Author Archives: mjwhitekingston

Have you ever looked at a wacky patent and wondered if it really could work? Discovery Channel Canada aims to find out in a new series premiering in August called “Patent Bending: Mad Ideas and Modern Science.” The 11-episode series … Continue reading →

I’m always on the lookout for examples I can share with researchers, especially postdocs and grad students,that illustrate the pitfalls of ignoring patent literature.Here’s a recent report about two polymer researchers at the Univ. of Mass. Amherst who took theircolleagues … Continue reading →

Patent Lens, a free international patent database maintained by CAMBIA, a non-profit research institute located in Caberra, Australia, now has RSS capability. Once saved in an RSS news reader such as Bloglines, searches conducted in Patent Lens will be periodically … Continue reading →

The dates for the 4th annual IPI-ConfEx have been announced. The meeting will take place March 4-8, 2007 in Sorrento, Italy. IPI-ConfEx is organized by a board of counselers representing various patent information professional associations worldwide. The conference is an … Continue reading →

The Canadian Intellectual Property Office recently announced the availability of patent file payment histories on CD-ROM. Copies of the CD, which contains approximately 4 million payment history records from 445,000 patent documents through Dec. 31, 2005, may be obtained from … Continue reading →

Discovery Channel Canada’s Daily Planet, a news program about science and technology, recently celebrated “Invention Week.” Featured inventions included colored bubbles, aka “Zubbles”, (US2006/0004110A1) and other cool ideas from the U.S. and Canada. Aspiring inventors will find a few useful … Continue reading →

The program for the 2006 EPO Patent Information Conference, scheduled for Nov. 6-7 in Cyprus, is now online. The conference will feature technical sessions, specialized training course and an exhibition of patent information products.

Photo: Patent searching circa 1960. Searchers (junior patent attorneys most likely) flip through stacks of paper patents in metal troughs located in the Patent Search Room. The IP Mall, an online resource center for intellectual property information provided by the … Continue reading →

The USPTO has published Classification Order 1,855, dated May 2, 2006. The order affects subclasses in Class 439, Electrical Connectors; it abolishes subclasses 620-622 and establishes 620.01-620.34.

The latest issue of ipFrontline has an interesting article called “The PTO’s Document Disclosure Program: Boon or Boondoggle,” by former patent examiner Thomas G. Field. The USPTO is currently seeking public comment on a proposal to eliminate the program. See … Continue reading →