Well,
It would have been a treat if Mr. Kemper had actually decided to comment on my patent link post, but I can’t blame him if he decides not to because that’s the smart money call. I’ve been down the patent road a couple times, and I glad there’s an IP attorney among us (Hi, Adfinitum) here to comment.
For anyone who’s curious, Line 6’s 1998 modelling patent (http://bit.ly/y90f5u) is pretty much the Mother Of All Amp Modeling Patents. And Douglas L. Jackson’s 2003 patent (previously mentioned, http://bit.ly/yBZtJF) is my nominee for the Mother Of All Amp Profiling Patents. For a while I wondered if Chris’ KPA was actually that design made real, but since it does not incorporate intermodulation distortion analysis I’m optimistic that the KPA is on to something original.
Now, Cristoph’s patent link was German but fortunately he’s applied in the U.S. as well, and you can read an English version at http://bit.ly/A1rVZD. This application (originally filed in 2007) is still pending.
In case you’re wondering, I’m a musical patent collector of sorts (I keep a list of these on my Website) because patents tell the other half of the story, namely the part that’s left out of AES papers and design conferences like DAFX. But, they’re admittedly difficult reading; you’re dealing with inventors who are trying to obscure their inventions by trying to cast overly wide nets over their claims (i.e, over-generalizing things through abstraction) or trying to cast overly narrow nets by revealing as little as they can get away with while being generally unenlightening about things.
But the point is, where utility patents like this are concerned, is to Reveal As Much Prior Art As You Can In Order To Explain What Makes Your Invention Different while Explaining In Detail How To Build A Particular (Physical, Material) Something. Patents don’t exist to protect Ideas – they exist to protect their Implementations. So, whenever Patent claims are brought up by anyone, I ask people to take nothing at face value and digest the actual works in question. And as Adfinitum mentioned, he’s right – I’m not aware of Line6 having ever litigated their modeling patent either, and frankly it makes So Many Claims that I’m not sure if they ever really could. This is the Keep It Simple Stupid rule of patents – more complexity means more holes for others to attack. But at least they’re practical claims, and the same goes for the Jackson patent.
I’m not at all concerned with any potential patent claims coming from the Axe-FX front, although I would be unimpressed by Cliff Chase as a businessman if he didn't try to cast some FUD in this area. Most people think that patents are an ironclad guarantee of inventor rights, but really they’re not – the “guarantee” comes through active litigation, and ONLY active litigation. Patents themselves are mainly proof that the inventor claimed something by a certain date, and classified it accurately – beyond that, it’s Game On which why the only people who benefit from patent litigation are Large Companies with Deep Pockets.
-djh