<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> Erwinspiano@aol.com wrote:   <blockquote TYPE=CITE>                 Richard   <blockquote TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">        Thanks for the balanced viewpoint here Richard</blockquote>           Regards>>>Dale Erwin   <blockquote TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">  This discussion has gone back and forth for a hundred years or more now, and its been illustrated in innumerable ways  throughout our tradition. One has a choice to make and one chooses based on what particular balancing of touch and tonal effects one wants. All that is fine. Where we go over the border is when we insist that there is some rational for declaring one particular preference is by definition superior to others. The areana simply does not fit the game as it were. And really folks... the diversity is one of our real strengths. The really new aspect of all of this development is the advent of a system for unprecedented evening  </blockquote>  </blockquote> And thanks for your refreshing replies last nite (my time) and again today. I was meaning to send you a note about your review of stance on the patent question. Suffice to say it reflects your sense of honor and ethics in an admirable manner. My hat's off to you ! Cheers Dale :) RicB     -- Richard Brekne RPT, N.P.T.F. UiB, Bergen, Norway <A HREF="mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no">mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no</A> <A HREF="http://home.broadpark.no/~rbrekne/ricmain.html">http://home.broadpark.no/~rbrekne/ricmain.html</A>  </html>