03.16.18
Deleted EPO Tweets and Promotion of Software Patents Amid Complaints About Abuse and Demise of Patent Quality
Tweet deleted (although everything was in tact)
Summary: Another ordinary day at the EPO with repressions of workforce, promotion of patents that aren’t even allowed, and Team UPC failing to get its act together
THE EPO has been censoring its staff quite a lot lately. We’ve just reported some more SLAPP against the media and in recent weeks we wrote about EPO management muzzling representatives.
“We are assuming that many examiners already understand the connection/correlation/overlap with the UPC; firms that are connected to patent trolls don’t mind declines in patent quality.”In spite of this growingly toxic atmosphere, staff found the courage to speak out against EPO policies. It spoke out about patent quality declines. After we had heard about it we posted the original petition (yesterday morning) and last night we complained that only two sites had covered it. There’s now a 3rd article, this one from World Intellectual Property Review (SUEPO now lists all 3).
To quote:
A petition submitted by 924 patent examiners has claimed that quality of the European Patent Office (EPO) patent is endangered by the demands of current management.
The petition was sent as a letter to the Administrative Council (AC), the EPO’s supervisory body, ahead of its meeting later this month.
“We are far too often put in front of the dilemma of either working according to the European Patent Convention and respecting the examiner’s guidelines, or issuing ‘products’ as our hierarchy demands,” said the petition.
We are assuming that many examiners already understand the connection/correlation/overlap with the UPC; firms that are connected to patent trolls don’t mind declines in patent quality*. In fact, to them it might as well be desirable. Their staff has promoted software patents for a long time. One such firm, Bristows, stands out. For the third time in a month Bristows messed up its own site (earlier today). This firm is so incompetent that it published a page that just says “Edward” and that’s it. It also posted another “Test” page and left it in tact. So their legal advice is as bad as their technical skills; they don’t know how to use their Web site, having published 3 posts in error (in just 15 minutes today). And that’s the third time in a month. As before, hours later the mess got cleaned up.
“It’s like giving a person a money-printing machine only for that person to endlessly produce and thus devalue cash. Same for patents.”More curious, however, was today’s EPO tweet about contracts in the Netherlands because the EPO later deleted this tweet, shortly after I had said: “Reminder: the EPO burned contractors there and Battistelli also ‘stole’ money…”
Why was their tweet deleted after that? Separately, the EPO carried on boasting/bragging about the number of granted monopolies. It’s like giving a person a money-printing machine only for that person to endlessly produce and thus devalue cash. Same for patents. I told them: “It’s not a competition, you know? Besides, these are low-quality patents, say EPO insiders…”
It was then that the EPO also promoted software patents using the “4IR” buzzword (Battistelli and IAM have already admitted that this is what the term stands for). It’s the new “CII”. █
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* Trolls rarely need to even have their patents tested in a court (they target the vulnerable, hoping for a settlement off the record). They just need a patent granted, sometimes then sold, and the ‘protection’ racket can begin.
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