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Sign up for tomorrow’s EPO webinar on PCT

(Update:  the webinar took place and I have written an article about it.)

Well, folks, maybe you knew about this imminent webinar a long time ago, but somehow I only learned about it today.  You know how you hate it that EPO only sends ISR/WOs out by postal mail?  Not electronically?  Well, I gather EPO intends to drag itself into the previous decade and plans to provide some electronic way to receive your ISR/WOs.

Yes, an extremely important webinar will take place about 24 hours from now.  Yes, I am giving you a mere 24 hours’ advance notice on this one.  Sorry about that.  Continue reading “Sign up for tomorrow’s EPO webinar on PCT”

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Getting a prompt Filing Receipt in a 371 case?

In the community of US practitioners who regularly enter the US national phase from a PCT application, it is a well-known problem that it takes an unreasonably long time for the USPTO to mail out a Filing Receipt.  There is, I am sorry to say, a dirty little secret way to get prompt filing receipt in such cases.  Normally I do not make use of it, but just now I plan to use it in one of my cases.  Continue reading “Getting a prompt Filing Receipt in a 371 case?”

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The State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania becomes trendy, modern and up-to-date

Dear readers, the important thing to remember is that you heard it here first!  On January 1, 2023, the State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania will become trendy, modern and up-to-date.  That is the date that the Lithuanian patent office will become a member of the DAS system for electronic interchange of priority documents.  Continue reading “The State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania becomes trendy, modern and up-to-date”

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US filers and filing at WIPO and daylight saving time

Keep in mind that most locations in the US will turn off daylight saving time today (November 6, 2022), but today is not the day that Switzerland will turn off daylight saving time.  (Switzerland turned off DST a week ago.)

Those who are filing documents at the International Bureau — documents that need a same-day filing date — should check to make sure they know what time it is in Switzerland as of today.

The main point here is that for a US filer, everything is now “back to normal”.  Whatever time zone offset a US filer is accustomed to between his or her time zone and Geneva, that offset is back to normal.

ePCT will tell you what time it is in Switzerland.

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Which ePCT topics you want me to teach sooner than others!

Yesterday I posted a blog article asking readers to let me know which ePCT topics they want me to teach sooner than other topics.  I listed fifteen topics.  I provided a very long and tedious questionnaire by which readers could indicate their personal rankings of the fifteen topics, as “urgent” or “average urgency” or “not urgent”.  Fifty-four readers responded, for which I am quite grateful.  Here you can see what they said:  Continue reading “Which ePCT topics you want me to teach sooner than others!”

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Which ePCT topics do you want me to teach sooner than others?

Update!  You can see the results here.

Hello dear readers.  How time flies!  It was a mere ¾ of a year ago that I announced (blog article) my plans to teach fifteen webinars on ePCT topics (as distinguished from PCT topics).  Now I really plan to get moving on these webinars.  I should mention that these webinars will be free of charge, thanks to sponsorship from WIPO.  Now what I ask is that readers please tell me which ePCT topics they want me to teach sooner than others.  Continue reading “Which ePCT topics do you want me to teach sooner than others?”

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Exploring the “gotchas” in the imminent shortened three-month trademark response period

In my blog article of October 12, 2022, I discussed the imminent shortened three-month response periods that will face trademark applicants starting on December 1, 2022.  Toward the end of the article I described what I saw as two “gotchas”, namely ways that an applicant could end up with an abandoned trademark application if the applicant were to choose to try to tough it out and hold back from paying the $125 extension-of-time fee.    Alert reader Michael Brown points out that depending upon the level of kind-heartedness in your Examining Attorney, you might not end up running afoul of the “gotchas”.  Continue reading “Exploring the “gotchas” in the imminent shortened three-month trademark response period”

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Daylight saving time and WIPO

Keep in mind that Switzerland will turn off daylight saving time today, October 30, 2022.  Those who are filing documents at the International Bureau — documents that need a same-day filing date — should check to make sure they know what time it is in Switzerland as of today.

For US filers, keep in mind that the US will not turn off DST today.  The US will turn off DST a week from now, on November 6, 2022.

US filers who are getting ready to file a document at the IB should thus pay close attention during this next week to what time it is in Switzerland.

Most readers of my blog will appreciate that the correct terminology is not “Daylight Savings Time” but “Daylight Saving Time”.

The practical effect for most US filers is that for the next week, you get an extra hour to e-file.  For example if you are in the Mountain Time Zone, normally you rush to file by 4PM if need a same-day filing date at the IB.  But for the next week you can file as late as 5PM and you will still get a same-day filing date at the IB.