IP slowdown as economic indicator

In case you still are not quite convinced that the global economy has slowed down quite a bit over the past 20 months or so, here's another piece of evidence of global recession.

WIPO released a study last week indicating that growth in intellectual property filings worldwide slowed down in 2007 and 2008 and that trademark filings may have actually decreased in 2008. I can't imagine this report is surprising to most, but it is nonetheless troubling.

As a purely unscientific aside, I've observed here in the Patent and Trademark Center that independent inventor and small business startup traffic has increased. It's anyone's guess as to why seemingly more people are stopping in, calling, or writing to ask about patents and trademarks, but I like to think that perhaps people who have lost their jobs are deciding that now is the time to act on ideas that they've been thinking about for years but have been too busy to pursue. Hey, somebody's gotta be an optimist...