming: the term “JavaScript” is deeply entrenched (code, docs, hiring, tooling), and Oracle hasn’t actually been policing everyday usage.

History and Java Confusion

  • Multiple comments revisit that JavaScript was originally Mocha/LiveScript and only later rebranded for Java co‑marketing.
  • People stress that Java and JavaScript are now completely separate technologies; the shared “Java” prefix is seen as historical marketing baggage that still confuses non‑developers.

Motives and Community Politics

  • Some view Deno’s move as partly brand PR (“savior of JavaScript”); others see it as a useful, community‑wide effort to loosen Oracle’s grip on a de facto public term.
  • Several note Oracle could gain significant goodwill by voluntarily relinquishing or loosening the mark, but expect the company to reflexively defend all IP assets instead.