growabrain: Tennis For Two

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May 29, 2008

Tennis For Two

Way back in 1958, William Higinbotham invented “Tennis For Two” to liven up visitor day at Brookhaven National Laboratory, his workplace. The game uses an oscilloscope with two control pads. It remained largely unknown until 1981 when a lawyer trying to break Magnavox's patent for video games came across writings talking about the game.

Blueprints of it were found to predate Magnavox's game, the case was settled out of court, and the game found fame as the second ever invented, since it was later predated by A.S. Douglas' 'OXO' game from 1952.

In retrospect, Higinbotham agreed he should have applied for a patent. But if he had, the patent would have belonged to the Federal government, and no riches would have come his way, anyway. The reason he did not apply, was that at the time, it didn't seem to be any more novel than the bouncing ball circuit in the instruction book

(Music on the video is 'To Find Our Freedom' by Peacekeepers, from the album 'Message From Planet Earth')

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