Alexander Graham Bell - Patent Thief?

DynaSoar writes "MSNBC is carrying an AP article reviewing a book, due out January 7, that claims to show definitive evidence that Bell stole the essential idea for telephony from Elisha Gray. Author Seth Shulman shows that Bell's notebooks contain false starts, and then after a 12-day gap during which he visited the US Patent Office, suddenly show an entirely different design, very similar to Gray's design for multiplexing Morse code signals. Shulman claims that Bell copied the design from Gray's patent application and was improperly given credit for earlier submission, with the help of a corrupt patent examiner and aggressive lawyers. Shulman also claims that fear of being found out is the reason Bell distanced himself from the company that carried his name. And if Gray Telephone doesn't seem to roll off the tongue, Shulman also noted that both of them were two decades behind the German inventor Johann Philipp Reis, who produced the first working telephony system."

how timely

[Hognoxious]

Brought to you by the isn't-this-just-a-little-bit-too-late department.

That's interesting.

[wcrowe]

So he's sort of the Bill Gates of the 19th century.

Read the patent number!

[192939495969798999]

Bell Stamp: I invented the telephone.

Gray: You stole it from me, Elisha Gray.

Bell: Read the patent number, bitch!

There are so many victims!

[FredFredrickson]

I'm another victim of this type of fraud. It seems that there needs to be a safeguard against this type of thing.

I invented a little button that allows you to buy things by clicking a single button once [slashdot.org], but I keep getting threatened with law suits!! THIS NEEDS TO STOP! I WANT MY ROYALTIES! Damn you patent squatters!

Re:Read the patent number!

[smittyoneeach]

Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Will_Rogers [wikiquote.org]

Re:Grey Area

[Intron]

Those who don't study history are doomed to reinvent it. And then patent it. ?? And then profit!

Re:Common Sense for Patents

[ByOhTek]

A good, honest, rational solution rather than ranting and raging with little useful information and no add to the topic?

You must be new here.

I had a few of those thoughts myself, but not all of them. Nice (and short) read.

I would add that people should be allowed to submit evidence of prior-art after patent acceptance without having to go through legal processes (violating the patent, going to court, and then *hoping* to win).

Re:Antonio Meucci invented the t

[colin_s_guthrie]

And it is here that I should point out that Bell was Scottish (born in my own fair City of Edinburgh) which makes him European (tho' arguably not at the time!). That's the trouble with everything that's got a modicum of thought/intelligence behind it - Americans' always think that they invented everything when it's clear to all those who looked, that the Scots invented the modern world [amazon.co.uk]. Telephone, Television, Penicillin and all the rest of it.

Try peeing higher than that :p

(Now I grant you you may have been referring to Grey, but I'm ignoring that due to the context of your Wikipedia quote).

Re:The most interesting thing about this controver

[Shakrai]

That's a lot of people; is it really so strange that two people with have the same idea

Does that mean if L. Ron hadn't invented Scientology somebody else would have? ;)

Scary thought.....

Re:The most interesting thing about this controver

[tie_guy_matt]

What you are saying is that Edison is credited with inventing something just because he had the breakthrough of having something that actually worked? What were they thinking?