AFAIK, the wind model patent in the US has expired. It would be nice if GO started development on one. It would make all the difference on some organ models.
The HW homepage still lists the wind model restriction for US. Why should HW inhibt a already working feature only US persons, if there would be no patent?
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However, on careful consideration of the patent itself, I see no reason whatsoever to pursue a purely digital wind model. The patent is very elaborate on describing how to create such an emulation using discrete electronic components. That is very different from a digital model.
So, what is holding everyone? Once you've created and published such a model, no-one can ever file a patent again but you, due to prior art.
For comparison, one of the patents referring to this, is US6369310, describing the "remote control of electronic instruments", filed in 2000, granted in 2002, in a period where MIDI and OSC were already well established. Either the PO-guys were sleeping and granted a patent which wont stand a chance in court, or there is room for specific deviations to reach the same goal using different techniques. I think the latter.
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You read the patent the wrong way. Ignore everything except the claims section.
For each claim, you either need to show a prior art (something which implemented/described something matching the claim) or find one aspect, why a implementation would not match the claim.
If you can do this for all claim of a patent, we can ignore the patent.
A good patent laywer takes care, that the claims are very generic and that the second claim extends the first with something a little bit more specific, so that even if you can invalidate claim 1, claim 2 still can be valid.
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Another and much simpler method would be to develop such a model anyway and create two distributions of GO: one with and one without a working wind model. If you are clear why you did this and warn US-citizens to only use the one without due to patent issues, other people can still enjoy the virtues of spontaneous detuning. This is the road HW took. For OS you should host the US-patent infringing version on non-US servers.
It is a US-patent, not a world dominion patent. Don't let them scare you away from innovation.
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The HW homepage still lists the wind model restriction for US. Why should HW inhibt a already working feature only US persons, if there would be no patent?
Well, I reacted on rumors on the web. Too soon, I guess. The patent is still there:
http://www.google.com/patents/US5508472
However, on careful consideration of the patent itself, I see no reason whatsoever to pursue a purely digital wind model. The patent is very elaborate on describing how to create such an emulation using discrete electronic components. That is very different from a digital model.
So, what is holding everyone? Once you've created and published such a model, no-one can ever file a patent again but you, due to prior art.
For comparison, one of the patents referring to this, is US6369310, describing the "remote control of electronic instruments", filed in 2000, granted in 2002, in a period where MIDI and OSC were already well established. Either the PO-guys were sleeping and granted a patent which wont stand a chance in court, or there is room for specific deviations to reach the same goal using different techniques. I think the latter.
You read the patent the wrong way. Ignore everything except the claims section.
For each claim, you either need to show a prior art (something which implemented/described something matching the claim) or find one aspect, why a implementation would not match the claim.
If you can do this for all claim of a patent, we can ignore the patent.
A good patent laywer takes care, that the claims are very generic and that the second claim extends the first with something a little bit more specific, so that even if you can invalidate claim 1, claim 2 still can be valid.
Ok, we could do that.
Another and much simpler method would be to develop such a model anyway and create two distributions of GO: one with and one without a working wind model. If you are clear why you did this and warn US-citizens to only use the one without due to patent issues, other people can still enjoy the virtues of spontaneous detuning. This is the road HW took. For OS you should host the US-patent infringing version on non-US servers.
It is a US-patent, not a world dominion patent. Don't let them scare you away from innovation.