It’s time to free JavaScript
38 comments
·December 4, 2025siwatanejo
suyash
The irony is I belive the JavaScript creator wanted to latch to Java's populartity to called it JavaScript and now both Java and JavaScript are owned by Oracle and they want the name but not want to change is to ECMAScript, it's real official name.
jemmyw
Well the creator wanted to call it livescript. The creating company (Netscape) wanted the Java association.
embedding-shape
> because it's a way better name (much less confusing, given that this lang doesn't have anything to do with Java anyway).
Probably if we were in the early 2000s this could have been a battle worth fighting. But considering we're in 2025 and probably more people are aware of JavaScript than Java at this point, even when you're deep in enterprise-land, I'm not sure it'd be less confusing.
Anyways, you're about two decades too late to this discussion :/
nacozarina
Our trade has a solid tradition of terrible names for programming languages. They are ALL bad. The whole Ekmuhscrip.js schism fits perfectly. Yes, this is our circus, and these are our monkeys.
phplovesong
That boat sailed soooo many years ago tho. Oracle has no business claiming javascript as a trademark.
cies
Oracle is in the business of bullying others using their big legal dept.
We all know this.
> Oracle has no business claiming javascript as a trademark.
You think so. That's okay. But ultimately it is up to a judge to decide. Right?
I agree with the EcmaScript. Just ditch the stupid name. Get all the petition signers to agree an move on. Fuck Oracle. Fuck JavaScript (it's nothing like Java anyway).
mcny
> But ultimately it is up to a judge to decide. Right?
I think we are getting a rude awakening about what is legal versus what is actually right are not always the same thing. There are some the horrible, horrible things here and the laws need updating, as opposed to us simply saying this is for a judge to decide and there is nothing else we can do.
I am ok with ditching the JavaScript name. I understand this cuts the problem entirely. However, there are other problems we have that we can't bypass so easily.
We need copyright terms to be much reduced. We need CFAA fully repealed and not replaced by anything. We need to abolish software patents. There is a lot we need to do that will likely take a century to accomplish and that's likely being too optimistic.
What we can't do is leave everything up to the judges because clearly even if we get a favorable ruling today, the precedent can be removed by another stroke of a pen.
rs186
Who are "people"? How would all of this start?
In terms of standard, the specs already use "ECMAScript" and don't even mention JavaScript (https://github.com/tc39/ecma262/), although TC39 website does use it frequently. I guess they could officially recommend people stop using "JavaScript", but I doubt they care.
Otherwise, the petitioner Deno here is only a small part of the ecosystem and barely controls anything (and really nobody other than TC39 controls anything, which is good). They (or anyone else) can't just shout "stop saying JavaScript!" and expect people to follow.
Not to mention JavaScript is a simple, easy to pronounce word compared to ECMAScript despite the baggage, which is probably why they chose it in the first place.
Let's say the "JavaScript" name is officially deprecated somehow. People will continue to use the name for as long as it exists.
So Deno's petition tackles these problems, addresses the root cause and appears to be legally viable. That is the "right thing to do" here. Avoiding the name does not solve the problem. It never does.
falcor84
But everyone already calls it JS. I think the transition would have been so much easier if the official name started with "J".
dkersten
Just rename it to "JS" (jay-ess) and forget about having the letters stand for anything.
petre
Like JunoScript or JangoScript? JavaScript is just very outdated ECMAScript.
pansa2
> people should rather use EcmaScript name instead of JavaScript
Or go back to calling it “LiveScript”
andix
What we use nowadays is actually ECMAScript and not JavaScript. We just call it JavaScript.
karel-3d
They now have GoFundMe where they are soliciting donations for a discovery phase of a patent cancellation request.
They have just 50k USD out of 200k USD they are raising. (No idea if that's appropriate; from the outside, it seems like a lot of money, but also they are fighting Oracle which has unlimited money, so, yeah)
For some reason it's not linked in the page itself.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-challenge-oracles-javascr...
jamesbelchamber
Don't anthropomorphise the lawnmower.
messe
The context:
> Do not fall into the trap of anthropomorphising Larry Ellison. You need to think of Larry Ellison the way you think of a lawnmower. You don't anthropomorphize your lawnmower, the lawnmower just mows the lawn, you stick your hand in there and it'll chop it off, the end. You don't think 'oh, the lawnmower hates me' -- lawnmower doesn't give a shit about you, lawnmower can't hate you. Don't anthropomorphize the lawnmower. Don't fall into that trap about Oracle. — Brian Cantrill (https://youtu.be/-zRN7XLCRhc?t=33m1s)
jeffrallen
Came here for this. Was not disappoint.
billpg
Let's stop calling it "JavaScript" entirely. "JS" is right there.
fhennig
Seems sensible to me, Oracle doesn't seem to use the trademark.
But also, what are the consequences of Oracle having the trademark, why is this an issue?
wengo314
i wish we instead dropped js for something vastly more sane.
cies
Amen to that (will never happen though).
Squarex
Can they drop javascript trademark without threating Java trademark?
andix
I guess that's the main issue. A lot of open source projects fell into this pit, when they put a related trademark into their name. Naming something OpenFastFirefox or iPhoneScript would cause a lot of trademark issues.
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homebrewer
Imagine if this effort was spent on solving more pressing problems, like the recent yet another security kerfuffle, or the overloaded maintainers whom everyone depends on but reliably fails to support.
Call the language JS, everyone already understands it, it's used on all the logos because it's short, we already another popular language with a very compact name (Go, which is harder to look up without mangling its name, and it's still doing fine).
suyash
exactly, just a whole lot of haters got nothing better to do.
I actually think that people should rather use EcmaScript name instead of JavaScript, because it's a way better name (much less confusing, given that this lang doesn't have anything to do with Java anyway). I wish Oracle started suing people to force everyone to use the better name.