UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE TRADEMARK PUBLIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING Alexandria, Virginia Tuesday, June 9, 2009 ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 2 1 A G E N D A 2 Introduction by TPAC Chair 3 JOHN FARMER 4 Welcome and Brief Comments by USPTO Leadership 5 JOHN DOLL 6 Discussion Regarding the Future of the Trademark Fence Report from and Discussion With the USPTO 7 Office of the Chief Financial Officer on the Status of the Trademark Fees Study 8 MARK OLECHOWSKI 9 MARK KRIEGER 10 ELIZABETH PEARCE - TPAC 11 Discussion with the Office of the Chief 12 Information Officer about the Status of Ongoing Technological Remediation, Including Whether 13 Roadmap Milestones Are Being Hit And Goals Being Accomplished 14 JOHN OWENS 15 Comments by and Questions for the Commissioner of 16 Trademarks 17 LYNNE BERESFORD 18 Public Comments on Any Other Issues 19 20 * * * * * 21 22 ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 3 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 (9:00 a.m.) 3 MR. FARMER: Good morning, everybody. 4 Welcome to the TPAC Public Meeting. Today is June 5 9, and my name is John Farmer, and I'm Chairman of 6 TPAC, the Trademark Public Advisory Committee of 7 the United States Patent and Trademark Office. 8 Thank you to our hosts at the USPTO for giving us 9 a wonderful experience yesterday and today and by 10 spending so much of their time to prepare us to 11 try to serve them and to try to serve the 12 Trademark community. 13 A couple of housekeeping matters before 14 we get going. Today's meeting is being webcast 15 just like the last meeting was webcast, and so we 16 say hello to the folks that are watching back at 17 home. There is an email address to which folks 18 who are watching this live or actually perhaps 19 even later can send questions or comments to TPAC, 20 and that email address is [email protected]. It's 21 TPAC's hope that that email address will not just 22 be a one-day thing, but it will become an online ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 4 1 suggestion box for things that are appropriate for 2 TPAC that could be sent to TPAC. I don't think 3 we're quite there yet as far as having it so 4 presented on the TPAC portion of the USPTO 5 website, but we hope to get there. 6 Also it is my understanding just as with 7 the last meeting that this webcast will be posted 8 in archive fashion online on the TPAC portion of 9 the USPTO website, and so if for historical 10 reasons people want to go back and look at what 11 happened, it will be there and we on TPAC like 12 that because that promotes the sort of openness 13 that we'd like to have. 14 I wanted to let you know that today we 15 will be having mainly a dialogue with the folks 16 that will be visiting with us. One thing that 17 we've changed this year, we did it at the last 18 meeting and we'll be doing again at this one, is 19 that we are trying to study up in advance on TPAC 20 so that our time here in the public meeting can 21 mainly be interactions and discussions and 22 questions, and we'll hope to carry that forward ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 5 1 today. 2 After folks make introductory comments 3 on their sections of the agenda, the pecking order 4 I'm going to follow as Chair in terms of taking 5 questions or comments is first I'll turn to fellow 6 members of TPAC, and then I'll turn to anyone else 7 present here in the live audience since they've 8 taken the trouble to come see us today. Then 9 lastly if we have time, we will take any questions 10 that have come in by email to the 11 [email protected] website. 12 We have some agenda changes today, and 13 that's going to make our meeting shorter, perhaps 14 significantly shorter than we had planned. For 15 those of you who have seen the agenda, perhaps 16 seen it as it's posted on our website, we have 17 decided to at least postpone for now discussion of 18 IV and V. IV was going to be a discussion 19 regarding the history of the funding of recessions 20 and diversions by the Trademark operation 21 vis-à-vis the Patent operation. And V was going 22 to be a discussion of the extent to which the ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 6 1 Patent operation may have inadvertently or 2 otherwise loaned funds or otherwise subsidized the 3 Trademark operation particularly in 1999 and 2005. 4 We on TPAC received extensive and helpful 5 materials on those issues from the Office of the 6 Chief Financial Officer on Friday, and we're 7 thankful for those. Thank you for taking the time 8 to prepare those, we know that took a lot of 9 effort, and for your initial briefing to our 10 Finance Subcommittee and to TPAC. But as TPAC 11 considered that, TPAC's view was that we just 12 don't mentally have our arms around the details 13 and the numbers well enough to be able to ask the 14 sort of questions that we would like to be able to 15 ask, and so for that reason we think it's 16 premature to try to have that presentation today 17 because we're just not ready on the TPAC side and 18 so we're going to push that off for a future time. 19 Because of that as I mentioned, our meeting will 20 be a little bit shorter today. 21 Another housekeeping measure especially 22 for the folks listening in at home, one thing that ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 7 1 we're trying to do on TPAC and we're changing 2 ourselves so we don't yet do a perfect job is to 3 try to give the office plenty of time to prepare 4 for our meeting and then allow us plenty of time 5 to prepare for what they wish to present and to 6 allow the public plenty of time to see what's 7 coming so that everyone can be better prepared. 8 This is a very expensive meeting you have. We 9 have a lot of very valuable people in the room 10 whose time is worth a great deal and we don't want 11 to waste your time. I've sat down and chatted 12 with John Doll and we worked out what we think 13 will be a good way to make certain going forward 14 that this will all be a smooth sailing ship, and 15 that is TPAC has committed that we will get our 16 proposed agendas and schedules because we have 17 more than just this public meeting when we come up 18 here, we have subcommittee meetings and so forth 19 and so on. At least 4 weeks in advance of our 20 public meetings, and that in turn the office will 21 have any written materials that they intend to 22 submit to us at least 2 weeks in advance of the ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 8 1 meeting so we'll have time to study them. And 2 then also so that we can put up on the TPAC 3 portion of the USPTO website any of the public 4 materials. Sometimes there are materials that are 5 confidential because they may address for example 6 personnel matters or budgets that are still in 7 process within the Executive Branch and obviously 8 we can't discuss those in public session or post 9 them, but for all other materials and any 10 materials that would be utilized at a public 11 meeting, we can get those up on the website. We 12 hope that will also serve the public because I 13 realize a lot of time folks have to decide whether 14 it's worth their while to come here perhaps to 15 comment or to even listen in on the webcast and 16 that will allow them to make those decisions and 17 also to better understand what is going on with 18 TPAC. So we hope that that build a stronger TPAC- 19 USPTO relationship as we go forward and we thank 20 Mr. Doll and the office for working that out with 21 us. 22 Having said all that, I'm going to turn ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 9 1 things over to Acting Director John Doll to give 2 whatever introductory comments he'd like to give. 3 MR. DOLL: Thank you, John. It's a 4 pleasure to be here today and I want to thank TPAC 5 and the public for taking the time out of your day 6 to work with us and talk to us today. It's a 7 pleasure. 8 It's a pleasure for me because as John 9 said I'm the Acting Director and I've spent almost 10 all of my 35 years in the USPTO on the Patent side 11 of the house, so this is a great opportunity for 12 me to get to know TPAC, to get to know some of the 13 Trademark users, and to appreciate exactly how 14 important the work is you do every day. It's 15 interesting that I know a couple of you already. 16 I was talking to Jeff right before the meeting and 17 it seems Jeff grew up less than 100 miles from 18 where I grew up in Ohio, so we've fellow Buckeyes 19 so we have a bond there. James Conley and I have 20 known each other for a really long time, way back 21 when James was running biotech conferences at the 22 Kellogg School, and so that was a great ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190 10 1 opportunity for me. I also had the opportunity 2 recently to meet Jackie Leimer. "Intellectual 3 Property" magazine had their annual awards 4 ceremony and they asked me to do a presentation, 5 and it was an honor for me to present Jackie with 6 the Outstanding IP Attorney of the Year Award at 7 that awards ceremony, and I want to thank you for 8 saving me when my presentation went terribly 9 wrong. Jackie jumped up and saved me. But I also 10 want to say thank you very much to Jackie and to 11 James because I understand this may be your last 12 term, so we really do appreciate everything that 13 you've done, we appreciate all of the hard work 14 and the expertise that you've brought to TPAC. If 15 possible I'd like to twist your arms to see if you 16 would reconsider, but Jackie has said don't even 17 talk to me. I have other things to do in my life 18 right now. But again thank you very much. I 19 appreciate the opportunity to talk to TPAC. 20 What I'd like to do is I'd like to talk 21 about three topics today. I'd like to focus first 22 on the general direction of the USPTO during our ANDERSON COURT REPORTING 706 Duke Street, Suite 100 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone (703) 519-7180 Fax (703) 519-7190