UNDER the nontechnical leadership of António Campinos, not an examiner himself (not even remotely; just another politician like his predecessor and his dad), the European Patent Office (EPO) has new words or terms for illegal patents -- terms which are sometimes adopted/borrowed by the USPTO to bypass 35 U.S.C. €§ 101.
"We should not be gullible; they very clearly talk about software patents, but they abstain from using these words."We don't want to sound repetitive as there's clearly no point saying again what we can link to instead. But let's just remind ourselves that last month the EPO started with the "digital" hype. They call "digital" almost anything which involves technology, algorithms included, and as soon as this week started the EPO tweeted: "Digital technologies are finding their way into every aspect of our modern lives. But what does the patent landscape look like in this field? We've put together this overview: https://bit.ly/2waSfO6"
It didn't take long for FFII to spot this and add: "Or illegal software patents. Time for the CJEU to intervene in your dubious practices."
On the same day (yesterday) the EPO wrote again with that old template and stock photography: "Did you know? We've got an e-learning centre where you can follow a whole range of courses on #patent-related topics."
First entry right there in that page is illegal software patents being promoted under the guise of "games".
Notice these new themes. "Digital..."
Now "games..." (or "videogames")
We should not be gullible; they very clearly talk about software patents, but they abstain from using these words.
The EPO also tweeted (yesterday): "#patentinsights: Patents can enable companies to renew their business models and enter new markets."
Read as: legitimate companies can use patents to profit from patent trolling and blackmail (or so-called "licensing").
Lately, as the plague spread around Europe, the EPO's Twitter account has been more shamelessly (than ever before) spreading this kind of propaganda, with as many as 3-4 promotions of software patents in one single day. They may name-drop "hey hi" (AI), "blockchain" and "4IR..."
All that hype and typically a bunch of mindless nonsense alludes to something which is not patent-eligible, not as per the EPC. They pretend that they can interpret the EPC through the scopes or optics of buzzwords, but they fool nobody but themselves.
Just a short while ago we saw this page or 'article' (more like a press release; it's borderline) entitled "Chinese tech giants Tencent, Alibaba filed for the most blockchain patents last year" and even the EPO itself admitted that those are bunk. Those are bogus patents on algorithms. The page says:
Chinese tech giants Tencent and Alibaba filed the most blockchain patent applications in 2019, according to research conducted by The Block’s Steven Zheng.
Tencent and its affiliates filed for 718 blockchain patents out of a total of over 5,800, while Alibaba Group filed 470. Together, they accounted for over 20% of the total.