[Federal Register Volume 60, Number 216 (Wednesday, November 8, 1995)]
[Notices]
[Pages 56320-56322]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 95-27690]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
Patent and Trademark Office
Dissemination of Patent Information
AGENCY: Patent and Trademark Office, Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of Open Meeting.
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SUMMARY: The Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) will hold a public
meeting to gain input into how it can maximize the potential of its
information dissemination program. In view of technology changes,
revisions to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circular A-130,
and the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (Public Law 104-13), the PTO
will review existing policies, and will use input from this announced
meeting to prepare a comprehensive information dissemination plan.
DATES: A meeting will be held on December 15, 1995, at 9:00 a.m.
Written comments must be submitted on or before December 31, 1995.
ADDRESSES: Address written comments to the Commissioner of Patents and
Trademarks, Attention: Wesley H. Gewehr, Administrator for Information
Dissemination, Crystal Park 3, Suite 451, Washington, D.C. 20231, or
fax to (703) 306-2737, or e-mail to larson@uspto.gov.
The meeting will be held in Suite 819 of Crystal Park 1, located at
2011 Crystal Drive, Arlington, Virginia.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Jane S. Myers, Office of Electronic
Information Products by telephone at (703) 306-2600, by fax at (703)
306-2737, by e-mail to larson@uspto.gov, or by mail to U. S. Patent and
Trademark Office, Office of Electronic Information Products, Crystal
Park 3, Suite 441, Washington, D.C. 20231.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The meeting will be open to the public, with
limited seating available on a first-come, first-served basis. Within
thirty days following the meeting, copies of the minutes of the meeting
may be obtained from the PTO Home Page (http://www.uspto.gov/), from
the PTO bulletin board service (PTO BBS) at (703) 305-8950, or from the
PTO, Office of Electronic Information Products, in Suite 441, Crystal
Park 3, Arlington, Virginia.
The PTO last published final guidelines related to information
dissemination in the Federal Register on Wednesday, May 3, 1989, and in
the Official Gazette of the United States Patent and Trademark Office
on Tuesday, May 30, 1989. The PTO also published a proposed Electronic
Information Dissemination Policy for public comment in the Official
Gazette of the United States Patent and Trademark Office on Tuesday,
December 1, 1992. The final guidelines and the proposed policy are
reprinted below, followed by a description of PTO's information
dissemination activities.
Electronic Data Dissemination Policies and Guidelines (as published in
the Federal Register on Wednesday, May 3, 1989, and in the Official
Gazette of the United States Patent and Trademark Office on Tuesday,
May 30, 1989)
Dissemination in Government Public Search Facilities and Depository
Libraries
It is the goal of the PTO to achieve effective, widespread
dissemination of information concerning patents and Federally
registered trademarks to all segments of the U.S. public.
A. The dissemination goal will be accomplished directly by the PTO
by providing electronic search and retrieval services to the public in
search facilities located in the PTO, in other facilities which may be
established by the Government and in Patent and Trademark Depository
Libraries (PTDLs). PTDLs are Federal, State and local government,
university or non-profit organization libraries designated by the PTO
to offer public access to patent collections.
B. To the extent funding is authorized and appropriated, search and
retrieval services will be provided in the PTO's search facilities and
PTDLs either:
(1) by the PTO, using its own data bases, computers, communications
equipment, and software, and/or
(2) by PTO contractors.
C. Access to commercial data bases that are available to the PTO's
examiners, for example industry-specific data bases, will be furnished
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either through an APS workstation or a terminal furnished by data base
vendors in the PTO public search facilities at commercial rates,
provided the user has established a commercial account with the data
base vendor.
The PTO will not act as an agent for any data base vendor in
providing training for, assisting in, or collecting fees for the use of
such commercial data bases.
D. Services furnished in the PTO public search facilities and in
PTDLs will be at no cost to the public for access to paper and
microform records. The costs of accessing PTO owned electronic data
bases and systems will be recouped from user fees set to recover the
marginal costs of such services.
E. The type of service for public search and retrieval, either PTO
or commercial services, will be chosen based on the method and criteria
established by the 1983 revision to OMB Circular A-76, entitled
``Performance of Commercial Activities.''
Distribution of PTO Data for Commercial Dissemination
F. In addition to B and C above, the PTO will pursue its
dissemination goal indirectly by encouraging the private sector firms
in providing such services to the public outside the PTO search
facilities and PTDLs.
G. Fees charged for bulk data developed by the PTO will be based on
the marginal cost of providing such distribution services.
H. Arrangements will be non-exclusive. Bulk resale of PTO data will
be permitted subject to the terms of each bulk data sales agreement.
I. Fees charged to the public for U.S. patent and trademark data
products will be based on the marginal cost of providing such products.
J. The PTO will receive non-U.S. electronic patent data through
exchange agreements with other patent offices and international
intergovernmental organizations. In general, the PTO will not
distribute such data, except in conjunction with services that may be
provided by the PTO or its contractors in the PTO public search
facilities and PTDLs. Rather, it will seek to have contractual
arrangements established directly between the organization and the
commercial data base vendor and will not act as a service agent or
representative unless there is a special need that cannot be met
otherwise.
Information Dissemination: General Statement of Principles (as
published in the Official Gazette of the United States Patent and
Trademark Office on Tuesday, December 1, 1992)
The overall mission goal of the United States Patent and Trademark
Office (PTO) with respect to the issuance of patents derives from
Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8, of the U.S. Constitution which states
that Congress shall have the power ``To promote the Progress of Science
and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to * * * Inventors the
exclusive Right to their * * * Discoveries''. The PTO's mission goal
with respect to the granting of trademark registrations derives from
Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3, of the Constitution which states that
Congress shall have power ``To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations,
and among the several States * * *''.
As an integral part of its mission, PTO is responsible for assuring
that patent and trademark information is available to all sectors of
society that have a need for, and can make use of, the information.
Through dissemination of such information, PTO provides the means to:
(1) foster the competent preparation of patent and trademark
applications; (2) avoid infringement of patent and trademarks; and (3)
understand the current state of the art as a basis for developing new
technology.
As an important part of its information dissemination efforts, PTO
will strive to have relevant information resources made generally
available in the United States in the most useful form and at a
reasonable price. This will include not only its own internal
information resources but also, to the extent possible, those of other
industrial property offices throughout the world.
The private sector has considerable experience in the packaging and
distribution of information products and services. The PTO will
continue to work through these private sector firms by facilitating
their access to PTO's internal information resources and purchasing,
where appropriate, finished products and services for the PTO's own
internal use.
The PTO will continue to rely on the nationwide network of Patent
and Trademark Depository Libraries as a significant means of providing
broad public access to its information products and services. PTO will
work with these libraries to take advantage of the advances in
information technology.
Generally, PTO will provide products and services directly to end-
users in those circumstances where: (1) a significant need exists; and
either (2) a. access to existing internal PTO information resources
permit major economics in the preparation and distribution of specific
information products and services through the avoidance of large scale
duplication of equipment or processing; or b. PTO is in a unique
position, because of its governmental functions, to provide information
that is sufficiently timely, accurate, or comprehensive.
In all cases, PTO will offer its information products and services
at a price sufficient to recover the marginal costs of its information
dissemination activities.
PTO will also work toward standardization and compatibility among
various patent and trademark related information products and services
available in the marketplace to enhance their overall usefulness to
both the intellectual property and research and development
communities.
Current PTO Information Dissemination Activities
As part of its mission, the PTO is required to disseminate the
information in the patents it grants and in the trademarks it
registers. The PTO carries out this mission by making information
available in its public search facilities located in Arlington, VA and
in PTDLs located throughout the country. The PTO provides a variety of
information products and services, including on-line access to data
bases, data on magnetic tapes, CD-ROM products, and copies of patents,
trademarks and related documents.
PTDLs and local search facilities provide public access to PTO
information using paper and microform products, and through on-line
access to internal data bases. The Patent Search Room offers access to
the Automated Patent System's Text Search (APS-Text) and to Classified
Search and Image Retrieval (APS-CSIR). PTDLs, who subscribe to the
automated system, provide APS-Text to their patrons. Patrons of the
Trademark Search Library have access to the Automated Trademark
System's X-Search and to the Trademark Reporting and Monitoring (TRAM)
System.
In order to expand the range of products and services offered at
PTDLs, the PTO has established a business partnership with libraries
located in Sunnyvale, California, and Detroit, Michigan. These partner
PTDLs offer the following expanded products and services: (1) on-line
access to APS-Text and APS-CSIR, (2) Video Conferencing capability
between patent examiners at USPTO and current and potential applicants,
(3) electronic ordering of patent documents.
The PTO maintains the PTO BBS and a World Wide Web site on the
Internet to provide information about products, services and current
activities. Internet access to the PTO BBS is available
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through FedWorld (National Technical Information Service). The PTO BBS
contains current patent bibliographic data, searchable for the most
recent thirteen weeks. The Web site contains the images and searchable
text for patents relating to AIDS research.
PTO offers electronic information products on various media,
including magnetic tape and Compact Disc-Read Only Memory (CD-ROM). The
PTO makes available machine-readable copies (on magnetic tape) of its
patent and trademark data bases to customers who pay a fee based on the
cost of preparing and distributing the tapes. The customers who
purchase the data are primarily large-scale retailers of on-line data
base services who in turn provide this data to thousands of customers.
The PTO makes extensive use of CD-ROM technology to disseminate its
information. Products are available for use, free of charge, in PTO
search facilities and at all PTDLs, and may be purchased by the public.
Four patent text products and three trademark text products, sold as
annual subscriptions, are updated bimonthly or quarterly. USAPat, sold
as an annual subscription and provided as two or three CD-ROMs per
week, contains the images of all patents as they issue weekly.
Another important way of disseminating patent and trademark
information to customers is through the Patent and Trademark Copy Sales
(PTCS) system. Using this system, the PTO can fulfill requests for
paper copies of patents and trademarks in a timely fashion.
Beginning in November 1995, PTO will make additional patent
information available on the Internet at no charge to the public. This
new service will be available via the PTO home page (http://
www.uspto.gov/), and will offer approximately twenty years of
searchable patent bibliographic text data (1.68 million documents
covering 1976 through 1995). All information contained on the front
page of a patent, excluding drawings, will be searchable and
retrievable.
Conclusion
Using the input gathered from the announced meeting and the written
comments, the PTO will analyze the existing information dissemination
program in light of the new and existing technologies, the Paperwork
Reduction Act of 1995, and OMB Circular A-130. The PTO will then
redraft its policy and publish it for comment prior to finalizing it.
Dated: November 2, 1995.
Bruce A. Lehman,
Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and
Trademarks.
[FR Doc. 95-27690 Filed 11-7-95; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-16-P
