Bluesky: @oppedahl.com
A few days ago was my first-ever successful DMR (digital mobile radio) activity (blog article). Today was my second I participated in a World Wide Check-In. It will be recalled that DMR is a communications protocol used by radio amateurs to speak with each other all around the world, using handheld transceivers. Participants use Continue reading "Second successful DMR activity"
(Update: my second-ever successful DMR activity was participation in the July 18, 2026 World Wide Check-In.) It turns out that there is a thing called DMR or digital mobile radio (Wikipedia article). This is a thing that some radio amateurs do. To do DMR, you use a hot spot such as the one shown at Continue reading "First successful DMR activity"
Long-time PCT enthusiasts will appreciate that in recent years, there have been few opportunities in the US to get high quality PCT training with more than one experienced presenter on the dais. Such PCT enthusiasts will likewise appreciate that in recent years, there have been few opportunities in the US to get high quality PCT training of Continue reading "Attend a two-presenter, 2½-day live…
(Update: now you can register for this PCT seminar. See this blog posting.) Save the date! The next PCT Seminar will be September 22-24, 2026 near the Denver airport.
Over and over again I somehow stumble upon or learn about a thing that seemingly almost everybody else already knew. Today s question is, why are shower head nozzles flexible? You probably already know why, in which case please post a comment below. Anyway, here is what I figured out about flexible shower head nozzles. By Continue reading "Why are shower head nozzles flexible?"
Now there is an Office Action in the red-hair-and-tinsel trademark application (previous blog article). You can see the TSDR page and the Office Action. The Examining Attorney gives several bases for refusal: Does not function as a service mark Non-distinctive trade dress Specimen refusal fails to directly associate mark with services Mark on drawing Continue reading "An Office Action in the…
I am intrigued to hear about a WIPO initiative called the “Global IP Assignment Platform” (GIPAP). I suggest that interested practitioners and IP owners register for one of these upcoming WIPO webinars. Imagine being able to do a few mouse clicks that would result in an assignment (ownership change) taking effect across many patent offices Continue reading "Global IP Assignment Platform (GIPAP)"
It will be recalled (blog article, April 30, 2026) that recently I had a luggage tracking tag get knocked loose from my suitcase and the tag ended up at an airport in Portugal. Thanks to comments from loyal readers, I was inspired to try harder on this. Until now my way of attaching a luggage Continue reading "New effort to secure a luggage tracking tag"
The Trademark Office at the USPTO does not handle Unicode characters well. This blog post discusses a recent example of this. Over the decades, there have been many ways to store human-readable chracters in computers. I came to the world of computers when ASCII and Baudot were in daily use, and IBM s EBCDIC was a Continue reading "USPTO handling Unicode poorly in trademarks"
Well, the unspoken thing has just been spoken. The only other thing I can recommend is just use [Microsoft] Word. It will be recalled (yesterday s blog article) that yesterday I tried to use Patent Center to efile a new US nonprovisional patent application. And I failed to use Microsoft Word. I used Libre Office. And Continue reading " the only other thing I can recommend is just use Word EBC…