Bonum Certa Men Certa

Suppression of Voices Critical of the European Patent Office (EPO)

Mind the AstroTurfing parallels... and remember that it's Guillaume Minnoye who is notably concerned about EPO leaks (whistleblowers)

Guillaume Minnoye, EPO, and Wikileaks



Summary: An analysis of recent trends in EPO coverage and conversations, which seem to be artificially steered (or manipulated) so as to better project authority and disseminate the EPO's misleading talking points

THE EPO's threats against critics (lawyers, national delegates, bloggers, staff representatives, judges etc.) have meant that many participants in the system have opted for self-censorship. But we believe that it goes further than this. There is censorship that we never even hear about, let alone can hear about (gag orders and demands of confidentiality contribute to this).



"There is censorship that we never even hear about, let alone can hear about (gag orders and demands of confidentiality contribute to this)."Now that the EPO pays a lot of money for fake media coverage and media distortion I have begun tracking -- a lot more closely than before -- anything which relates to the EPO. We ask others to report such things to us as well. EPO AstroTurfing already seems likely given what we saw earlier today. This is familiar to us because we already know Microsoft AstroTurfing and techniques of Microsoft PR agencies, having researched these for over a decade. One way to warp a debate is to inject positive (for the client) comments into typically hostile forums, thereby derailing the discussion.

Particular patent lawyers are weighing in, latching onto anonymous comments which seem likely to be AstroTurfing. They are of course supporting the almighty President Battistelli as if all the abuses can be magically swept aside and the examiners are merely spoiled and paranoid. The following new comment demonstrates what's wrong (reversal of the forum's momentum, putting staff on the defensive): "I was tired to read since more than two years only comments about suicides, human rights violated, non-respect of the law, abuses, nepotism, etc."

"Particular patent lawyers are weighing in, latching onto anonymous comments which seem likely to be AstroTurfing."Bear in mind that such comments aren't from regular commenters; these are patent lawyers whose personal blogs attack the staff of the EPO and actively help the management's relatively dubious narrative, even in recent posts such as this one from "Meldrew" ("Patent Attorney" from London) or this one from "TreatyNotifier" (Dutch male).

Seeing how quickly (especially today) the discussion in IP Kat got derailed, we must at least suspect a subversive hand, perhaps part of the €880,000 media campaign. As one regular pointed out, "lying to the AC and asking them to take an illegal decision would be dismissed by his supervising authority in the outside world." (and if not above the law)

"The EPO is a truly sick organisation and more people need to get the real facts, not the fictional 'facts' which EPO managers paid €880,000 for FTI Consulting to spread around."Another person, in a separate thread, wrote about PACE (which is being defended by some anonymous commenters) that "the directors can change the priorities of individual files and some are using it as a means to insure the directorate reach its global objectives. Some directors want their bonus as well (or fear to be sent to pension).

"Also: there are instructions not to allow examiners who have a large prio 1 stock to take Christmas leave. As one can only transfer so many days, they will lose their leave. That motivates some to work only on files with "top" priority, which may or may not be PACE files."

We wrote about this last month. How is this even complying in any way with European laws?

In our next post we are going to focus on how the EPO abuses not just holiday leave but also sick leave. The EPO is a truly sick organisation and more people need to get the real facts, not the fictional 'facts' which EPO managers paid €880,000 for FTI Consulting to spread around. It's like a lobbying campaign by very affluent people, trying to protect their astronomical (secret but very high) salaries.

“Money is like a sixth sense without which you cannot make a complete use of the other five.”

--W. Somerset Maugham



Recent Techrights' Posts

The Week to Come
Planning ahead
LLM Slop Has Only Been a Boon for Misinformation Online
The very same companies that were supposed to maintain quality (again, not limited to Google with PageRank) are now actively participating in generating and spreading slop
When They Tell You It's Free, Does That Mean No Charges (If So, Who's Paying and Why)?
there's "no free lunch"
 
Links 28/07/2025: COVID-19 Sped up Brain Aging, "Circumvention is More Popular Than Compliance"
Links for the day
Richard Stallman is Usually Right Because He Thinks "Outside the Box"
he is able to observe society (mores and norms) as somewhat of an outsider
LWN Has Been Down for a Long Time, Another Casualty of LLM Bots?
Time will tell. How much time though?
Slopfarms Versus 'Linux' (and Against People Who Write Real Articles About GNU/Linux)
LLM slop in slopfarms by Brian Fagioli and Redazione RHC
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Running pkgsrc in a FreeBSD Jail
Links for the day
Microsoft Turns News Sites Into Spamfarms
Is the site The Register MS the next IDG?
The Register MS/The Register US
On Saturday I contacted them for a comment (before issuing criticism)
Hacking revelations at Vatican Jubilee of Digital Missionaries
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 27, 2025
We're Going to Focus Less on the Molotov Cocktail-Throwing Microsofters and More on Patents
We can get back to focusing on what we wanted to focus on all along
Just Trying to Keep Web Sites Honest (Journalistic Integrity)
the latest articles in LinuxIac are real
Links 27/07/2025: Political Affairs, Data Breaches, Attacks on Freedom of the Press
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: Hot in Japan and Terminal Escape Codes
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: More Microsoft Layoffs Coming, Science and Hardware News
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: FSF Hackathon and "Hulk Hogan Was a Very Bad Man"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: DAW Mixer Chains and Simple Software
Links for the day
The Register MS is Inventing or Giving Air Time to New Conspiracy Theories so as to Distort the Narrative As High-Profile Agencies Fall Prey to Microsoft Holes
But the problem is holes, i.e. Microsoft making bad products; the problem is Microsoft
Most Editors at The Register Are American, Including the Editor in Chief, a Decade-Long Microsoft Stenographer (Writing Prose to Sell Microsoft)
It's not easy to tell where the site is based (we tried) because it's hiding behind ClownFlare and CrimeFlare hasn't been well lately
Pushers of systemd Rewrite History (Richard Stallman Said UNIX "Was Portable and Seemed Fairly Clean")
Unlike systemd
"New Techrights" Soon Turns 2 (A Few Days Before the FSF Turns 40)
We have a lot more to say about LLM bots
When Silence Says So Much
Garrett, a 'secure' boot pusher, will need to defend himself in the UK High Court
The Register in Trouble
There is not much that can be done at this point
Trajectory of The Register: From News Site/s Into "B2B"... and Into Microsoft Salespeople
Something isn't right at The Register
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 26, 2025
Misinformation in Social Control Media
Social control media passes around all sorts of tropes
Slopwatch: Fake Linux 'Articles' and Slopfarms With "Linux" in Their Names/Domains
throwing bots at "Linux" to make some fake articles
Links 26/07/2025: Amazon Shutdown in China, Russian Economy Slows
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: History of Time (1988) and Gemini Games
Links for the day
Links 26/07/2025: 50 Percent Tariffs in Amazon, Dying Intel Offloads Network and Edge Group (NEX)
Links for the day
Doing My Share to Tackle Online Slop and SPAM
Trying my best to 'fix' the Web
Blaming Programming Languages for Users' and Developers' Bad Practices
That's like blaming cars for drivers who crash into things
Slopwatch: Fakes, FUD, Duplicates, and Charlatans Galore
The Web as we once know it is collapsing. Some opportunists try to replace it with low-quality slop.
The Register UK Seems to Have Become American and Management is Changing (Microsofter as Editor in Chief)
The Register 'UK' is now controlled by the Directions on Microsoft guy
Many People Still Read Techrights Because It Says the Truth, Produces Evidence, and Does Not Self-Censor
Unlike so many other sites
The Register is Desperate for Money, According to The Register
I decided to check how they're doing as a business
Microsoft Finally Finds a Use Case for Slop?
Create low-quality chaff to shift the media's attention?
Microsoft Windows Lost 400 Million Users in a Few Years, Why Does The Register Double Down on Windows With New US Editor?
days ago they hired a new US editor
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 25, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 25, 2025
For Libel Reform One Must First Bring (or Raise) Awareness to the Issues and Their Magnitude
I myself know, from personal experience
Links 26/07/2025: Rationed Meals in the US and TikTok Repels Investments (Too Toxic)
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: "Bloody Google" and New People in Geminispace
Links for the day
Response to Solderpunk (Father of Gemini Protocol) About the Gemini Community
Solderpunk responds to non-sequitur
HTML and the Web Used to be Something a Child Could Learn, "Modern" Web is a Puzzle of Frameworks, Bloat, and Worse
When the Web was more like Gemini Protocol