Category: Patents

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Attend a two-presenter, 2½-day live in-person Patent Cooperation Treaty seminar in beautiful Colorado

Long-time PCT enthusiasts will appreciate that in recent years, there have been few opportunities in the US to get high quality PCT training with more than one experienced presenter on the dais.

Such PCT enthusiasts will likewise appreciate that in recent years, there have been few opportunities in the US to get high quality PCT training of such depth and breadth as to call for more than one day of training.

Now for the first time since before Covid, attend a multi-day live in-person Patent Cooperation Treaty seminar in the US taught by two experienced presenters.  This training will take place in beautiful Colorado, near the Denver airport.

Maybe also attend an optional half-day program specifically directed to docketing of the PCT!

Loyal readers of this blog are encouraged to subscribe, if they have not already done so.  Loyal readers of this blog are also encouraged to use coupon codes (which expire July 28) for discounts on the registration fees:

    • coupon code BL1 – 2.5-day seminar $200 off
    • coupon code BL2 – docketing $60 off
    • coupon code BL3 – both courses, $260 off

For more information, or to register, click here.

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USPTO’s non-DOCX surcharge rears its ugly head again

(Update:  23 hours have passed since I opened ticket number 2-01001251 about Patent Center puking on a patent application prepared in Libre Office.  Nobody from the USPTO got back to me during these 23 hours.  Tomorrow is the priority date on which I need to get this patent application filed.  I phoned up the EBC again just now, and was told “the only other thing I can recommend is just use [Microsoft] Word.”  See followup blog article.)

The USPTO’s non-DOCX surcharge is now rearing its ugly head again.  Let’s see if, between now and tomorrow, May 15, 2026, the USPTO people in charge of the non-DOCX penalty provide decent software support for the filing of a new patent application that was prepared using a word processor that is not Microsoft Word. Watch this blog to see how the USPTO handles this defect in Patent Center. Continue reading “USPTO’s non-DOCX surcharge rears its ugly head again”

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PCT training in San Francisco on Wednesday, May 13

Are you attending the AIPLA Spring 2026 meeting at the San Francisco Fairmont hotel?  If so, I invite you to attend some PCT training on Wednesday, May 13 from 4PM to 6PM in the French Room.  Your presenters are Hanna Kang from WIPO and yours truly.  We will talk about two topics:

    • choosing a Receiving Office, and
    • choosing an International Searching Authority.

The training is sponsored by the PCT Issues Committee.

Here are the presentation slides for “choosing an ISA”.

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USPTO corrects its new web site

Two days ago I blogged (see blog article) about a hallucination on the USPTO’s new web site, namely the existence of a “provisional patent”.    The web site said:

File a provisional patent

Now the USPTO has corrected the web site.  Now the bullet point is:

File a provisional patent application