Patent Law

Garbage In

By Gary Odom and Jordan Kuhn

Jon W. Dudas, USPTO numero uno: "We are getting more and more unpatentable ideas, worse and worse quality applications." Craven worm lying through his teeth, or imbecile trying to impress the rubes? You be the judge.

You may rightly discern that the above query is insupportable as an either/or proposition.

Dudas, quoted in the New York Times, backed up his accusation with stats: " Historically, in the last 40 years, the allowance rate -- the percentage of applications ultimately approved -- hovered around 62 percent to 72 percent. It went up to 72 percent in 2000, but dropped to 43 percent in the first quarter of this year." Statistics as truth - ask Mark Twain.

What Dudas is trying to accomplish by denigrating patent attorneys and agents is a mystery. Perhaps he thinks attributing the dramatic dip in allowance rate to improved quality examination would be unbelievable, as well it should be.

The precipitous plunge in allowance rate was accomplished by fiat: management directive to "reject, reject, reject." The upshot, anticipated by the PTO, has been a piling up of appeals. The anticipation of increased appeals prior to the allowance rate plunge itself is evidence of the fiat.

Dudas masterminded, to use the term loosely, an illegal attempt to curtail patent applications and examination, recently quashed by a federal district court. Recent behavior indicates that Dudas prefers lashing out rather than licking his wounds.

The patent office cannot hire enough examiners to meet workload, as pay and working environment are deficient. With a boss who irrationally rants, this should come as no surprise.

Full post as published by The Patent Prospector on April 30, 2008 (boomark / email).