How did the software patent disaster begin?
Read all about this topic in "patently absurd":
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.07/patents_pr.html
Furthermore, do a search in google or yahoo under "diamond vs diehr".
March 3,1981
For the first time in the history, a patent protection of a digital algorithm became proclaimed as under statutory basis - AGAINST the resistance of the US Patent Office; AGAINST the US Patent Office Board of Appeals; AGAINST the desperately expressed worries about threatening patent-inflation - as a consequence thereof; and AGAINST the opinions of many judges and experts.
E.