ÿþ<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC '-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN'> <html><head><title>540872-00009.htm</title> <meta name='vs_defaultClientScript' content='JavaScript'> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"> <meta name='vs_targetSchema' content='http://schemas.microsoft.com/intellisense/ie3-2nav3-0'> <meta name='Originator' content='CommentWorks'></head><body><Table> <tr><td><b>Comment Number: </b></td><td>540872-00009</td></tr> <tr><td><b>Received: </b></td><td>2/4/2009 2:11:17 PM</td></tr> <tr><td><b>Organization: </b></td><td>Salesforce.com, inc.</td></tr> <tr><td><b>Commenter: </b></td><td>Paul Durdik</td></tr> <tr><td><b>State: </b></td><td>CA</td></tr> <tr><td><b>Agency: </b></td><td>Federal Trade Commission</td></tr> <tr><td><b>Rule: </b></td><td>Public Hearings Concerning the Evolving Intellectual Property Marketplace</td></tr> <tr><td>No Attachments</tr></Table> <hr><P><b>Comments:</b></p>The USPTO has sold itself to the largest of companies, simply rubber-stamping anything sent to it by Oracle or Microsoft, without regard to its quality. Meanwhile, worthwhile inventions from smaller companies such as ours are subjected to needless delay and a barage of useless/irrelevant rejections to block the smaller company from obtaining a patent. Larger companies then use their &quot;licensing programs&quot; to shutdown the smaller companies, who have nothing to defend themselves with, stifling innovation and destroying any competition.</body></html>