But their questions kept coming back to is the "component", is "software" the physically manifest medium or is it just the information.

The "blueprint" analogy was almost perfect.

They've obviously seen enough background material to begin to understand why most of us techies assert that software should NOT be patentable.  And how treating it as patentable in this case led to the contradiction of US patents dictating enforcement of US Law on foreign soil.

It seemed to me that the justices had almost made up their mind that software patents are a mistake and were probing the attornies on both sides to give them reason not to think so.

The real, albeit very cerebral, fun was watching the MS attornies try to have it both ways.  They want to "win" but they don't want software patents invalidated, which at this point seems about as likely as an is-but-is-not ruling that patents are "components" on US soil but just designs outside US jurisdiction.   It was an amusing dance.

ASB I've read that you cant count on anything from the arguments, but I'm hopeful.  Remember the "software patents" madness is a very recent "innovaton" brought in by the back door anyway.

I'm hopeful, but too cynical to be much so.