Digital Trends

Microsoft has been granted a patent on the Page Up and Page Down keystrokes — but did they really invent them?

Microsoft is getting close to owning 10,000 patents, and the latest is one for the Page Up and Page Down keys on your computer keyboard. Yes, really.

They first applied for the patent in 2005 and were finally granted it last week, according to ZDNet, although the service showed a 1981 IBM keyboard with those keys.

In the patent application the invention of the keys is credited to Timothy Sellers, Heather Grantham and Joshua Dersch and described as "in one implementation, pressing a Page Down or Page Up keyboard key/button allows a user to begin at any starting vertical location within a page, and navigate to that same location on the next or previous page."

Microsoft also holds patents on double-clicking buttons and a scrolling mouse wheel that some argue was based on work originally done by others or arose from a common idea.