Found at www.uspto.gov , the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s website provides its users with a huge amount of information about the Office and about patents and trademarks.
The site includes search engines for:
- Issued patents (text entries from 1976, scanned entries before that)
- Published patent applications (from 2001)
- Trademarks – registered and applied-for
There are filing mechanisms for both patent and trademark applications; the mechanisms even work reasonably well.
I send clients to this site regularly; it is readable by those who do not possess the knowledge of an IP practitioner and those clients who actually go to the site come back with awe in their voices, telling me that they didn’t know there was that much information out there.
The home page is always a running flow of USPTO news. Two items in today’s flow are worth mentioning here.
- The National Inventors’ Hall of Fame has found a home at the USPTO’s museum. This exhibit is well worth visiting. Find the full story here.
- April 6, 2009 is Design Day at the USPTO. Starting at 9 a.m., design patent examiners, design managers, independent inventors and patent attorneys and agents will have the opportunity to exchange ideas, information, and knowledge about design patent practice. Hon. Randall R. Rader, Chief Judge of the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (which has exclusive jurisdiction over patent appeals) is the scheduled keynote speaker. Find registration information here, and find the agenda here. This event is FREE, but you have to pre-register.