Bonum Certa Men Certa

More Than 2,000 People, Including Directors, Said to Have Protested in Munich (About HALF of All EPO Staff Including The Hague Protest)

This is how the EPO's management wants the press to perceive staff protests (violence and/or vandalism, anti-EU biases)

Graffiti protest



Summary: A look at the growing support for SUEPO and the likes of it; the EPO's apparent response to it, which we increasingly believe involves military-grade AstroTurfing (the US-based FTI Consulting contract)

THE harder the staff pushes, the harder the management pushes too, resorting even to attack pieces in the press. We are now seeing anonymous comments in support of EPO management, repeating the EPO's own talking points which we often find in the media (corporate press).

"We are now seeing anonymous comments in support of EPO management, repeating the EPO’s own talking points which we often find in the media (corporate press)."We already know that the EPO is actively distorting media coverage. In the face of protests in Munich (not to be mistaken for other Munich protests), as well as the Dutch protest (last Tuesday), the people who are in favour of the management, apathetic or too afraid to show up in protests will soon be in the minority! Despite the horrible threats and the grave dangers (to one's career plus potential lawsuits), people are still defecting -- publicly -- to SUEPO et al.

We don't typically write much on a Sunday, but we have decided that it's time to write some more articles about the EPO, simply because the AstroTurfing (or what looks like it) has kicked into high gear today (on a Sunday!). FTI Consulting-coordinated propaganda (US-based) or something more innocent?

"Despite the horrible threats and the grave dangers (to one's career plus potential lawsuits), people are still defecting -- publicly -- to SUEPO et al."We can't tell for sure, but we can make informed guesses. The claims of EPO staff are under an apparent AstroTurfing attack right now -- one without ethical boundaries. We named some aspects of the current media strategy in previous posts of ours (the latest being accusing the whistleblowers of serious crimes).

Naming the "Investigation Unit (IU) or the ControlRisks people," one person responds to anonymous provocation by saying: "If you do not know what that means, ask you friend. Ask him also if he knows why more than 2000 people inclusive directors were protesting in front of the Isar-building."

We haven't yet found any media report about this massive protest. Remember that one of the PR strategies is to actively suppress reports about particular events. We thoroughly checked all the English-speaking media on Friday, Saturday, and earlier today. We even checked some of Munich's Sunday papers or sites. Assuming these numbers are correct, no doubt we're seeing all-time highs here. There is no head count because if people in attendance identify themselves, they'll risk losing their job.

"We haven't yet found any media report about this massive protest."Useful reminder to our readers: the EPO now spends, on average, €2444 per day on reputation laundering alone. Put another way, as this new comment put it, "the trolls are back ! 73000 EUR / months spent in whitewashing by the EPO thanks to applicants' money..."

We have amassed nearly 40,000 comments at Techrights, but there are not many Internet trolls in Techrights (not so much spam, either) because a quick registration is needed. It helps weed out the noise and keep a higher signal.

“Suddenly a lot of comments pro-management are appearing at the IPKat," told us one person a couple of hours ago. "The media strategy is working.”

"Having read all the comments in this thread (nearly 40 of them at the time of writing), we can reaffirm that there’s some kind of whitewash going on there."As this one comment put it, "any attempts to do a staff survey are blocked by the management as well as any attempts to initiate an external audit or external investigations about what's going on at the EPO (except spying on staff by companies such as "Control Risks", of course)."

We don't want to quote the provocation or AstroTurfing, so instead we'll quote this one epic response to it.

A surfer in the President's wash says...

@Sybella

“There will be no whitewash in the White House.”

Richard M. Nixon


Having read all the comments in this thread (nearly 40 of them at the time of writing), we can reaffirm that there's some kind of whitewash going on there. Remember that the EPO spends €880,000 distorting the media in just one year. It also gives a fraction of that to refugees for cheap, opportunistic PR (considering the media focus at the time). Source: epo.org (think before you click)

"Remember that the EPO spends €880,000 distorting the media in just one year."Also consider what looks like media back-rubbing between IAM and EPO, which pays some of IAM's writers. Here is IAM congratulating EPO for the EPO to later cite IAM as 'evidence'. Source: epo.org (think carefully before you click)

Does it mean that IAM is just a mouthpiece? No, it just means that IAM has little credibility on EPO-related matters, for reasons we explained here repeatedly in the past.

"That €880,000 budget does go somewhere and it gets spent achieving the objectives (reputation laundering) one way or another."Yesterday we joked that it would be nice to have a leaked document template like “Dear Joff Wild … If… that would be great … Love, Benoit” (hypothetical joke of course).

Here in Techrights we have not asked for money and we have no conflicts of interest. There are still some decent news sites out there, such as WIPR and IP Watch (even though sometimes even IP Watch produces puff pieces for the EPO, piggybacking beer for PR).

"Reports of AstroTurfing help paralyse the AstroTurfing."Last but not least, we kindly ask readers to inform us if they see evidence of likely EPO AstroTurfing, either in the media or in comments. That €880,000 budget does go somewhere and it gets spent achieving the objectives (reputation laundering) one way or another. Reports of AstroTurfing help paralyse the AstroTurfing. I know this based on experience covering Microsoft AstroTurfing for many years, having researched their many pertinent PR agencies (some of the prominent ones include comment AstroTurfing).

“In the United States, for example, about one sixth of the gross national product, over a trillion dollars per year, is devoted to marketing. Marketing is manipulation and deceit.”

--Noam Chomsky

Recent Techrights' Posts

Nat Friedman Had Left Microsoft GitHub Exactly One Week Before Matthew Garrett Sent His First SLAPP (Which Was an Empty Threat, He Was Abusing the Legal System of Another Continent to Terrorise Critics Who Had Just Unearthed Major Microsoft Scandals)
And it was likely talked about by his lawyers around the exact same time Nat Friedman was packing up
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, June 05, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, June 05, 2025
Pushing Microsoft's Proprietary Trash/Trap as "Open" and "Linux" (Windows is 'Linux' Now?)
Maybe it's time to just stop saying "FOSS". The people who use that term are promoting Microsoft.
Slopwatch: Comparing Linux to Vermin, Attacking BSD With LLM Slop, and Helping Microsoft Demonise Linux/OpenBSD/SSH Over Weak User Passwords
Microsoft must be laughing its arse off, seeing how a bunch of Serial Sloppers (no skills, no comprehension, no integrity, no creativity) and slopfarms use Microsoft LLM to flood the Web with anti-Linux FUD
Links 05/06/2025: US Poised for Another $2.4 Trillion to Debt, Cops Want GAFAM Kill Switches
Links for the day
Links 05/06/2025: First US Spacewalk 60 Years Ago, GNU Octave 10.2.0 is Out
Links for the day
Scandinavia Saying Goodbye to Microsoft
The Danes have had enough of Microsoft
GNU/Linux Measured at 6% in Bangladesh, According to statCounter
Windows isn't growing, it's going away
Gemini Links 05/06/2025: Loop Earplugs Review and ANS Forth
Links for the day
Armenian Adoption of GNU/Linux
Russian influence in Armenian must be worrying to Microsoft
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part II: Turning a Once-Respected Patent Office Into a Circus and Laughing Stock
It's not legal, but administrators who don't care about the law and don't fear the law would just go ahead and turn things to junk
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, June 04, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, June 04, 2025
Slopwatch: Mindless Slop Pieces, Fake Images and Text, Linux FUD on the Cheap
spewed out by Microsoft-controlled LLMs
Links 04/06/2025: Workers' Strikes, Sudan Exodus
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: Linux Foundation PR Spam and Lee Jae-myung Wins Election
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Future Leaders of the World and Platforming Jordan Peterson
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: WSL Backfiring on Microsoft and "Disney, Microsoft Announce Massive Layoffs"
Links for the day
Our Case is a Very Easy Win, the SLAPPs From Microsofters Were a Grave Error, and Censoring Information Won't Work (It'll Only Ever Backfire)
Censoring is what people do when they lose the argument
Say the Truth, the Rest Will Follow
There's no guarantee that writing the truth will result in an audience (or readership), but over time - in the long run - people generally gravitate towards what they know or feel to be crude truth, not just what's comforting (albeit false or self-deluding, usually groupthink dictated from above)
How to Expose High-Level Corruption Without Getting in (Too Much) Trouble
Democracy depends on free press and freedom of the press depends on being able to safely publish (and keep available) material that bad people don't want to be known to anybody
In-Depth EPO Coverage at Techrights Turns Eleven
11 years is a very long time
Windows Measured Below 10% in Afghanistan, GNU/Linux Gaining a Lot
about 80% are Android (Linux) users, compared to only about 10% for Windows
Poland's Political Predicament and Social Control Media
Democracy and fake "tech" don't mix well; the latter tends to interfere with the former and that's why we get more "Putins" out there
EPO: Taking Away From the Staff to Give More to the Rich
The Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote to EPO staff earlier this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 03, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, June 03, 2025
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part I: It's a Lot Like the EPO
we can commence a series soon
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Inescapable Questions and Quitting All "Oligarch Tech"
Links for the day