Google Gets Mixed Reception in High Court Clash With Oracle (1)

Alphabet Inc.’s Google got a mixed reception at the U.S. Supreme Court as it sought to overturn a ruling that could force the company to pay billions of dollars for improperly using Oracle Corp.’s copyrighted code in the Android operating system.

Holding a low-tech telephone session in one of the biggest software fights in American history, the justices on Wednesday questioned Google’s contention that it had no way to replicate the code without forcing millions of software developers to learn a new programming language.

Justice Neil Gorsuch told Google’s lawyer that Apple Inc. and other companies have “come ...