It has been more than a quarter of a century since the Supreme Court issued a substantive opinion concerning 35 USC section 101 — Diamond v. Diehr. On the same day that the Court heard the oral argument in Diamond v. Diehr, it also heard a companion case in Diamond v. Bradley. Diamond v. Bradley concerned 35 USC section 101 in the context of an apparatus claim for a computer. Chief Justice Burger took no part in the decision which resulted in a 4-4 split decision by the remaining eight justices. As a result, the CCPA’s judgment was affirmed.
Obviously, computing has advanced significantly in the last quarter of a century. However, the following sound bite truly puts that advancement in perspective. [Listen] (“[W]ord processors — you know, those machines that are replacing typewriters in offices.”)