For every new JSR, there has been a new Apache project which has been, if not the de-facto reference implementation, one of the major implementations (for better or worse). I just don't see this happening in the future. There will obviously be other organizations that will take up the slack, but I honestly don't see it working as well as with Apache.

I know all about the new-hotness that are Groovy, JRuby, Closure, Scala, KDK, Android etc... This isn't a Java-the-language discussion. This is a Java the platform/JVM discussion. Oracle's actions so far have been pretty chilling for the entire platform. You can't run any of the above without the JVM, and that is what Oracle is controlling.

Java will survive for a long time, and I don't think that anyone doubts that. But for the first time in a long time there is some doubt about whether or not it is a platform to build future products on.

In my mind, Apache is the canary in the coal mine. It might take a while, but they will lose their position of dominance over this.

Then again, it's been a ~15 years, isn't the industry ready to promote something else as the new major language? We've already seen Ruby and Python strengthen their positions.