37 CFR 1.705(d) has been amended to provide that a patentee may request reconsideration of PTA within 2 months of issuance if the patent indicates a revised PTA relative to the PTA indicated on the notice of allowance.

The USPTO has posted a notice to remind applicants to clearly mark submitted trade secret information, proprietary information, and protective order materials as outlined in MPEP 724.02. Materials not properly marked will be published in electronic format and will only be removed from public access for reasons of national security.

Amendments made prior to publication may now be included as part of the 18-month application publication, provided that such amendments are submitted in sufficient time to be entered into the file wrapper (typically 9-14 weeks before projected publication date). To ensure publication, the patent office recommends submitting the application, as amended, through the EFS (electronic filing). This raises two issues: First, if you are hoping that publication of your application will provide notice to infringers and allow back-royalties, then you may want to make sure that the amendments are included in the publication. Second, published amendments may provide even easier access for competitors who hope to get a glimpse of your R&D activities. Arnold Silverman discusses whether publication reveals confidential information.

The USPTO has urged independent inventors to beware of commercial invention-promotion services. The patent office warns people to examine the disclosures that invention promoters are now required to give to potential clients. They include: How many inventions they have evaluated; How many of those inventions received positive or negative evaluations; The total number of customers; How many of those customers received a net profit from the promoter's services; and How many of those customers have licensed their inventions because of the promoter's services. The Wichita Eagle, Eric Heels and Nipper have the story.

The USPTO has announced that it "supports greater protection for traditional knowledge and folklore." I spoke with a patent official who headed the U.S. delegation to the WIPO Geneva Convention. According to him, the protection should come through methods external to the USPTO. These methods include a database of traditional knowledge and better accessability to model contracts.