Das ist so lustig, dass man es für die Nachwelt aufbewahren muss. Wegen des government shutdown in den USA sind die meisten Behördenseiten nicht mehr verfügbar. Ein schönes/trauriges Beispiel ist die Seite der NASA, von den ganzen offiziellen Twitter Accounts will ich ja noch gar nicht reden:
Und da fragt man sich jetzt natürlich, arbeitet da überhaupt noch jemand beim Amerikanischen Patentamt? Die beruhigende Antwort: Ja, aber auch nur noch vier Wochen. Und an manche Sachen kommt man halt nicht ran, weil da keiner mehr arbeitet 🙂 Das ist erschreckend, wie knapp da überall kalkuliert wird.
USPTO Operation Status
During the general government shutdown that began October 1, 2013, the United States Patent and Trademark Office will remain open, using prior year reserve fee collections to operate as usual for approximately four weeks. We continue to assess our fee collections compared to our operating requirements to determine how long we will be able to operate in this capacity during a general government shutdown. We will provide an update as more definitive information becomes available.
Should we exhaust these reserve funds before the general government shutdown comes to an end, USPTO would shut down at that time, although a very small staff would continue to work to accept new applications and maintain IT infrastructure, among other functions. (Should it become necessary for USPTO to shut down, details of the agency’s plan for an orderly shutdown are available on page 78 of the United States Department of Commerce’s shutdown plan, available here.)
Any new or updated public information related to USPTO operations during the government shutdown will be placed on this page.
The 18th Annual Independent Inventor Conference at the USPTO has been cancelled.
The USPTO File Repository Warehouse that houses archived paper patent and trademark files is located in a federal facility owned and operated by the General Services Administration (GSA). Because of this, it is closed during the government shutdown. Requests for paper files will be temporarily suspended. Accessibility to electronic files remains unchanged.