Bonum Certa Men Certa

How Institut International des Brevets (IIB), INPADOC and Other Historic Endeavours Relate to EPO and DG1/DG2

Not much public information/online literature about it (not anymore)

Institut International des Brevets (IIB)



Summary: The roots of the Dutch/German-centric EPO and the lesser-discussed points/questions which these roots may bring up

LAST NIGHT we wrote about the EPO being a cash cow of Germany. A lot of this money comes from outside Europe to mostly enrich the German economy (for patents with European -- and beyond -- scope).



"EPO staff representatives have, over the years, written a lot about the issue of impunity/immunity in international organisations."The FFII's President then told me he "heard the money goes into the Ministry of Justice, and if that's the case, they also decide on UPC, so there might be a serious conflict of interest there. During the swpat [software patents] directive, competence was transferred from the ministry of economics to the ministry of justice."

Germany's role in the EPO and the roots of EPO structures are worth recalling. We studied the subject a long time ago (when Germany blatantly refused to enforce German law against the EPO's management), but we never published anything about it. Whose European Patent Office is it anyway? "I'm not at all into social media, but I just had a look at their EPO Twitter feed," said former EPO staff. "What a crock! Do they sub-contract to the Pyongyang People's daily?"

No, it's based in Germany. A lot of the EPO is based there. It should certainly not be a taboo subject to highlight this fact. It's not a protest against the European Union or against Germany itself.

"Let's not forget the element which emerged later: an 'unwanted' DG (DG3) was sent to Haar.""The reference to Art. 5(2) illustrates a profound asymmetry," one person told me when the EPO threatened to sue me. "The EPO claims immunity in all matters whenever it suits them. But then they turn around and cries "but, hey, please, I'm a real person!" when it also suits them. I'm not sure whether the drafters of the EPC had such a monstrous outcome in mind."

EPO staff representatives have, over the years, written a lot about the issue of impunity/immunity in international organisations. It is, indeed, quite a monstrosity.

Citing several pages of a 1990s law treatise, one reader of ours said that "[t]here is at least one chapter specifically dealing with the EPO. A mere few lines describe a case which happened in Austria sometimes in the 1980s which I found rather egregious."

This, in turn, leads back to EPO history (which might be poorly or inaccurately recalled). To quote:

IIRC, the EPO took over a commercial company, and made it an integral part of organisation.

If memory serves me right, the company wasn't named, but it could only have been INPADOC, the patent information service. The Vienna agency is now in charge of the production of the EPO's own patent information, the publication of EPO patent-related documents, and gathers patent information worldwide for inclusion in EPO databases, which are also sold.

Again, inferring from the few details given, the company must have had a long term lease for their office space, but the EPO moved the operation to new premises, and simply walked out of the old contract.

The landlord sued for the unpaid rent, considering that the office took over the obligations of the former entity, but the EPO pulled the "IMMUNITY" trump card, and the judge obliged!!!

Now, Art. 5 was obviously designed to allow the EPO to sue, say, plumbers who botch their work.

But a competent plumber whose bill wasn't paid by the EPO must also be able to sue, isn't it?

I don't know what kind of impression 30-year old continental case law would make on an English judge.

I would be rather surprised if the Derbyshire council, or any other one, wouldn't be allowed in matters of commercial law. A parallel could be drawn.

BTW, this was the Vienna office which Battistelli want[ed] to swap with DG3.

How about a triangular exchange? DG3 to Vienna, Vienna to Berlin, and Berlin to Munich... The more, the merrier.



We often wondered why DGs came about at all. What was the historic significance of these? Here's a possible explanation:

The EPO was built on two pillars:

1) The IIB, "Institut International des Brevets", which was a pre-existing institution founded around 1947 based at The Hague. It was designed to supply prior-art searches to a number of countries, for the eventual determination of patent validity strictly under national laws. In essence it was a big library with a lot of librarians. It was merged into the EPO as its "Directorate General 1" - DG1. [And IIB staff weren't too happy about that, but that's another story.]

2) The DG2 in Munich which opened its doors in 1978, for performing the substantive examination assessing patentability according to the law defined in the EPC, based on documentary evidence located by DG1.

[The distinct DG1 and DG2 have now disappeared and merged into a new "DG1"]

The IIB had been mostly an affair of French, Benelux and Latin countries in the early 20th century, of which Germany had been excluded.

I would have to find absolute proof of that, and visit archives, but it seems from the circumstantial evidence that this project was intimately connected to an humanist dream of a world documentation center for gathering and organising all forms of human intellectual production.

The early history of concept of DG2 is more sinister, and if I were Battistelli, I would avoid using the "nazi" label to smear my opponents... quite a bit of stuff in German from 1940-1945 is quite uncomfortable to read, as it looks like a virtual blueprint for the structure of the 1973 EPC...

Is this the kind of history you had in mind?

The miracle in my eyes is how an humanist endeavor [DG1] and a corporate wet dream [DG2] came to be merged into one project as a part of "European Construction".


Let's not forget the element which emerged later: an 'unwanted' DG (DG3) was sent to Haar. Poetic?

"Back around 2010 we wrote many articles about the vision of a global patent system, based largely on leaked material which came to be known as Cablegate.""I've been interested for a long time in the early history of the EPO," one person once told us, "a topic on which not that much has been written. By "history" I mean, real work by historians analyzing the motivations of the negotiating parties, and on the "proto-history" of the institution. The quest for an international patent system has been ongoing for at least the last 140 years, and the EPO undoubtedly isn't the final episode."

Think of the UPC, among other things, maybe even WIPO's ambitions and IP5. Back around 2010 we wrote many articles about the vision of a global patent system, based largely on leaked material which came to be known as Cablegate.

Recent Techrights' Posts

In Norway, Android/Linux Has Just Hit All-Time High (First Time Since 2020), GNU/Linux Already Very Prevalent
Despite its small population size, Norway gave us Qt and many other things
Microsoft's Mass Layoffs Very Wide-Ranging, Media Focused on Gaming Though Microsoft Mass-Firing Lawyers and "AI" Staff (Contradicting Its Supposed "Investment" in "AI")
Microsoft plans to fire almost half a thousand people in legal roles
2012 Article About the Free Software Foundation Blasting Canonical/Ubuntu Over Adoption of "Secure" Boot (Microsoft's Remote Control Over GNU/Linux Since PCs' Power-on)
By Katherine Noyes (article has since then became 404, not found)
Debian Can Dump Blind Users Because I am Not Blind
the sort of mentality we're up against
The European Patent Office Cannot Attract Proficient Patent Examiners Who Master Their Domain
They are enablers and facilitators of corruption
 
Gemini Links 19/07/2025: "Climate Justice” and Forking Programs
Links for the day
What Wayland and Microsoft/IBM systemd Have in Common
focus on what IBM (Red Hat) is pushing while running over critics.
Linux Already Has About 60% of the "Market"
"When mentioning the client side," opines an associate, "it is essential to recite the list of other markets where Microsoft is negligible or a no-show. It is repetitive to do so, but it needs saying -- often."
Finland (and NATO) Must Move to GNU/Linux and Dump Microsoft Even Faster
"Microsoft is not a technology problem, it is a staffing problem."
The Microsofters We Sued Helped Microsoft Make GNU/Linux 'Expire' This Year
"Linux and Secure Boot certificate expiration"
linuxconfig.org Joins linuxtechlab.com and Others, Becomes a Slopfarm With Fake Linux 'Articles' (LLM Slop)
They contain "linux" in their domain names, but they are just slopfarms
Links 19/07/2025: Microsoft Cuts in China and Wall Street Journal Sued for Reporting on Jeffrey Epstein
Links for the day
Fascistic Policies Got 'Normalised' in 'Public Office'. Let's Not Let the Same Happen in 'Tech'.
Political discourse typically guides what's "normal" and what "good citizens" should believe/feel
Yes, Your Mastodon Instance Will Also Shut Down
Few people run a one-person instance in the Fediverse
The Demise of GAFAM Necessitates Greater and Broader Awareness
Morale at Microsoft is really bad
Free Software Foundation Reaches 75% of Funding Goal
Not bad for this "Fosschild"
Slopwatch: 7 New Examples of Fake 'Linux' Slop Pieces (Plagiarism With Misinformation)
Serial Sloppers need to be shunned
Links 19/07/2025: Kapo-berg Settles, Software Patents Challenged
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 18, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 18, 2025
Links 18/07/2025: Peace With PKK and Connie Francis Dies
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/07/2025: Alhena 5.1.8 and Bornhack 2025
Links for the day
How to Top Up a "Limited Liability" With Even More Limitations (Dodging Accountability in the UK)
Some people call it a "shell game". Sometimes it's done for tax evasion purposes.
Free Software Foundation, Inc. (FSF) Inches Towards 75% of Fund-Raising Target
Will the cutoff date be extended again?
Gemini Space (or Geminispace) Grows, But Usage of Certificate Authority Let's Encrypt Drops Further
Ideally, all Gemini capsules should use self-signed certificates
Links 18/07/2025: More Microsoft Layoffs in Activision, The New Stack (Sponsored by Microsoft) Complains About Openwashing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/07/2025: OCC25 Gnus for Reading Usenet and RSS Feeds, Small Web Updates
Links for the day
[Meme] 9AM Meeting at Brett Wilson LLP
Brett Wilson LLP in space
Listing as Staff People Who Left the Company More Than Six Years Earlier
There are apparently no laws against that
Brian Fagioli Shovels Up LLM Slop (Plagiarism) Onto Slashdot, Then Uses Slashdot for Affirmation or as Badge of Honour
Notice how some of his latest slop is presented ("as featured on Slashdot")
Social Control Media Productivity
Snapping photos of the bone
The Law Firm SLAPPing Us For the Microsofters Lost 72% of Its Tangible Assets in the Past Year, According to Its Own Reports
That might help explain why they're willing to tolerate serial stranglers from Microsoft as clients
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity.com Slopfarm and Slopfarms Propped Up by Google News
"As LLM slop is foisted onto the WWW in place of knowledge and real content, it now gets ingested and processed by other LLMs, creating a sort of ouroboros of crap."
Links 18/07/2025: Weather Events and Health Hazards
Links for the day
Microsoft's All-Time Low in Finland
Microsoft is in a freefall
Security: Shane Wegner & Debian statement of incompetence
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 17, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, July 17, 2025
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: "Goodreads for Gemini" and Defence of "The Small Web"
Links for the day
Links 17/07/2025: Anger and Morale Issues at Microsoft, Wars and Conflicts Get Digital
Links for the day
CALEA / CALEA2 is the Real Problem, Not Chinese Operatives Exploiting CALEA / CALEA2 (as Any Other Nation Can)
CALEA / CALEA2 is more of a front door than a back door
99.99% Uptime in First Half of 2025
Since January there was only one noticeable outage
Nils Torvalds and Anna "Mikke" Torvalds (née Törnqvis) Hopefully Use GNU/Linux by Now
"Torvalds Family Uses Windows, Not Linus’ Linux"
Attack of the Slopfarms
FUD-amplifying bots with slop images, slop text (LLM slop)
When People Call a Best/Close Friend of Bill Gates a "Serial Rapist"
Good thing that the Linux Foundation keeps the "Linux" trademark ("Linux Mark") clean
Not My Problem, I Don't Care
Context/inspiration: Martin Niemöller
Honest Journalism About the European Patent Office Ceased to Exist After SLAPPs and Bribes to the Media
The EPO is basically a Mafia
Microsoft Bankruptcy in Russia, Shutdown in Pakistan, What Next?
It seems possible that in 2025 alone Microsoft will have laid off over 50,000 workers
Life Became Simpler When I Stopped Driving and I Don't Miss Driving When I See "Modern" Cars
Gee, wonder why car sales have plummeted...
Why I Believe Brett Wilson LLP and Its Microsoft Clients Are All Toast
So far our legal strategy has worked perfectly
EPO Jobs Are Very Toxic and Bad for One's Health
Health first, not monopolies
Response to Ryo Suwito Regarding the Four Freedoms
the point of life isn't to make more money
Microsoft's Morale Circling Down the Drain
Or gutter, toilet etc.
What Matters More Than "Market Share"
The goal is freedom, not "market share"
Tech Used to be Fun. To Many of Us It's Still Fun.
You can just watch it from afar and make fun of it all
Links 17/07/2025: "Blog Identity Crisis" and Openwashing by Nvidia
Links for the day
Greffiers and the US Attorney of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
The lawsuit can help expose extensive corruption in the American court system as well
Credit Suisse collapse obfuscated Parreaux, Thiébaud & Partners scandal
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The People Who Promoted systemd in Debian Also Promote Wayland
This is not politics
UK Media Under Threat: Cannot Report on Data Breach, Cannot Report on Microsoft Staff Strangling Women
The story of super injunction (in the British media this week, years late)
Victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, Wanted to Sue Him But Lacked the Funds (He Attacked Their Finances)
Having spoken to victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
Links 17/07/2025: Science, Hardware, and Censorship
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: Staying in the "Small Web" and Back on ICQ
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 16, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, July 16, 2025