USPTO Survey on Patent eCommerce Customer Satisfaction

Via an email most of you probably received from the Patent Office too:

As a valued United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) customer, your opinions are important and enable the USPTO to learn what is working well and where there is room for improvement. The brief questionnaire at the URL stated below, specifically addresses your experience with EFS-Web and other Patents e-Commerce initiatives.

The questionnaire will require approximately 10 minutes of your time, and all responses will be held in the strictest confidence. The 2008 USPTO Patents e-Commerce Customer Satisfaction questionnaire will close on Sunday, July 21

To participate please click the link below:
http://vovici.com/l.dll/JGs72C77072C7lnmD9U2119473J.htm

Thank you for your time and assistance,

USPTO Search and Information Resources Administration’s Office of Patent Information Resources

If you have any questions about EFS-Web, PAIR or other e-Commerce initiatives, please contact the EBC Customer Service Center at 866 217-9197 (toll-free), 571-272-4100 or by e-mail at ebc@uspto.gov.

I took the survey. You should too. They want feedback on how to improve the system…let’s give it to them (some of the questions involve PDFs, RSS, XML, so if you’d like to see that kind of data access…SPEAK UP!).

I don’t see a direct link to the survey on their website. Should the above link not work, search your old emails for “2008 USPTO Patent eCommerce Customer Satisfaction.”

Related Posts:

• More on on-line viewing of pending patent applications (PAIR/IFW)
• Electronic Filing System improvements
• USPTO Announces New Private PAIR Feature: Outgoing Correspondence Notification

How could USPTO.gov be improved?

Great list of changes the USPTO should make regarding web page organization and access to patent data
The Patent Librarian: Transparency in the US Patent System.

For other things that could be changed…see ReThink(IP) on “Things we hate about the USPTO.gov website.”

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• Another site for patent searching
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Slick sliding animation for helping you determine if a copyrighted work is in the public domain

Via the American Library Association’s Copyright Advisory Network Digital Copyright Slider.

See also their Fair Use Checklist (pdf).

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Best new gadget….Netflix Player by Roku

Netflix (last year?) added a service called “Watch Instantly” where they allowed subscribers to watch streamed selections on their computers for free (as part of their subscription). The titles in the “Watch Instantly” library (10,000+ of them) aren’t “New Releases,” but older movies and TV episodes. Example content available on Watch Instantly: The Office: Season 1, Dexter: Season 1, Heroes: Season 1 and 2, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Young Frankenstein.

I guess I’m too Gen X, but watching movies on my computer isn’t my thing.

Then…a company by the name of Roku teamed up with Netflix to release a $99 “Netflix Player.” The Netflix Player is a little box about the size of 5 stacked CD jewel cases that you connect to your computer network at home (via wired or wireless) and to your TV set via standard A/V connectors (A/V, S-video, Component, HDMI). It took a whopping 4 minutes for me to unbox it, plug it in and get it connected to my TV/router.

Once it boots up, the Netflix Player then gives you a unique code that you enter on the Netflix website that links your Netflix Player box to your Netflix account. As soon as you do that, every title you have in your Netflix “Watch Instantly” queue shows up in the Netflix Player’s queue.

The Netflix Player comes with little remote control that you can use to navigate the menu. When I select a title to watch, it takes 20-40 seconds for it to “spool up” and start playing near DVD quality. Very cool.

We’ve watched dozens of things in the last couple weeks, from my kids watching cartoons, to my wife and I watching old TV series episodes. If they add support for CBS or Hulu.com in the future (as rumors seem to indicate is a possibility), I would consider canceling my cable subscription…it is THAT good.

If you have Netflix…you might consider picking one up for your TV too.

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Invention Promotion Company settles with FTC for $10.7 million

Apparently, the FTC has settled its case with Davison & Associates for $10.7 million in cash, real estate and investment assets, less than half of the $26 million dollar judgment awarded in 2006. See: Pittsburgh Tribune-Review - “O’Hara invention promoter, FTC settle case for $10.7 million.“

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Online Time Clock for Law Firm Employees

With mentions in TechCrunch, Technorati, Inc.com, and an iPhone App…..one local Idaho software company (TSheets) is making big waves! See also this Idaho Business Review post.

As a user of their product (my office uses their software for our employees), I completely understand why. It is a great product. One slick feature is that the administrator (e.g., your office manager) has to approve any computer used to log in/out. Thus, an employee can’t log in/out from home (unless you approve them to do so).

So…if you’re looking for an online time clock (that exports to QuickBooks)…you might check out TSheets.com. They even have a free trial!

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Quicktime, TIF and USPTO Images

Quick update to an earlier “tech tip”* post of mine (”Tech Tip: Die QuickTime, Die“) regarding how QuickTime blocks the use of AlternaTiff
(my preferred Tiff viewer for USPTO patent images).

Earlier today, I decided to smack QuickTime around again (my problem was back, even though (1) I reinstalled AlternaTiff AND (2) AlternaTiff showed up as the preferred plug-in to use in FireFox AND (3) Windows’ default file type (for .tif, .tiff) was NOT set to QuickTime. Even though these were all set how they should be…QuickTime still managed to be the plug-in that loaded whenever I tried to view a USPTO patent image (.tif).

In that I don’t remember the last time I used QuickTime (and I get sick and tired of killing that little Q icon in my task bar every time iTunes updates**), I decided to uninstall QuickTime. Guess what. Mysteriously, AlternaTiff works again.

After I went nuclear on QT, I noticed this page on the Idaho Secretary of State’s page that covers how to smack down QuickTime (”Help Viewing TIFF’s“). If you don’t want to uninstall, you might try those options (or the ones in my earlier post (”Tech Tip: Die QuickTime, Die“).

*My previous “Tech Tips” posts can be found here: http://inventblog.com/category/tech-tips.

**…makes me want to write a separate post about how Apple becoming is the new RealPlayer…installing junk bundling software on my computer I don’t want (e.g., QuickTime, Safari), asking me whether I want to update/install those programs every time a new version of iTunes comes out. Alas.

[Update: link to the USPTO page on .tif files and plugins- http://www.uspto.gov/web/menu/plugins/tiff.htm]

[Update 2: I went to run iTunes this morning...received an error that "QuickTime is required to run iTunes, please reinstall." Fail!]

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Thomas Edison used “click wrap”?

Matt Buchanan’s new blog on “Friday fun - Edison’s mark” (referring to terms and conditions Edison used on a marking plate for his Amberola Phonograph).

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Did you know that most books published between 1923 and 1963 are in the public domain?

At least that is what Google, in reviewing Copyright renewals is finding. See Google Book Search Blog on US copyright renewal records available for download.

Google’s latest announcement (the topic of that post) was scraping together a 56MB XML file (zipped) containing a list of the books that were not renewed.

The fact that Google is tracking such information and (presumably) scanning those public domain books for online reading…is an unbelievable thing.

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Where lawyers don’t eat

Above the Law has a post up on “Where the Lawyers Eat Out” which contains a list of “recommendations for restaurants in various Biglaw cities.”

Something tells me that ‘if’ Boise was a “Biglaw city” that this local restaurant would probably not make the list: The Crescent “NO LAWYERS” Bar & Grill. Not because of the food/service, but because of their “no lawyers” policy. Their menu (menu link: here) includes:

LAWYER FRIES — “You know that lawyers don’t have any!” Some people call them Rocky Mtn. Oysters or Bull Fries. We “lovingly” call them lawyer fries. Served with hot mustard. $8.95

The menu even explains that the restaurant’s name came after a legal dispute with a neighbor (attorney) over the bar owner wanting to build a swimming pool in his backyard (and the attorney fighting him over it). Only in Idaho….

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