History of the telephone patents, however, were commercially decisive, because they dominated telephone technology and were upheld by court decisions in the United States. The modern telephone is the result of work of many people. Alexander Graham Bell was, however, the first to patent the telephone, as an "apparatus for transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraphically". Bell has most often been credited as the inventor of the first practical telephone. However, in Germany Johann Philipp Reis is seen as a leading telephone pioneer who stopped only just short of a successful device, and as well the Italian-American inventor and businessman Antonio Meucci has been
Disclosure of the invention under the European Patent Convention patent application as filed, consisting in an insufficient identification of the subject-matter claimed, cannot subsequently be cured without offending against Article 123(2) EPC which provides that the subject-matter content of a European patent application as filed may not be extended. An insufficiently clear and complete disclosure of the invention is a ground of opposition, and revocation. Although the European Patent Convention does not exclude the patenting of "revolutionary" inventions,<ref name="T 1329/07"> Decision T 1329/07 of the Technical Board of Appeal 3.4.02 of 11 November 2010, point 2.2.3</ref> The burden of proof generally lies upon an opponent to establish insufficiency of