My weblog, http://radio.weblogs.com/0107846/2002/08/13.html#a62 has a link to a Datamation Interview with Ray Tomlinson who is credited with inventing e-mail in 1971, and Discovery Magazine gave him a special award because of his achievements. I see that Earl has 1972 for when the software was released, that Ray wrote. The discrepancy might be based on who got what info when. Was there any beta testing? Was it patented or copyrighted before it was released?