In this article David Noble traces the evolution of the patent, providing critical insight into the changing nature of invention and the controls exerted upon that process by the relevent social groups of industry and government. The writers of the American constitution introduced a transformative view of the patent system "to promote the progress of science, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive rights to their respective writings and discoveries." A priority was clearly being placed on the recognition and reward of inventive thought. By giving the inventor the right to prevent others from making, using or selling the invention, it was assumed that the technique would be developed for commercial use under the protection given. Thus the patent system was introduced to benefit both society and the inventor. As the size of business grew with rapid industrialization, patent owning corporations replaced inventors in the exploitation of patents. The inventor was increasingly enticed to give up his patent rights in exchange for corporate funding and security. In 1885 twelve percent of patents were issued to corporations, by 1950 that figure had risen to at least seventy five percent. The reasoning behind this remarkable shift toward institutional control was economic in nature. Patents were the most effective way to control competition, being in essence the only legal form of absolute monopoly. The science based industries were dependent upon patent monopolies from the outset and thus searched for ways to bend the system and circumvent the Sherman and Clayton anti-trust acts. As it turned out, securing patent monopolies proved to be the most efficient method of obtaining and prolonging command of a science based market.
The intent of the patent system, the protection of the lone inventor, became superceded by one in which the institutions who favoured invention fell under the patent umbrella of protection. Thus a system emerged as yet another means to corporate ends. It became mandatory for each employee to sign a contract automatically rendering patent rights to the employer. Noble illustrates this pattern with the examples of AT&T and General Electric. The individual policies of GE and AT&T were precisely crafted to prolong monopolies over patents vital to their industry. To accomplish this they incorporated into their policies such methods as incomplete disclosure of information in patent applications, the use of trademarks, the outright suppression or delayed introduction of patented products, the compulsory assigning of employee patents to the company and the deliberate production of auxiliary patents. This was obviously an attempt to prevent competitive interests from entering the market in question and it was paralleled by a hitherto unheard of fortune spent on internal research.
The major outcome of these developments was a change in the actual nature of invention. It had moved from the sphere of the individual, to team research in the laboratories of the large corporations. The nature of the work itself changed, it was often conducted under high pressure, with the inventor having little control over the work he was doing. The image described is that of an assembly line of inventors, drained of the pleasure of discovery and alienated from the rewards that so attracted the inventor of old.