03.17.17
Gemini version available ♊︎UPC Fake News Rising Sharply as Door Closes for Unitary Patent Ratification and Jo Johnson ‘Needs’ to Believe the UPC Will Actually Happen
Team UPC keeps spreading a lot of fake news in the UK, e.g. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
Reference: Wikipedia
Summary: An outline of some of the latest attempts to distort the truth for financial gain (lawyers who stand to gain from the UPC, along with their giant clients that wish to crush competition across Europe)
THE UPC is not in a good state or in decent shape. There is a lobbying campaign, however, trying to make it seem as though the UPC is desirable, imminent, and unstoppable. Dr. Ingve Björn Stjern too has already debunked these myths. That’s what they are: myths. Honest, albeit few, people inside the legal profession sometimes care to admit the truth under their real name. Many are complicit by silence, oftentimes out of convenience. As someone put it some weeks ago in IP Kat, the very thought of UPC in the UK “is a perfect example of what lobbying can achieve!”
“Dr. Ingve Björn Stjern too has already debunked these myths. That’s what they are: myths.”We are a Web site composed largely by a single person (hi!), but that doesn’t mean we’re powerless in the face of an extraordinary lobbying campaign funded in part by Benoît Battistelli and the EPO for a number of years. They’re lying to us. They are trying to fool all of us, including our elected officials.
As we have explained here repeatedly (even yesterday), the UPC simply cannot — as a matter of law — happen in the UK (court jurisdiction, requirement of being EU member state etc.), so the best Team UPC can do right now is rewrite what’s known as “UPC” with Milan instead of London. It wouldn’t even (necessarily) be called “UPC” at that point. Speaking of Milan, see yesterday’s article from Trevisan & Cuonzo Avvocati (a law firm), titled “Should I stay or should I go: the Court of Milan rules on the possibility of deciding on an invalidity/infringement action pending opposition before the EPO” (it would be off topic to remark on it right now).
“Honest, albeit few, people inside the legal profession sometimes care to admit the truth under their real name. Many are complicit by silence, oftentimes out of convenience.”The reality of the UPC being strictly impossible in the UK is not being tolerated. The law firms down in London are very, very angry. They are also somewhat nervous, knowing that Article 50 is coming and Jo Johnson has not yet ratified anything (even when Team UPC said he was ‘supposed’ to, namely March 7th).
Here we have a lawyer at James Ware Stephenson stating: “#IP #Brexit UPC function depends on quality of judges – UK is therefore best location of the UPC @IPaware”
But wait, what are the assumptions here? That British judges are somehow superior (supposedly the English language too) and that the UPC will come to post-Brexit Britain? “Quit pretending that UPC is coming to the UK,” I responded, “based on fake news that the lobbyists are trying to reinforce…”
“They try to attract UPC-related business, hence their constant lobbying for the UPC.”I have not received a respond, but never expected one either. The UPC proponents live in their own bubble and simply reject anyone who points out facts. Another person wrote that “JILL Smith of Dyson concerned about keeping what we have in IP @Dyson @ipaware #Brexit event @Briffalegal”
For those who wonder what “@ipaware” in these tweets refers to, it’s the “IP Awareness Network”, which is a sort of front group for the likes of Team UPC (and beyond), akin to CIPA. They’re simply lobbyists. Go to their original/official site and you will see “Site off-line”, so they don’t even maintain a Web site really (not so well anyway).
Darren Smyth, who has been lobbying for the UPC while knowing it's bad for the British industry, has just said (in the above context, “IP Awareness Network”): “UK industry will be reluctant to use Unitary Patent and #UPC until clear whether UK will stay in after #Brexit @IPaware”
They try to attract UPC-related business, hence their constant lobbying for the UPC. At whose expense? Brits who actually create things, and would be rendered vulnerable if the UPC ever became a reality. The same is true not only for Brits.
“Team UPC itself, suffice to say, is a 24/7 operation of UPC fake news, just amplifying its own misinformation as the closing date (Brexit/Article 50) looms.”Another one of those British UPC hopefuls (looking to profit from it, without actually creating anything) wrote that “#Unitary patent looks, at this point in time, to be on track for start date of December 1 2017.”
“You are linking to fake news from Team UPC,” I clarified, linking to our detailed debunkings of these fake news. Repeating fake news about UPC and Spain seems the only thing they’re capable of doing now (even linking again to already-debunked news from a week ago).
Team UPC itself, suffice to say, is a 24/7 operation of UPC fake news, just amplifying its own misinformation as the closing date (Brexit/Article 50) looms. Bird & Bird IP, a core part of Team UPC, needs to come clean about spreading fake news regarding Spain, but instead it writes that “The Socialist Party presses the Minister for answers on why Spain remains out of the #UPC system,” linking to its own lobbying, (mis)filed under the “news” section, under “articles”.
“Well, the “UPC Prep Committee” is nothing but the wolf that guards the sheep (or the fox watching over the hen house).”Team UPC employee Beatriz Díaz de Escauriaza (Associate in Spain) does some more lobbying, again with fake news which misrepresents what actually happened there. It’s not even news, it goes years back (2015) and is in no way indicative of upcoming change of mind, unless the Spanish media gets ‘planted’ in it politically-motivated shame pieces (as already happens, after pressure from Team UPC and maybe the EPO/FTI Consulting).
MIP, which keeps pushing for the UPC in strategic events (that just happen to coincide with Battistelli's lobbying visit to Jo Johnson), now refers to a "Committee" which is itself Team UPC as a source when it says: “Interesting: UPC Prep Committee “confident” UPCA Protocol will come into effect at end of May!”
“That’s like asking think tanks of fracking giants whether or not fracking is harmful to one’s health and the fracking analogy goes a long way because the EPO contracted fracking lobbyists to push agenda like the UPC.”Well, the “UPC Prep Committee” is nothing but the wolf that guards the sheep (or the fox watching over the hen house). That’s like asking think tanks of fracking giants whether or not fracking is harmful to one’s health and the fracking analogy goes a long way because the EPO contracted fracking lobbyists to push agenda like the UPC.
Truth be said, we have become accustomed to fake news about the UPC, courtesy of Team UPC and few gullible journalists who engage in no fact-checking process; this isn’t a new strategy and they have been doing this for many years, always predicting the imminent arrival of something that never came, in order to blackmail politicians into signing things in a rush, thinking they would be left behind/outside otherwise. █
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