Last year I attended a meeting of the ACM at HP in San Jose. The topic was the early history of computing. During the session the presenter touched on a patent court case for a patent on digital computing that had occurred in 1973. I was not exactly up with the latest tech news back then and missed the story. That you have not heard of the case if because the patent was not upheld. Had it been, and had the patent applicant done the usual evergreening, computer might still refer to a job role, rather than a machine.
I am probably not anti patents; just anti the present US patent system which is being foisted on the world through their bilateral trade deals. Yes, unfortunately Australia now grants software patents. Hopefully the Europeans will bring some sense to this by continuing to refuse to go the US way. My opinion is that these temporary government granted monopolies should be granted in far fewer cases than they now are. The original idea when they were first introduced in England hundreds of years ago was to foster innovation, not to prevent it.
This very fascinating story is related at http://www.scl.ameslab.gov/ABC/Trial.html.
As an aside, the court case also found that John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry had constructed the first electronic digital computer at Iowa State College in the 1939 – 1942 period, not the Mauchly and Eckert who had been taking credit for three decades. The Wikipedia entry gives a balanced account. Encarta does too, even mentioning that Atanasoff was not given credit until the court case in 1973.
