US Patent Office will not accept upside down faxes

PsyKoH · #1 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 10:31 AM

[Only Registered Users Can See LinksClick Here To Register]

Quote:

I know, the headline seems like a joke. After all, what do you do if someone inadvertently fed a page upside down into the fax machine? You simply turn the page over or, if you get an electronic version, use the reader software to rotate it. Apparently this is not within the standard operating procedures of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. No, if your fax comes in upside down, then send you a message in return saying that they can’t accept it and to re-fax...

And some want the government to run our health care...

dsuave624 · #2 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 11:06 AM

That has to be a joke, no fucking way

**ABC** · #3 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 11:57 AM

**Sassan** · #4 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 09:24 PM

Hahahahahahahahahaha

Serg Zone · #5 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 09:42 PM

Brilliant

Fred Ryan · #6 (**permalink**) 02-04-2010, 09:48 PM

silly. just ridiculous.

Spike · #7 (**permalink**) 02-08-2010, 05:29 PM

In their defense, if the electronic fax was sent upside down, it could be a total nightmare because patents are usually hundreds or even thousands of pages long. Off hand, I'm not sure if there's a batch process for this in any program but I could see why they would reject the submission if they had to flip it one page at a time.

But regardless, you would think that they would have a program that takes care of this in the even that it was sent upside down...

Xtrema · #8 (**permalink**) 02-08-2010, 05:39 PM

Bwhwahahahha

kierandill · #9 (**permalink**) 02-08-2010, 09:24 PM

Lifetime props to anyone that faxes an upside down photocopy of their ass to the the patent office....

Xtrema · #10 (**permalink**) 02-08-2010, 10:40 PM

So it actually not 100% clear.

Is this 180 upside down? Or got the wrong side of page upside down?

Serg Zone · #11 (**permalink**) 02-10-2010, 11:26 PM

They're likely using some sort of optical character-recognition technology and those things are 80% reliable in good cases and in bad cases such as this one it is nearly useless unless the vendor provides a fix for it and if they don't, it'll run into millions to get one. My company started using it for document repository and i'm sure that any business as big as and as dependent on document processing as USPO is probably using something similar.

Blacktop · #12 (**permalink**) 02-11-2010, 12:19 AM

I hate fax machines. Twitchy, glitch prone shitty outdated tech. They need to go the way of the rotary phone.

carfreak67 · #13 (**permalink**) 02-11-2010, 10:22 PM

Typical government nonsense.

Digital senders FTW.