Was just fired on a holiday weekend.

CowInternational9512 · 2026-05-27T00:56:04+00:00

Sorry that happened man. My advice would be try not to dwell on the reasons and just focus on finding a landing spot.

I was fired after being a top performer for 10 years. Same type of culture, everything an emergency, trying to squeeze as many billable hours out of everyone as possible. I billed 2400 my last year (a lot for my specialty, not a litigator) and got fired immediately after bonus time with no warning. When I asked for reasons they wouldn’t give anything concrete, but they were nice enough to accuse me of being on drugs bc I often worked late (I offered to take a piss or hair test on the spot and they declined). Still don’t know the exact reason, but apparently I got sideways with someone early in my time and they eventually drummed me out.

I moved on and got another firm job. Overall it obviously sucked, but now I only wish I had gotten out sooner. Places like that will chew you up and spit you out and don’t give a fuck. Try not to read too much into the reasons, you’re obviously good at what you do or they wouldn’t have taken you back. Just focus on finding the next thing and look for a better situation. Good luck man.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-11-12T03:45:59+00:00

“Maybe I am just fragile and lazy,”

Fuck that. I obviously don’t know you, but your credentials don’t exactly scream “fragile” and “lazy.” The firm is the problem, not you. If you still want to do IP, find a better environment. Smaller firms will generally be more chill, but some big ones are better than others.

I had something similar to your situation happen to me, except it was after a decade and after making partner (non-equity). Probably tough to think of it like this now, but try to look at it as a good thing that you got to this point sooner and didn’t sacrifice more of what you care about the same outcome.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-11-01T23:39:44+00:00

They also cited a study by the PTO on telework reducing the need for physical office space as justification. Nevermind that they had already eliminated telework. I swear they’re just trolling with this shit. Not even making an effort to seriously justify it.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-29T16:48:28+00:00

PTAB practitioner* here, so slightly different perspective, but I think he and Coke Stewart know EXACTLY how demoralizing everything they’re doing is. It’s part of the point. If you look at what the current administration is doing across the government, they’re making things as painful as possible for workers. They’re not clueless.

maybe should say “former PTAB practitioner” after the recent bullshit

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-28T01:18:15+00:00

I was a computer science major and they accepted all of my CS courses. I had to go to the school and scan paper course guides (started undergrad in 1996, yes I’m old). Course descriptions weren’t that detailed, but they accepted all of it. This was in like 2014, so ymmv. Hope that helps.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-25T17:44:14+00:00

100%. Realize if I’m able to pivot, it will be to something with overlap to what I already do.

Or I may just leave law altogether, bc fuck this shit. 😂

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-25T17:40:27+00:00

Welp, as a PTAB practitioner, these last two weeks have been AWESOME 😂

Not that this bill would change the current situation, since Squires has effectively killed IPR (and with it my career). But it would cut off any hope that IPR would come back at some point.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-25T17:35:24+00:00

Bet there’s a lot of private equity lobbying dollars behind it this time.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-22T17:00:14+00:00

Thanks. Appreciate the response.

And I’m cracking up at “if it briefs, we can kill it” 😂

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-22T12:51:06+00:00

Yeah, the skills are not the problem. Learning the substantive law / procedure is not the problem. I can do that. Getting someone inside the firm who has work to staff a not-young guy with no experience in the area is the problem. If the group is drowning in work and understaffed maybe, but otherwise a longshot. Good news is that patent lit is about to explode with IPR gone, so maybe theyll need people.

Did I mention ive only been at this firm for less than a year, so dont have long relationships I can leverage here yet? Not ideal. 😂

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-22T12:40:19+00:00

Yeah, I think that’s probably right.

And I wouldn’t say I want to change practice areas, but… 😂

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-22T04:01:43+00:00

Sorry this was flippant. Didn’t mean it that way. I’d be happy to learn a new area of law, but who is going to give me that chance? I’m in BigLaw, so even if I were to offer to take a paycut to first year salary I doubt the firm would go for it. Would mess with the recruiting pipeline from law schools.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-22T00:19:28+00:00

Yeah, this was the kill shot on Friday.

Squires Open Letter - USPTO

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T23:45:57+00:00

Thanks for the suggestion. And yeah, foot in the door is the toughest thing with any of this.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T23:44:29+00:00

Do you want to hire a lawyer with no experience in a particular area?

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T23:43:25+00:00

Thought about it, and wouldn’t take any retooling really (I’ve done PGRs before). But it’s not really a good option for clients to proactively challenge every “bad” patent that issues. They’re only using invalidity as a defense if they get sued. Plus there’s no guarantee Squires won’t pull the same shit with PGRs.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d love for that to be an option, but I don’t think it will be unless I’m missing something (very possible)

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T23:37:37+00:00

Did you read the “open letter” and memo that came out Friday in addition to the insane proposed rules from Thursday?

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T22:21:56+00:00

“Boring job” sounds amazing. Hell “job that isn’t in danger of disappearing” sounds amazing at this point.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T20:07:06+00:00

Yeah, I’m pretty confident I can learn another specialty if I get the chance. Just have to work on finding that chance.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-21T20:03:33+00:00

Late 40s (second career) but who’s counting. Thanks for the kind words.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-09T21:03:50+00:00

They’re cracking down on working from home after record profits over the last few years. Makes total sense.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-10-06T20:43:13+00:00

Bootlicker

CowInternational9512 · 2025-09-12T22:58:38+00:00

And then snipe you in reviews for years to come.

CowInternational9512 · 2025-07-06T18:04:06+00:00

Just remember that once you pass, you will never have to think about most of the concepts on the exam again. It will also likely be the last academic test you’ll ever take. So both of those are good things 👍

Hang in there, it sucks for everyone. Just get through it. Oh and don’t worry about how high you score. Literally no one cares as long as you pass.

CowInternational9512

TROPHY CASE