Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site weitek.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!qantel!hplabs!turtlevax!weitek!mahar From: mahar@weitek.UUCP (mahar) Newsgroups: net.music.synth,net.games.video Subject: Re: Marble Madness & FM Music Synthesis Message-ID: <269@weitek.UUCP> Date: Mon, 16-Sep-85 13:35:24 EDT Article-I.D.: weitek.269 Posted: Mon Sep 16 13:35:24 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 21-Sep-85 05:21:49 EDT References: <2614@ihnss.UUCP> <267@weitek.UUCP> <2882@ut-sally.UUCP> Organization: Weitek Corp. Sunnyvale Ca. Lines: 17 Xref: watmath net.music.synth:524 net.games.video:488 Summary: well . . . In article <2882@ut-sally.UUCP>, crandell@ut-sally.UUCP (Jim Crandell) writes: > In article <267@weitek.UUCP> mahar@weitek.UUCP (mahar) writes: > >In article <2614@ihnss.UUCP>, knudsen@ihnss.UUCP writes: > >> FM chip should be pretty easy to build. > >Your right. FM chips are not that hard to build. However, Yamaha > >has the basic patent on FM sound generation. Atari's lawyers > >didn't want to fight it so they just bought the chips from Yamaha. > > Uh -- wait a minute. Exar was making an FM-able waveform generator > chip (XR206, I think) fifteen years ago. Aren't you leaving out a > significant part of the story? Patenting FM synthesis is a lot like patenting the color blue to my mind. I'm well aware that others were there first. They didn't get that patent however. There exists a feature of patent law which makes an idea unpatentable if "it is obvious to anyone skilled in the art." I think FM qualifys here. Yamaha's lawyers have big teeth however, and Atari didn't want to mess with them.