Ant-Like Persistence

Here is a PDF copy of a letter that got sent today to USPTO Director Kathi Vidal about Patent Center.  The letter, dated September 29, 2023, is from One Hundred Seventy-Eight Members of the Patent Center Listserv.  An HTML copy of the letter, with clickable links, may be seen here.

The emailed PDF copy of the letter got sent early in the morning of Friday, September 29th.  The paper copy of the letter to Director Vidal, sent by USPS, got delivered this morning, Monday, October 2 (click here to see tracking).  Here is the opening paragraph of the letter:

This is an urgent matter for your personal attention.  We write to ask that decommissioning of the USPTO’s two main software systems for patent applicants, Private PAIR and EFS-Web, currently announced for November 8, 2023, be delayed until Patent Center is complete and robust.  These software systems are the USPTO’s primary interface, critical-path linchpins for the entire US patent system.  This letter identifies a number of individual defects in the Patent Center software.  The pattern of software defects suggests something larger and more important—defects in the USPTO’s software development process.  We suggest that the USPTO’s current process trajectory cannot bring Patent Center to acceptable functionality or quality in six weeks.  These issues require your personal attention, and cannot be delegated.

I certainly hope that Director Vidal will read the letter carefully and will give much thought to the letter.

Update:  the letter has been sent.

Hello dear readers.  At https://blog.oppedahl.com/?page_id=9872 you can see a letter that is now “locked” for you to sign.  This is about the USPTO’s scheduled shutdown of Private PAIR and EFS-Web on November 8, 2023.

As of right now the people who have already signed add up to over seventy signers.  They have between them paid over $38 million to the USPTO in the past decade.  They have between them prosecuted more than 32K US patents to issuance in the past decade.

I plan to close the signature system by about the early morning of Friday the 29^th.  I plan to send out the letter in the middle of the day on Friday the 29^th.  If you are willing to sign, please do so now rather than postponing your signature until Friday the 29^th.

The USPTO announced a couple of days ago that it has picked the date (November 8, 2023) on which it plans to shut down Private PAIR and EFS-Web, leaving its paying customers with nothing to use except the bug-ridden Patentcenter.  (See USPTO announces shutdown of EFS-Web and Private PAIR, September 20, 2023.)  This decision by USPTO management to shut down Private PAIR and EFS-Web would, perhaps, be a sound decision if several things were true:  Continue reading “Patentcenter is not yet ready for general release”

It is recalled that one of USPTO’s stated goals for Patentcenter is that before it shuts down EFS-Web (scheduled to occur on November 8, 2023), the USPTO will bring forward all of the functions and features of EFS-Web into Patentcenter.  It is also a matter of common sense that each function and feature in Patentcenter that works for one application type needs to be implemented for all other relevant application types.   This blog article reports that the USPTO is now doubling down on a baffling refusal to implement the “Corrected Application Data Sheet” function for 371 applications.   USPTO’s position is, apparently, that so long as the USPTO documents the defect, then this relieves the USPTO of any need to actually correct the defect. Disappointingly, the USPTO extends this refusal to Hague and provisional applications as well. Continue reading “USPTO won’t fix the missing “corrective ADS” features in Patentcenter”

It is distressing to have to do fact-checking on USPTO webinars, but that is what the attendee is reduced to.  In a September 19, 2023 webinar, the USPTO presenter stated that Patentcenter trouble ticket CP33 (“sort by patent number”) has been fixed.  This is untrue.  Continue reading “No, USPTO has not fixed “sort by patent number” in Patentcenter”

The USPTO has announced (see the press release that the USPTO altered to say “November 15”) that on November 8, 2023, seven weeks from today, it will shut down EFS-Web and Private PAIR.  USPTO customers will be left only with Patentcenter.  Barring some surprise, this will be a disaster for USPTO customers.  Continue reading “USPTO announces shutdown of EFS-Web and Private PAIR”