Request for Comments and Notice of Roundtable on USPTO Use of Crowdsourcing To Identify Relevant Prior Art, 67159-67161 [2014-26835]
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Federal Register / Vol. 79, No. 218 / Wednesday, November 12, 2014 / Notices
First, from the date of this Order until
December 16, 2023, Mohammad Hakim
Hashemi, with a last known address of
29 The Cedars, Herons Lorde, London,
England W138JF, and when acting for or
on his behalf, his successors, assigns,
employees, agents or representatives
(the ‘‘Denied Person’’), may not, directly
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Second, no person may, directly or
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VerDate Sep<11>2014
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Jkt 235001
Person, or service any item, of whatever
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Sixth, this Order is effective
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Issued this 5th day of November, 2014.
Karen H. Nies-Vogel,
Director, Office of Exporter Services.
[FR Doc. 2014–26701 Filed 11–10–14; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE P
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark
Office
[Docket No. PTO–P–2014–0013]
Request for Comments and Notice of
Roundtable on USPTO Use of
Crowdsourcing To Identify Relevant
Prior Art
United States Patent and
Trademark Office, Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of public meeting;
request for comments.
AGENCY:
The United States Patent and
Trademark Office (USPTO) is
announcing a December 2, 2014
roundtable and requesting written
comments on USPTO use of
crowdsourcing to identify relevant prior
art. Members of the public are invited to
participate at the roundtable. On
SUMMARY:
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67159
February 20, 2014, the White House
issued a series of executive actions
including crowdsourcing prior art as a
means to strengthen patent quality. The
roundtable will address the executive
action by exploring: (1) How the USPTO
can utilize crowdsourcing tools to
obtain relevant prior art in order to
enhance the quality of examination and
issued patents; and (2) ways the USPTO
can leverage existing private sector
solutions for the electronic receipt and
hosting of crowdsourced materials as a
means to provide prior art to examiners.
DATES: Event Date: The roundtable will
be held on December 2, 2014, beginning
at 1 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST),
and ending at 5 p.m. EST.
Roundtable Registration Deadline:
Registration to attend the roundtable in
person or via webcast is required by
November 25, 2014. Additionally,
requests to participate in the roundtable
as a speaker must be submitted in
writing no later than November 18,
2014. See the ‘‘Event Registration
Information’’ section of this notice for
additional details on how to register and
how to request to present as a speaker.
Written Comment Submission
Deadline: Any member of the public,
whether attending the roundtable or not,
may submit written comments on any of
the issues identified in part II of the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of
this notice for consideration by the
USPTO. Written comments must be
received on or before December 9, 2014,
to ensure consideration.
ADDRESSES: Event Address: The
roundtable will be held in the Moot
Court Room, Benjamin N. Cardozo
School of Law, 55 Fifth Avenue, New
York, NY 10003.
Addresses for Written Comments:
Written comments should be sent by
electronic mail addressed to
CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@
uspto.gov. Comments also may be
submitted by postal mail addressed to:
Mail Stop Comments—Patents,
Commissioner for Patents, P.O. Box
1450, Alexandria, VA 22313–1450,
marked to the attention of Jack Harvey,
Director, Technology Center 2800.
Although comments may be submitted
by postal mail, the Office prefers to
receive comments by electronic mail.
Comments will be available for public
inspection via the USPTO’s Internet
Web site at https://www.uspto.gov/
patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_
roundtable_20141202.jsp, and at the
Office of the Commissioner for Patents,
located in Madison East, Tenth Floor,
600 Dulany Street, Alexandria, VA
22314, upon request. Because comments
will be available for public inspection,
E:\FR\FM\12NON1.SGM
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TKELLEY on DSK3SPTVN1PROD with NOTICES
67160
Federal Register / Vol. 79, No. 218 / Wednesday, November 12, 2014 / Notices
information that is not desired to be
made public, such as an address or
phone number, should not be included
in the comments.
Event Registration Information: To
register to attend or request to present
as a speaker, please send an email
message to
CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@
uspto.gov and provide the following
information: (1) Your name, title,
company or organization (if applicable),
address, phone number, and email
address; (2) whether you wish to attend
in person or via webcast; and (3)
whether you wish to make an oral
presentation at the roundtable and, if so,
which topics identified in part II of the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of
this notice will be addressed and the
approximate desired length of your
presentation. Each attendee, even if
from the same organization, must
register separately.
Due to time constraints, the USPTO
may not be able to accommodate all
persons who wish to make a
presentation. However, the USPTO will
attempt to accommodate as many
persons as possible who wish to make
a presentation within the time
constraints. After reviewing the speaker
requests and the information regarding
the presentations provided in the
requests, the USPTO will contact each
speaker prior to the event with the
amount of time available and the
approximate time that the speaker’s
presentation is scheduled to begin. The
amount of time available for each
presentation may be limited to ensure
that all persons selected to speak will
have a meaningful opportunity to do so.
Speakers who opt to employ slides as
part of their presentation must send
final electronic copies of the slides in
Microsoft PowerPoint to
CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@
uspto.gov by November 25, 2014, so that
the slides can be displayed at the
roundtable. Additionally, the USPTO
will provide an opportunity for persons
in the audience not previously selected
as speakers to speak at the roundtable
without a formal presentation.
For more information on the
roundtable, including webcast access
instructions, agenda and a list of
speakers, please visit https://
www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/
crowdsourcing_roundtable_
20141202.jsp.
If special accommodations due to a
disability are needed, please inform the
contact person(s) identified below.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Requests for additional information
should be directed to the attention of
VerDate Sep<11>2014
17:55 Nov 10, 2014
Jkt 235001
Jack Harvey, Director, Technology
Center 2800, by telephone at 571–272–
8004, or by email to jack.harvey@
uspto.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
I. Background
On February 20, 2014, the White
House issued a series of executive
actions including crowdsourcing prior
art as a means to strengthen patent
quality. Information on the White House
executive actions is available at https://
www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/
executive_actions.jsp. In response to the
executive actions and feedback received
in the context of the Software
Partnership, the USPTO hosted a
roundtable on April 10, 2014, focused
on the use of crowdsourcing and thirdparty preissuance submissions to
identify relevant prior art. See Request
for Comments and Notice of Roundtable
Event on the Use of Crowdsourcing and
Third-Party Preissuance Submissions To
Identify Relevant Prior Art, 79 FR 15319
(March 19, 2014).
The roundtable featured both USPTO
and public presentations, along with a
question and answer session to solicit
public input on the current third-party
submission process and ways the
USPTO can use crowdsourcing to
enhance the quality of examination and
issued patents. The USPTO also
received written comments on the
topics that were identified in the March
19, 2014 notice and discussed at the
April 10, 2014 roundtable. Details about
the roundtable, as well as the webcast
recording and written comments
received are available at https://
www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/
crowdsourcing_roundtable_04-2014.jsp.
II. USPTO Use of Crowdsourcing Tools
To Identify Relevant Prior Art
Based on the feedback the USPTO
received responsive to the March 19,
2014 notice and April 10, 2014
roundtable, the USPTO has decided to
further explore the use of
crowdsourcing tools to enhance the
quality of patent examination and
issued patents. To that end, the USPTO
is seeking public input on the extent to
which it can utilize crowdsourcing tools
to obtain relevant prior art.
Crowdsourcing involves leveraging the
knowledge of a large group of people,
such as from an online community, to
obtain needed information.
The USPTO recognizes that any use of
crowdsourcing tools must comply with
applicable patent laws, regulations and
procedures. For example, any USPTO
crowdsourcing activities would need to
preserve the ex parte nature of patent
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examination and be in accordance with
the provisions of 35 U.S.C. 122(c). That
statutory provision provides that ‘‘[t]he
Director shall establish appropriate
procedures to ensure that no protest or
other form of pre-issuance opposition to
the grant of a patent on an application
may be initiated after publication of the
application without the express written
consent of the applicant.’’
The USPTO seeks input from the
public at the roundtable and/or via
written comments on the following
issues:
1. In what ways can the USPTO
utilize crowdsourcing to identify
relevant prior art that would be
available for use in the examination of
published applications while
maintaining the ex parte nature of
patent examination? Some examples of
how the public traditionally uses
crowdsourcing include: passively
monitoring discussions (thread)
between parties on crowdsourcing Web
sites, and posting a question on a
crowdsourcing Web site and viewing
responses to the posted question.
2. If the USPTO were to post a
question relating to the technology of a
published application on a
crowdsourcing Web site, what follow-up
communications, if any, could someone
from the USPTO have with parties on
the Web site? Some examples of how
the public traditionally engages in
follow-up communications on
crowdsourcing Web sites include: A
conversation on the thread with a
particular party who responded to the
posted question to clarify information
the party provided, and a conversation
on the thread with a particular party
who responded to the initial posting to
request additional information.
3. What appropriate precautions, if
any, could the USPTO employ to ensure
that the use of crowdsourcing tools does
not encourage a protest or other form of
preissuance opposition to the grant of a
patent? (See 35 U.S.C. 122(c).)
4. If the USPTO cites in an
application prior art obtained via
crowdsourcing tools, to what extent, if
any, should the USPTO document the
crowdsourcing activities used to
identify the prior art?
5. For each published patent
application, if the USPTO gave the
patent applicant the option to opt-in or
opt-out of the USPTO’s use of
crowdsourcing, would applicants
choose to participate in the
crowdsourcing program? What
considerations would inform the
applicant’s decision?
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Federal Register / Vol. 79, No. 218 / Wednesday, November 12, 2014 / Notices
III. Request for Information on
Electronic Receipt and Hosting of
Crowdsourced Prior Art
Notice of Federal Advisory
Committee meetings.
ACTION:
The USPTO wants to ensure that the
best prior art is available to the
examiner during examination. Because
this information often resides with the
technical and scientific community,
crowdsourcing may be a promising way
to uncover hard-to-find prior art,
especially non-patent literature. A
growing number of organizations from a
wide range of industries have expressed
a willingness to help the USPTO with
its crowdsourcing efforts by pledging to
provide public product documentation,
educational materials, and other forms
of non-patent literature.
Accordingly, the USPTO issued a
Request for Information (RFI) titled
‘‘Crowdsourced Non-Patent Literature
Hosting’’ (Solicitation Number:
PTOHMB201501), on October 9, 2014,
seeking information from qualified firms
capable of electronically receiving and
potentially hosting the materials that
have been pledged to the USPTO
through the above-described
crowdsourcing effort. Detailed
information on the RFI is available at
https://www.uspto.gov/about/vendor_
info/current_acquisitions/index.jsp.
At the roundtable, the USPTO seeks
to build on information received in
response to the RFI to further explore
ways the USPTO can leverage existing
private sector solutions for the
electronic receipt and hosting of
crowdsourced materials as a means to
provide prior art to examiners. Any
formal responses to the RFI must be
submitted in writing in accordance with
the instructions set forth therein and not
as written comments in response to this
notice. After the close of the RFI
comment period, information about the
roundtable discussion on the RFI will be
made available at https://www.uspto.gov/
patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_
roundtable_20141202.jsp.
Dated: November 6, 2014.
Michelle K. Lee,
Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for
Intellectual Property and Deputy Director of
the United States Patent and Trademark
Office.
[FR Doc. 2014–26835 Filed 11–10–14; 8:45 am]
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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Office of the Secretary
Defense Science Board; Notice of
Federal Advisory Committee Meetings
AGENCY:
Department of Defense.
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Jkt 235001
The Defense Science Board
will meet in closed session on December
10 and 11, 2014, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
at the Pentagon, Room 3E863,
Washington, DC.
DATES: December 10 and 11, 2014, from
8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
ADDRESSES: The Pentagon, Room 3E863,
Washington, DC.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms.
Debra Rose, Executive Officer, Defense
Science Board, 3140 Defense Pentagon,
Room 3B888A, Washington, DC 20301–
3140, via email at debra.a.rose20.civ@
mail.mil, or via phone at (703) 571–
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SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This
meeting is being held under the
provisions of the Federal Advisory
Committee Act of 1972 (5 U.S.C.,
Appendix, as amended), the
Government in the Sunshine Act of
1976 (5 U.S.C. 552b, as amended), and
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The mission of the Defense Science
Board is to advise the Secretary of
Defense and the Under Secretary of
Defense for Acquisition, Technology &
Logistics on scientific and technical
matters as they affect the perceived
needs of the Department of Defense. At
this meeting, the Board will discuss
interim findings and recommendations
resulting from ongoing Task Force
activities. The Board will also discuss
plans for future consideration of
scientific and technical aspects of
specific strategies, tactics, and policies
as they may affect the U.S. national
defense posture and homeland security.
In accordance with section 10(d) of
the Federal Advisory Committee Act,
Public Law 92–463, as amended (5
U.S.C. App. 2) and 41 CFR 102–3.155,
the Department of Defense has
determined that the Defense Science
Board meeting for December 10 and 11,
2014, will be closed to the public.
Specifically, the Under Secretary of
Defense (Acquisition, Technology, and
Logistics), in consultation with the DoD
Office of General Counsel, has
determined in writing that all sessions
of meeting for December 10 and 11,
2014, will be closed to the public
because it will consider matters covered
by 5 U.S.C. 552b(c)(1) and (4).
In accordance with 41 CFR 102–3.140
and section 10(a)(3) of the Federal
Advisory Committee Act, interested
persons may submit a written statement
for consideration by the Defense Science
Board. Individuals submitting a written
statement must submit their statement
to the Designated Federal Official at the
SUMMARY:
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67161
address detailed in FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION CONTACT; at any point,
however, if a written statement is not
received at least 10 calendar days prior
to the meeting, which is the subject of
this notice, then it may not be provided
to or considered by the Defense Science
Board. The Designated Federal Official
will review all timely submissions with
the Defense Science Board Chairperson,
and ensure they are provided to
members of the Defense Science Board
before the meeting that is the subject of
this notice.
Dated: November 5, 2014.
Aaron Siegel,
Alternate OSD Federal Register Liaison
Officer, Department of Defense.
[FR Doc. 2014–26678 Filed 11–10–14; 8:45 am]
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[Docket No.: ED–2014–ICCD–0122]
Agency Information Collection
Activities; Submission to the Office of
Management and Budget for Review
and Approval; Comment Request;
Consolidated State Application
Office of Elementary and
Secondary Education (OESE),
Department of Education (ED).
ACTION: Notice.
AGENCY:
In accordance with the
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44
U.S.C. chapter 3501 et seq.), ED is
proposing an extension of an existing
information collection.
DATES: Interested persons are invited to
submit comments on or before
December 12, 2014.
ADDRESSES: Comments submitted in
response to this notice should be
submitted electronically through the
Federal eRulemaking Portal at https://
www.regulations.gov by selecting
Docket ID number ED–2014–ICCD–0122
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or hand delivery. If the regulations.gov
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SUMMARY:
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]]>Agencies
[Federal Register Volume 79, Number 218 (Wednesday, November 12, 2014)]
[Notices]
[Pages 67159-67161]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2014-26835]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
[Docket No. PTO-P-2014-0013]
Request for Comments and Notice of Roundtable on USPTO Use of
Crowdsourcing To Identify Relevant Prior Art
AGENCY: United States Patent and Trademark Office, Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of public meeting; request for comments.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is
announcing a December 2, 2014 roundtable and requesting written
comments on USPTO use of crowdsourcing to identify relevant prior art.
Members of the public are invited to participate at the roundtable. On
February 20, 2014, the White House issued a series of executive actions
including crowdsourcing prior art as a means to strengthen patent
quality. The roundtable will address the executive action by exploring:
(1) How the USPTO can utilize crowdsourcing tools to obtain relevant
prior art in order to enhance the quality of examination and issued
patents; and (2) ways the USPTO can leverage existing private sector
solutions for the electronic receipt and hosting of crowdsourced
materials as a means to provide prior art to examiners.
DATES: Event Date: The roundtable will be held on December 2, 2014,
beginning at 1 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST), and ending at 5 p.m.
EST.
Roundtable Registration Deadline: Registration to attend the
roundtable in person or via webcast is required by November 25, 2014.
Additionally, requests to participate in the roundtable as a speaker
must be submitted in writing no later than November 18, 2014. See the
``Event Registration Information'' section of this notice for
additional details on how to register and how to request to present as
a speaker.
Written Comment Submission Deadline: Any member of the public,
whether attending the roundtable or not, may submit written comments on
any of the issues identified in part II of the SUPPLEMENTARY
INFORMATION section of this notice for consideration by the USPTO.
Written comments must be received on or before December 9, 2014, to
ensure consideration.
ADDRESSES: Event Address: The roundtable will be held in the Moot Court
Room, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, 55 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY
10003.
Addresses for Written Comments: Written comments should be sent by
electronic mail addressed to CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@uspto.gov.
Comments also may be submitted by postal mail addressed to: Mail Stop
Comments--Patents, Commissioner for Patents, P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria,
VA 22313-1450, marked to the attention of Jack Harvey, Director,
Technology Center 2800. Although comments may be submitted by postal
mail, the Office prefers to receive comments by electronic mail.
Comments will be available for public inspection via the USPTO's
Internet Web site at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_roundtable_20141202.jsp, and at the Office of the
Commissioner for Patents, located in Madison East, Tenth Floor, 600
Dulany Street, Alexandria, VA 22314, upon request. Because comments
will be available for public inspection,
[[Page 67160]]
information that is not desired to be made public, such as an address
or phone number, should not be included in the comments.
Event Registration Information: To register to attend or request to
present as a speaker, please send an email message to
CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@uspto.gov and provide the following
information: (1) Your name, title, company or organization (if
applicable), address, phone number, and email address; (2) whether you
wish to attend in person or via webcast; and (3) whether you wish to
make an oral presentation at the roundtable and, if so, which topics
identified in part II of the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this
notice will be addressed and the approximate desired length of your
presentation. Each attendee, even if from the same organization, must
register separately.
Due to time constraints, the USPTO may not be able to accommodate
all persons who wish to make a presentation. However, the USPTO will
attempt to accommodate as many persons as possible who wish to make a
presentation within the time constraints. After reviewing the speaker
requests and the information regarding the presentations provided in
the requests, the USPTO will contact each speaker prior to the event
with the amount of time available and the approximate time that the
speaker's presentation is scheduled to begin. The amount of time
available for each presentation may be limited to ensure that all
persons selected to speak will have a meaningful opportunity to do so.
Speakers who opt to employ slides as part of their presentation must
send final electronic copies of the slides in Microsoft PowerPoint to
CrowdsourcingRoundtableNY@uspto.gov by November 25, 2014, so that the
slides can be displayed at the roundtable. Additionally, the USPTO will
provide an opportunity for persons in the audience not previously
selected as speakers to speak at the roundtable without a formal
presentation.
For more information on the roundtable, including webcast access
instructions, agenda and a list of speakers, please visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_roundtable_20141202.jsp.
If special accommodations due to a disability are needed, please
inform the contact person(s) identified below.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Requests for additional information
should be directed to the attention of Jack Harvey, Director,
Technology Center 2800, by telephone at 571-272-8004, or by email to
jack.harvey@uspto.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
I. Background
On February 20, 2014, the White House issued a series of executive
actions including crowdsourcing prior art as a means to strengthen
patent quality. Information on the White House executive actions is
available at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/executive_actions.jsp. In response to the executive actions and
feedback received in the context of the Software Partnership, the USPTO
hosted a roundtable on April 10, 2014, focused on the use of
crowdsourcing and third-party preissuance submissions to identify
relevant prior art. See Request for Comments and Notice of Roundtable
Event on the Use of Crowdsourcing and Third-Party Preissuance
Submissions To Identify Relevant Prior Art, 79 FR 15319 (March 19,
2014).
The roundtable featured both USPTO and public presentations, along
with a question and answer session to solicit public input on the
current third-party submission process and ways the USPTO can use
crowdsourcing to enhance the quality of examination and issued patents.
The USPTO also received written comments on the topics that were
identified in the March 19, 2014 notice and discussed at the April 10,
2014 roundtable. Details about the roundtable, as well as the webcast
recording and written comments received are available at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_roundtable_04-2014.jsp.
II. USPTO Use of Crowdsourcing Tools To Identify Relevant Prior Art
Based on the feedback the USPTO received responsive to the March
19, 2014 notice and April 10, 2014 roundtable, the USPTO has decided to
further explore the use of crowdsourcing tools to enhance the quality
of patent examination and issued patents. To that end, the USPTO is
seeking public input on the extent to which it can utilize
crowdsourcing tools to obtain relevant prior art. Crowdsourcing
involves leveraging the knowledge of a large group of people, such as
from an online community, to obtain needed information.
The USPTO recognizes that any use of crowdsourcing tools must
comply with applicable patent laws, regulations and procedures. For
example, any USPTO crowdsourcing activities would need to preserve the
ex parte nature of patent examination and be in accordance with the
provisions of 35 U.S.C. 122(c). That statutory provision provides that
``[t]he Director shall establish appropriate procedures to ensure that
no protest or other form of pre-issuance opposition to the grant of a
patent on an application may be initiated after publication of the
application without the express written consent of the applicant.''
The USPTO seeks input from the public at the roundtable and/or via
written comments on the following issues:
1. In what ways can the USPTO utilize crowdsourcing to identify
relevant prior art that would be available for use in the examination
of published applications while maintaining the ex parte nature of
patent examination? Some examples of how the public traditionally uses
crowdsourcing include: passively monitoring discussions (thread)
between parties on crowdsourcing Web sites, and posting a question on a
crowdsourcing Web site and viewing responses to the posted question.
2. If the USPTO were to post a question relating to the technology
of a published application on a crowdsourcing Web site, what follow-up
communications, if any, could someone from the USPTO have with parties
on the Web site? Some examples of how the public traditionally engages
in follow-up communications on crowdsourcing Web sites include: A
conversation on the thread with a particular party who responded to the
posted question to clarify information the party provided, and a
conversation on the thread with a particular party who responded to the
initial posting to request additional information.
3. What appropriate precautions, if any, could the USPTO employ to
ensure that the use of crowdsourcing tools does not encourage a protest
or other form of preissuance opposition to the grant of a patent? (See
35 U.S.C. 122(c).)
4. If the USPTO cites in an application prior art obtained via
crowdsourcing tools, to what extent, if any, should the USPTO document
the crowdsourcing activities used to identify the prior art?
5. For each published patent application, if the USPTO gave the
patent applicant the option to opt-in or opt-out of the USPTO's use of
crowdsourcing, would applicants choose to participate in the
crowdsourcing program? What considerations would inform the applicant's
decision?
[[Page 67161]]
III. Request for Information on Electronic Receipt and Hosting of
Crowdsourced Prior Art
The USPTO wants to ensure that the best prior art is available to
the examiner during examination. Because this information often resides
with the technical and scientific community, crowdsourcing may be a
promising way to uncover hard-to-find prior art, especially non-patent
literature. A growing number of organizations from a wide range of
industries have expressed a willingness to help the USPTO with its
crowdsourcing efforts by pledging to provide public product
documentation, educational materials, and other forms of non-patent
literature.
Accordingly, the USPTO issued a Request for Information (RFI)
titled ``Crowdsourced Non-Patent Literature Hosting'' (Solicitation
Number: PTOHMB201501), on October 9, 2014, seeking information from
qualified firms capable of electronically receiving and potentially
hosting the materials that have been pledged to the USPTO through the
above-described crowdsourcing effort. Detailed information on the RFI
is available at https://www.uspto.gov/about/vendor_info/current_acquisitions/index.jsp.
At the roundtable, the USPTO seeks to build on information received
in response to the RFI to further explore ways the USPTO can leverage
existing private sector solutions for the electronic receipt and
hosting of crowdsourced materials as a means to provide prior art to
examiners. Any formal responses to the RFI must be submitted in writing
in accordance with the instructions set forth therein and not as
written comments in response to this notice. After the close of the RFI
comment period, information about the roundtable discussion on the RFI
will be made available at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/init_events/crowdsourcing_roundtable_20141202.jsp.
Dated: November 6, 2014.
Michelle K. Lee,
Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Deputy
Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
[FR Doc. 2014-26835 Filed 11-10-14; 8:45 am]
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