Re: [PIUG List] Should PTO add patent status to patent database?

Hello Greg,

These are great issues and I think almost everyone can agree that
these would be useful features.

Perhaps the question should be whether it's the responsibility of the
USPTO to do this or if it can be left to private enterprise to provide
what is arguably a value-added feature.

Now before someone thinks I am advocating that only the STNs or
Thomsons or Questels of the world could and should do this please keep
in mind that they are not the only patent resources in the world. How
difficult would this be for the freepatentsonline or other players to
accomplish under their own business models?

At what point does the government meet it's obligation to provide
information without creating adverse competitions to businesses in
this industry that are trying to survive?

An interesting philosophical query on a warm Friday afternoon.

Have a nice weekend,
Tony Trippe

On Aug 22, 2008, at 1:39 PM, Gregory Aharonian wrote:

>
> I have two suggestions which I have to beleive are trivial to
> implement:
>
> 1) The patent full text database available from the PTO
> should indicate whether the patent is still active, i.e.,
> the assignee has paid the latest maintenance fee.
>
> 2) For any U.S. patent application that has issued as a
> patent, the returned text data for the patent application
> should have a hyperlink for the corresponding issued patent.
>
> I am sure others have the pet peeves, and maybe PIUG should make
> a list and formally present it to the Patent Office. The PTO
> search engines have always been retarded, decades behind real
> search technology. But some of these fixes don't even require
> new search engines, just a bit of ingenuity.
>
> Greg Aharonian
>
>
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Received on Fri Aug 22 2008 - 20:08:37