USPTO Participates in Obama Administration Open Government Initiative

On his first full day in office, President Obama issued a memorandum on transparency and open government, calling for an unprecedented level of openness in government and recommendations for establishing a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. On May 21, the Administration launched the Open Government Initiative to solicit ideas and expertise from the public for developing open government policy.

As an example of public participation the President is talking about, the USPTO's peer review pilot is showcased in the Innovation Gallery on the White House Web site. Here, the public can see examples of new ways in which Executive branch agencies are using transparency, participation and collaboration to achieve their missions.

The peer review pilot, launched in June 2007 in the computer related arts and expanded in 2008 to business methods, encourages the public to review volunteered published patent applications and submit technical references and comments on what they believe to be the best prior art to consider during the examination. The pilot is being conducted in cooperation with the Peer-to-Patent Project, organized by the New York Law School's Institute for Information Law and Policy.