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When exactly does the $400 non-DOCX penalty kick in?

Here is what the USPTO said today (archived here) about its $400 penalty for failing to file in Microsoft Word format:

As previously noted, we will continue to allow filings in non-DOCX filing formats for new, non-provisional utility patent applications until January 17, 2024. After January 17, those filing new, non-provisional utility patent applications with specification, claims, and abstract in non-DOCX filing formats will incur a surcharge.

It’s clear that filings carried out on January 16, 2023, or earlier, may be done in trusted PDF format without penalty.  It’s clear that filings carried out on January 18, 2023, or later, must include a Microsoft-Word-formatted copy of the patent application to avoid the penalty.

But what will happen for patent applications filed on January 17, 2024?  

The Federal Register notice says the effective date of the penalty will be January 17, 2024.  This means that a filer who files on January 17 (and fails to provide the Microsoft-Word-formatted copy) will incur the penalty.

But the quoted language above says the penalty will be incurred for applications filed after January 17.  In other words, a filing that is not “after January 17” will not incur the penalty.  And I note that January 17 and “after January 17” have no overlap.  They are not the same thing.

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Let’s complete a survey for the PCT people at WIPO

Hello dear readers.  The people at WIPO who handle the PCT system are hoping to do a better job for their users, and so they have posted a questionnaire.  If you make use of ePCT, or if you use the services of RO/IB, you can share your thoughts through this questionnnaire.  Here is the invitation:

Starting in March 2023, the RO/IB has been working as a Pilot Team on enhancing our customer services.  We need again your support to ensure that we meet your expectations. We also invite you to share your ideas to help us go further.  Please complete the survey below and feel free to forward it to anyone in your PCT community.  Please click here and start the survey. It will take around 2 minutes.

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In “In re Chestek LLC”, oral argument transcript now available

It will be recalled that on December 7, 2023, an oral argument took place before the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit for In re Chestek PLLC. This appeal relates to the USPTO’s requirement that a trademark applicant reveal to the USPTO where he or she sleeps at night.

A transcript of the oral argument is now available. You can listen to the audio recording of the oral argument here.  It is important to realize that the transcript that follows is based upon best efforts, but the authoritative source is the audio recording.

The recording is about 30 minutes in duration.   The judges on this panel were:

    • Judge Alan D. Lourie
    • Judge Raymond T. Chen
    • Judge Kara F. Stoll

The two speakers at the lectern were:

    • Andrew Grossman, for appellant in re Chestek PLLC
    • Mary Beth Walker, for appellee the USPTO

As a reminder you can see the appeal briefs here.

The transcript follows.

Continue reading “In “In re Chestek LLC”, oral argument transcript now available”

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Today’s oral argument for In re Chestek PLLC

(Update:  a transcript of the oral argument is now available. )

As I wrote recently (blog article) I will be an observer at the oral argument for In re Chestek PLLC.   It will be possible to listen to a live stream of the oral argument here.  The session begins today at 10AM Eastern Time.  A case called IOENGINE, PLLC v. lngenico Inc will go first (taking an estimated 40 minutes) and then the oral argument for In re Chestek LLC will take place.   To prepare for the event you may wish to review the briefs.  You can see:

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Being smart about receiving book royalties from Amazon

Let’s suppose that you have some book that is published through the Amazon publishing-on-demand platform (which very annoyingly is named “Kindle Desktop Publishing”).   And let’s suppose (keep with me on this) that you actually would like to receive your author royalties for this book.  It turns out that if you have an account with Wise Business, you can set things up to have a much better chance of actually receiving your royalties.  Continue reading “Being smart about receiving book royalties from Amazon”

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Picking a trusted place to back up your smart phone

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Let’s imagine something that might be unlikely (stick with me on this)  namely that you have a smart phone.  Yes I realize that you may have an old-fashioned phone that is not a smart phone.  But maybe it is an Android phone (yay!) or maybe it is an iPhone (some day you will migrate away to what I think is a better kind of smart phone, but I suppose no time soon).  And in the event that you do have a smart phone, let’s suppose you like the idea of backing it up to some trusted place.  What are the absolutely worst places to back up your smart phone (hint:  probably you are right now backing it up to a place that is not a good place)?    What is an example of a smart place to back up your smart phone?  Continue reading “Picking a trusted place to back up your smart phone”

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getting good use of your code-required smoke alarms

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If your home was constructed in the past twenty years, it almost certainly has several code-required smoke alarms.  You can see, at right, an example of this.  The home that I discuss here has half a dozen of these First Alert model 3120B smoke alarms.

The point of this blog article is to help you make some actual meaningful use of your code-required smoke alarms, above and beyond their intended function which is to permit the building inspector to grant a “certificate of occupancy” for the newly constructed home.  Continue reading “getting good use of your code-required smoke alarms”

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Has your membership in a listserv been disabled due to “excessive bounces”?

(Updated November 25, 2023 to recognize that if your email service provider is bouncing the normal listserv postings, your email service provider may also have bounced the warning message that was sent to you about your email service provider bouncing the normal listserv postings.)

In recent days, dozens of members of our intellectual property listservs have received (or at least have been sent) email warnings that start like this:

Your membership in the mailing list <blah> has been disabled due to excessive bounces.  The last bounce received from you was dated <recent date>. You will not get any more messages from this list until you re-enable your membership. You will receive 2 more reminders like this before your membership in the list is deleted.

If you received such an email warning, this is because (a) you belong to one or more of our listservs, and (b) you selected Microsoft (outlook) to be your email service provider.   But of course another possibility is that you did not receive this warning email message, because your email service provider bounced the warning email message too.  What should you do next? Continue reading “Has your membership in a listserv been disabled due to “excessive bounces”?”