Happy New Year !!

To all of you reading this Blog every now and then, let me start this first post of the year by wishing you all the best for 2010! For those doing the EQE 2010, good luck in these last +/- 2 months.

Looking back at 2009 I can only conclude that it has been a remarkable, interesting an succesful year.

Succesful in the sense that I (contrary to my expectations) passed the EQE.

Interesting in the sense that I've found a way to stay up-to-date with what's going on at the EPO that is useful not only for me yet may also be of interest to others.

Remarkable in the sense that I did not expect that the Blog would receive so many pageloads as illustrated below. From the very beginning in April 2009 until October 2009 the number of monthly pageloads has increased significantly to a total number of about 27.000. The small drop in November and December is clearly related to the number of posts, which decreased over the last two months. Overall, I'm very happy with this result.

In addition, the Blog now has

34 E-mail subscriptions
69 RSS subscribers


2010 will hopefully be even more interesting; at least the following can be expected:

- Significant layout changes
- A/B Tools will be updated
- Up-to-date editable version of the EPC Articles and Rules available
- OJEPO and PCT summaries will be moved to the Google Docs platform
- More articles, more case law discussions
- ....

Cheers !!

New Blogs on the block

Two new Blogs have recently started, both of these may be worthwhile following in preparing for the EQE.

Salted Patent

K's Law

Happy reading !

Friday evening considerations

As the evening of another very hot day sets in, the mind starts working again.

..... flowcharts instead of large pieces of text ..... case law organised so one can actually find it quickly ..... A tools ..... B Tools ..... C Tools ..... how about the Guidelines ..... what am I going to do with the PCT ..... is this Blog appreciated at all ..... where do I find the time to further optimise the layout of the Blog and the download area ..... what will it look like in the future and what do I need to do to get there ..... what am I going to do with advertising in the future ..... will I try to find sponsoring for the Blog ..... will I invite others to join the Blog as authors ..... will I start promoting this Blog actively ..... where do I find the time to organise all the stuff I mentioned above ..... did I pass the EQE

The answer to at least one of these issues will be known on August 5.

I just wonder if I will be having the same thoughts next year ?

Cheers !

Printing and commenting

Just as a reminder, you can print the posts on this Blog without the sidebars by first clicking on the title of a post, then by clicking the "print this post" link, which you find at the bottom. Alternatively you can print by using the  button.

In addition this is also the place where you can comment on my posts.

Design changes

Just so you know, I'm in the process of modifying the design of this weblog. Thus, the looks and feel may change the next weeks. Of course the content will stay.

One of the first modifications concern the new logo and the added printing functionality.

You can now print the posts without the additional content of the header and the side-bar. First select a post by clicking on it's title, which will bring the post in a new window. Then scroll down to the end of the post where you find a link "Print this post". I have tested this succesfully with Google Chrome and Internet Explorer. For some (unknown) reason Firefox will only print the first page.