Trademark Office memory hole activity explained

(Updated, see below, to report events at the Trademark Office on May 24, 2022.  Yes I correctly predicted several aspects of what eventually did happen on May 24, 2022, as seen in the updates below.)

Well, folks, the USPTO has sort of vaguely and indirectly half-answered what happened last week with the 6001 US trademark registration numbers that were communicated to applicants and then got sent down the memory hole (blog article and blog article).  The explanation, such as it is, is that there was “a recent paper vendor disruption”. 

To recap, what normally happens each Tuesday is that the Trademark Office issues US trademark registrations.  Here are some recent Tuesdays, and for each, the number of US trademark registrations that got issued:

• April 5, 2022 – 7536
• April 12, 2022 – 7434
• April 19, 2022 – 5231
• April 26, 2022 – 5971
• May 3, 2022 – 5802
• May 10, 2022 – 6001, but after sending them down the memory hole, zero

On May 10, 2022, the USPTO issued 6001 trademark registrations, which you can see listed here.  But then the USPTO decided that this had not actually happened, and placed a document into each of the 6001 files, saying:

Note to the file:  Application status mistakenly changed to registered on May 10, 2022.

In my previous blog articles (blog article and blog article) I guessed (now it seems, correctly) that the memory-hole activity of May 10, 2022 was linked to the Trademark Office’s previously announced plans to stop providing physical US trademark registration certificates and instead to leave trademark owners to make do with mere PDF registration certificates.  The Trademark Office had announced that the last date that it would mail out physical US trademark registration certificates was Tuesday, May 31, 2022.  The following Tuesday (June 7, 2022) was to be the first date that a trademark owner would receive only a mere PDF registration certificate.

Now comes a strikingly oblique announcement from the Trademark Office:

Our Trademark and IT teams are accelerating our transition to electronic registration certificates. Starting May 24, approximately two weeks earlier than previously announced, we will begin issuing electronic registration certificates.

The new date accelerates the benefits of the electronic certificates and addresses a recent paper vendor disruption. Due to the disruption, the USPTO will not issue registration certificates between May 10 and May 23. 

Registrants will still be able to order printed presentation copies of their registration certificate beginning May 24. In the coming days we will issue a Federal Register Notice about this change. 

Thank you for your patience as we move toward serving our trademark community in a more resilient and sustainable way. 

It takes a bit of work to try to extract plain meaning from this announcement, but I think what the Trademark Office is really saying is along the lines of the following:

• We previously told you that the last date that we would mail out physical US trademark registration certificates would be Tuesday, May 31, 2022.  Now we are telling you that the last date for mailing out of physical US trademark registration certificates was two weeks ago, on Tuesday, May 3, 2022.  
• We were of course planning to mail out 6001 physical US trademark registration certificates on Tuesday, March 10, 2022.  But something about that went terribly wrong, and it was terribly embarrassing for the Trademark Office, and we don’t plan to ever come out and say what exactly went terribly wrong.  We are calling it “a recent paper vendor disruption” which might mean a big blow-up with Reed Tech, the government contractor that we were going to fire after May 31, 2022 for purposes of printing US trademark registration certificates.  Or it might just mean some sort of failure on our part to plan ahead well enough on maintaining an inventory of the special paper that we (used to) use for printing the US trademark registration certificates.  Or maybe it was some failure on our part to maintain an inventory of the presentation covers that we (used to) glue onto the US trademark registration certificates.  We’re not saying.
• Whatever the embarrassing thing is that we don’t want to tell you, it is so bad that it also means that we are abandoning any hope of mailing out the 6000 or so physical US trademark registration certificates that we would have normally mailed out tomorrow, May 17, 2022.
• Whatever the embarrassing thing is, it is so bad that it also means that we are abandoning any hope of mailing out the 6000 or so physical US trademark registration certificates that we would have normally mailed out on Tuesday, May 24, 2022.
• Whatever the embarrassing thing is, it is so bad that it also means that we are abandoning any hope of mailing out the 6000 or so physical US trademark registration certificates that we would have normally mailed out on Tuesday, May 31, 2022.
• Yes, you can do the math and what you get is that there are approximately 24 thousand US trademark applicants who in the ordinary course of business would have received physical US trademark registration certificates on May 10, May 17, May 24, and May 31.  That’s not going to happen.  Those 24 thousand physical US trademark registration certificates are also going down the memory hole.
• You will recall that we told you that the starting date for “only PDF” was June 7, 2022.  By this we mean that starting on June 7, 2022, US trademark filers would have to make do with mere PDF US trademark registration certificates.  Now what we are telling you is that this will start two weeks earlier, on May 24, 2022.
• No, we are not going to commit to getting all of the registrations issued on May 24 that should have registered on May 10 or May 17.  Maybe we will issue three times as many registrations on May 24 as usual, maybe not.  You will just have to wait and see.  (Update:  yes the Trademark Office issued three times as many registrations as usual on May 24.  See blog article.)
• Nor are we telling you whether the US trademark registration number that we told you on May 10 (if you were one of the 6001 applicants who were told what your US trademark registration number is) is the number that will be on the “PDF only” certificate that we (might) send you on May 24.  Maybe it will be that registration number, maybe not.  (Update:  Yes the Trademark Office gave each of those customers the same registration number on May 24 that it had been given on May 10 and then had taken away from the customer on May 12.  See blog article.)
• What we are telling you is that if you were one of those 6001 applicants who clearly were supposed to receive registrations on May 10, tough.  Not only are we saying that you did not really receive your registration on May 10.  We are also saying you will not receive it on May 17.  The soonest that you might receive it is on May 24.  (Update:  Yes each of them did receive the belated registration on May 24.  See blog article.)
• Same thing if you are one of those six thousand or so applicants who were supposed to receive registrations tomorrow (May 17).  Tough.  We are telling you right now, it won’t happen tomorrow.  The soonest that you might receive it is May 24.  (Update:  Yes each of them did receive the belated registration on May 24.  See blog article.)
• So what if you were anxiously waiting to receive your registration so that you could go down the court house and sue somebody?  Tough.  So what if you were anxiously waiting to receive your registration so that you could register the mark with US Customs?  Tough.
• Oh, that million dollars or so that we will be saving because those most recent 24 thousand physical US trademark registration certificates are getting sent down the memory hole?  Will we be sharing that money with applicants?  Forget about it.