Category: Patents

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USPTO should stop the forced logouts from Private PAIR and EFS-Web

When you log in to USPTO’s Private PAIR and EFS-Web system, you have to go through a cumbersome process.  You have to mouse around and find a “crypto certificate” on your hard drive that proves your identity.  You have to wait for a very slow “Java applet” to run, taking some tens of seconds.  And you have to type in a password that is required to contain at least one smiley face (just kidding).  This would not be so bad except that this system logs you out at more or less random times, after anywhere from ten to sixty minutes of inactivity.  A quick trip to the bathroom or coffee machine can lead to your having to log in all over again.  In a normal work day a USPTO customer might be forced to log in again a dozen or more times.

A couple of years ago I surveyed users of PAIR and EFS-Web about this system of forced logouts.  The vast majority of respondents said that for them, this system of forced logouts is a bug, not a feature.  I passed the results of the survey along to USPTO people who are responsible for this system.  Unfortunately in the two years that have passed since this survey, USPTO has not done anything to improve this situation.

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What USPTO should do — make patent assignments viewable

USPTO, in response to pressure from the White House and from big companies that are recipients of cease-and-desist letters, recently published proposed rules with a stated goal of promoting transparency in ownership of patents.  There are many things wrong (blog) with the proposed rules.  But there is a simple thing that the USPTO could do to promote transparency in ownership of patents that would not require rulemaking at all — make patent assignments viewable.

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A blog with a name – “Ant-like Persistence”

About two months ago I launched this blog.  It took me a while, but now I have picked a name for the blog.  The alert reader will recall Learned Hand’s (perhaps backhanded) compliment to patent practitioners, citing their “ant-like persistence” (Lyon v. Boh, 1 F.2d 48, 50 (S.D.N.Y.1924).  With a nod to those patent practitioners who at the start of the twentieth century exhibited the ant-like persistence that inspired Learned Hand to write this colorful phrase, I hereby dub this the “Ant-like Persistence” blog.

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Why not allocate USPTO examiner resources intelligently?

USPTO’s present practice is to try to make patent examiners examine cases pretty much in sequence according to their filing date.  The oldest case gets examined first, more or less.  (There are of course exceptions for example for cases that are on the Patent Prosecution Highway.)  I suggest this is not the smartest way for USPTO to allocate its examination resources.

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