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<title>USPTO Examiners - Securing Innovation</title>
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<copyright>Copyright 2008</copyright>
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<pubDate>Mon, 10 Nov 2008 04:11:16 -0500</pubDate>
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<title>Rating USPTO Examiners Anonymously</title>
<description><![CDATA[Is this hot or not? <a href="http://271patent.blogspot.com/2008/04/friday-shorts.html">Peter Zura points</a> to a new website: <a href="http://www.usptoexaminers.com/">USPTO Examiners</a>.<br />
<br />
From the USPTO Examiners Mission Statement at the time of this posting:<br />
<blockquote>USPTO Examiners is a website designed for professionals to anonymously review, rank, and learn about a patent examiner or a trademark examining attorney who works at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).<br />
<br />
Patent examiners and trademark examining attorneys are public employees who help determine the technological and economical future growth of each industry and business in the world. A simple word such as &ldquo;allowed&rdquo; or &ldquo;rejected&rdquo; from a patent examiner or a trademark examining attorney could grow or financially burden a company, business, or individual. Accordingly, it is extremely important for the USPTO to have well trained patent examiners and trademark examining attorneys who understand that each of their decisions could benefit and/or harm an industry, business, and/or individual. Having highly competent patent examiners and trademark examining attorneys will result in the USPTO issuing high quality patents and trademarks.<br />
<br />
Patent and trademark practitioners who deal with individual patent examiners and trademark examining attorneys are in the best position to express their opinions (e.g., their concerns, as well as their satisfaction) about each patent examiner or trademark examining attorney. Individuals who refer to this website may factor in the opinions of the patent and trademark practitioners when determining the competency and responsiveness of a particular patent examiner or trademark examining attorney. As such, these opinions could be a valuable tool when planning and strategizing a prosecution of a patent or trademark case, which can result in saving clients and inventors a substantial amount of time and money during the course of prosecuting a patent or a trademark.<br />
<br />
Accordingly, this website has been developed to form an online collaborative environment in which members of professional organizations, corporations, and inventors may anonymously pool their experiences and opinions about a patent examiner or a trademark examining attorney, including their knowledge of the law and technology, as well as their accessibility.<br />
<br />
Your opinions are completely anonymous. You are only required to make a user name and a password to post an opinion about an individual patent examiner or a trademark examining attorney. We do not require that you reveal your identity or provide any identifying information when making a user name and password to make a posting.<br />
<br />
USPTO Examiners appreciates the time that patent and trademark practitioners take to post their anonymous opinions.<br />
</blockquote>It remains to be seen how this &quot;anonymous rating&quot; of patent examiners will work in the patent industry, which tends to be litigious. Will companies that deal with patent examiners have to develop an <a href="http://blogs.cisco.com/news/2008/03/ciscos_internet_postings_polic_1.html">Internet postings policy like Cisco's</a> that emerged from &quot;<a href="http://blogs.cisco.com/news/2008/03/lessons_learnedcisco_updates_p_1.html">lessons learned</a>&quot; from the <a href="http://thepriorart.typepad.com/the_prior_art/2008/03/troll-tracker-l.html">Patent Troll Tracker Blog fiasco</a>? For <a href="http://blawgit.com/?p=623">a good overview of corporate blogging policies</a>, see the recent post by Patent Attorney Brett Trout at BlawgIT.<br />
<br />
If you're interested in the ongoing discussion of anonymous communications online, you might want to listen to the latest <a href="http://www.mayitpleasethecourt.com/journal.asp?blogid=1767">podcast on Lawyer2Lawyer</a> in which host Craig Williams interviews Raymond Niro Sr., the attorney who seemed to have been a favorite subject of Rick Frenkel's Patent Troll Tracker Blog. In the second segment of the podcast, Craig speaks with the popular patent blogger, Dennis Crouch from Patently-O, to get his perspective on the Troll Tracker and the dangers of blogging anonymously. Some of that discussion might be relevant to this new USPTO Examiners site, as well, though not specifically mentioned. No doubt, it might be the subject of more blog posts and podcasts in the future.<br />
<br />
We'll be following closely the discussion about anonymous free speech concerning patents, too, as it might well be relevant to consider with regard to the <a href="http://www.patentdebate.com">Patent Debate</a> discussion board.<br />
<br />
What do you think?]]></description>
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<category>Anonymous Blogs</category><category>Cisco</category><category>Patent Debate</category><category>Patent Troll Tracker</category><category>Patents</category><category>USPTO Examiners</category>
<pubDate>Fri, 04 Apr 2008 15:12:30 -0500</pubDate>
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