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Thirteen seats left for AIPLA Trademark Roundtable in Denver

It will be recalled that AIPLA is hosting a free-of-charge trademark roundtable at the Denver patent office.  Two very important people from the Trademark Office will be there — Meryl Hershkowitz, the Deputy Commissioner for Trademark Operations, and Wendy Cohen, Interlocutory Attorney for the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.  This is a rare and unique opportunity to talk face-to-face with Trademark Office people about issues that are important to you as a trademark applicant or practitioner.

Only thirteen seats remain open for this roundtable.  If you want to attend, now is the time to register.  You can see the event page here on the USPTO web site.

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Time of day returns to normal for US filers filing at the International Bureau

Readers will recall my blog post of two weeks ago in which I described that an American filer would (for a limited time of two weeks) have an extra hour during which to file a same-day filing at the IB.  Well, now it’s back to normal.  Now the drop-dead time for e-filing (or fax filing) is the usual 4PM (Mountain Time).

So for your PCT filing at the RO/IB, or your direct filing of a Hague Agreement design application, or your payment of a renewal for a Madrid Protocol international trademark registration, or an Article 19 amendment, or a PCT Demand … it’s back to normal.

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A rainy-day project – labeling electrical outlets

Here’s a fun rainy-day project for those visiting nieces and nephews – labeling the electrical outlets.  A first person is stationed at the circuit breaker panel.  A second person is roaming the house, carrying a label maker and a lamp.  These people are using walkie-talkies, if needed, or better yet, if they have amateur radio licenses, ham radio handy-talkies.  The lamp is plugged into an outlet and is turned on.  The person at the circuit breaker panel switches off the breakers one by one until it is determined which circuit breaker powers the outlet.  A label is printed and applied to the cover plate of the outlet.  (For example in this case it is breaker number 15.)  The process is repeated until every electrical outlet has been labeled.

For extra credit, a third person can sketch a map of the house and the outlet locations plotted on the map.  The map can then be posted next to the circuit breaker panel.

When the project is finished, everybody can make popcorn and watch a movie.  A fun activity for the entire family!

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USPTO thinks there is such a thing as a “provisional patent”?

I guess probably a dozen times a day I go to the USPTO web site.  I go to the home page, and then I click around until I find what I need (for example Private PAIR).

Now we all know there is no such thing as a “provisional patent”, right?  Yes there is such a think as a “provisional patent application”.  But there is no such thing as a “provisional patent:.

I just now noticed an astonishing thing about the main page of the USPTO.  The home page of the USPTO invites the visitor to search for information on a “provisional patent”.

Continue reading “USPTO thinks there is such a thing as a “provisional patent”?”

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Learning about “wifi calling”

Today’s blog article is a “tech” article and it is a “trademarks” article. The main point of this blog article is that probably you should activate “wifi calling” on your mobile phone, if you have not already done so.

For most mobile telephone customers in the US, wifi calling has only been available for a few months. So a reader of this blog may be forgiven for having failed to activate this service before now.

What is wifi calling? Continue reading “Learning about “wifi calling””

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ISA/RU search fee to increase on May 1

For a US filer who is filing a PCT application and who is picking the Russian patent office, the search fee will increase on May 1, 2017.  The search fee, presently $449, will increase to $482.

If you rank ISAs in order by the size of the search fees, the Russian patent office will still be the least expensive searching authority available to US filers after May 1, just as it is now.

The formal name of the Russian patent office is Federal Service for Intellectual Property but the nickname is Rospatent.  Which gives us an opportunity to brush up on our knowledge Cyrillic.  As you can see in the logo at the upper right, in Cyrillic the “P” is what we English speakers would voice as an “r”.  The “C” is what we would voice as an “s”.  The Π (like a Greek letter π) is what we would voice as a “p”.  And the “H” is what we would voice as an “n”.

Which brings me to a fun old classic mystery movie in which this Cyrillic H played a part.  In the movie, a handkerchief is found with an “H” embroidered on it.  This implicates a person whose name is pronounced starting with an “h”.  But a clever person in the movie realizes that the “H” might be sounded as an “n”, implicating a person with a Russian name.

The first person to post a comment identifying this movie will win a super spiffy digital voltmeter from Oppedahl Patent Law Firm LLC.