Bonum Certa Men Certa

The European Patent Office (EPO) Has Become a Propaganda Mill After the FTI Consulting Deal

EPO and FTI Consulting



Summary: Only a few months after the EPO signed the €880,000 FTI Consulting contract there is little coming out of the EPO other than low-quality patents (including software patents) and a lot of self-serving, self-aggrandising propaganda

THERE is nothing but greenwashing this morning from the EPO's PR department [1, 2]. Even a month later (if not more) they haven't quite gotten tired of trying to associate EPO patents with ethics, using propaganda which they paid to create.



As Gordon B-P, a British Local Lay Minister, put it yesterday: "Why on earth should a Patent Office need a "PR Team" in the first place? Bizarre..." (in reference to this recent article of ours, as well as the FTI Consulting work)

"IAM’s EPO-friendly ‘magazine’ (also paid indirectly by EPO) is currently organising (with payment from the EPO's PR agency) a pro-UPC event in the US."IAM's EPO-friendly ‘magazine’ (also paid indirectly by EPO) is currently organising (with payment from the EPO's PR agency) a pro-UPC event in the US. Yesterday this 'magazine' (paid by the EPO, a proponent of the UPC) kept trying to shame Germany -- again! -- into UPC endorsement (the last sentence says "Germany seems to have gone very quiet about ratification of the Unified Patent Court"). Is this reporting or advocacy? And if it's advocacy (similar to PR), then whose? It's not hard to see what's going on here...

Yesterday we published a document from the A.C. (Administrative Council) which outlines further crackdowns on EPO staff. Here is a new comment about it which says:

"Some new CA-Docs are out."

Self-serving and to be expected. "On a proposal from the President,," nuff said?

This is why many of us (who have been here for a long time - and admittedly - know that it is difficult at this stage of life) are looking for a way out of the shambles that the EPO is becoming.

These people who are running (used jocularly) this place are beyond comprehension - they have no terms of reference - and yet they are given carte blanche. It only makes sense because the people that really count (elected politicians) are not just not interested enough or fail to see the bigger picture.

Luddites had the same problem back in the 18th century,,,,


Watch how the EPO is run; it's a tyranny, not a democracy, and we know who benefits here. It's just about as democratic as a corporation (which is inherently anti-democratic, by design). No wonder today's EPO mostly serves large corporations, even when these corporations aren't European at all. No wonder today's EPO gently moves towards allowing software patents in Europe, much to the chagrin of Microsoft, IBM, and so on.

"When I said at 32C3 that "presentation of information" was also under attack, I was right. Graphical User Interfaces patentable in Germany, despite the exclusion of "presentation of information" in the EPC," Benjamin Henrion wrote today [1, 2] in reference to his recent CCC talk, with link to this article from Bastian Best, who wrote: "Patent applications on new types of GUIs oftentimes run into trouble in Germany because the examiners consider them to be “presentation of information“. As the avid reader will know, the presentation of information is one of the items on the list of subject-matters excluded “as such” from patent protection."

The EPO isn't a European institution. It's international, global, and globalist. It has become abundantly evident that Europe derives almost no value at all from the EPO and the UPC would only make things worse (unless you're some non-European corporations seeking to sue the whole of Europe in one fell swoop).

Recent Techrights' Posts

Coming Soon: Microsoft Fake Results, Mass Layoffs, and Silence About All the People Microsoft Pressured to "Quit" (So That They Don't Get Counted as Layoffs)
there will be more mass layoffs
Speed of GNU/Linux
The media seldom speaks of the dangers of "proprietary software"
Proprietary Windows Versus "Linux" News (Trying to Keep People on Windows, Never Exploring GNU/Linux)
Good editors know better how to recognise threats and not give them lip service
Ensuring That Every Computer User Anywhere in the World Can Take Control of All His or Her Computers
We must fight the people who attack general-purpose computing, in particular those who push this agenda very aggressively inside Linux
Gemini Links 28/04/2025: Autism and Structural Navigation
Links for the day
What Happened to the Open Source Initiative (OSI) Elections: The Purge, the Cover-up, and the Witch-hunts
OSI has gone "full Microsoft"
 
China is Already Culling GAFAM (Not Just Microsoft Windows)
OS monoculture or "OS hegemony" may be coming to an end
The "Telephone Operating System in the Vatican" is 95 Years Old, Vatican Moved to GNU/Linux
Maybe Microsoft is down to zero already
If Tesla Shares (and Alleged Value) Fell 55% (From $489 to $222) in a Few Months Maybe It's Not Worth Anything At All (It's Just Gambling)
Tesla swasticars have turned from a "status symbol" into a "public embarrassment" and cause for casual humiliation
Chromebooks' Adoption in Sweden No Longer Depends on Schools
School breaks are when classrooms are shut
No, IBM is Not Investing $150 Billion in the US and It Doesn't Even Have That Kind of Money
Here we go again... media as a vehicle of lobbying and misinformation
Leak: The EPO's General Consultative Committee (GCC) Does Not Consult Staff on Crucial Matters and Bypasses the Administrative Council (AC) to Do Illegal Things
violations against the EPO's very staff
New Leaks Coming Soon, We Maintain 100% Record of Successful Resistance to Censorship
We won't be told what we can and cannot say (especially when it's true)
Central African Republic (CAR): Vista 11 is Only ~0.2% Market Share
99.8% to go!
BSD and GNU/Linux Replaced Microsoft in Secure Servers, All Microsoft Has Left is LLM Slop for Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD)
the FUD machine never rests
Gemini Links 28/04/2025: A Simple Task Tracking and Auto-Prioritization Tool and Other Programs
Links for the day
Links 28/04/2025: Canada's Election, Pakistan-India Conflict
Links for the day
Glue Inside Your Pizza (or Why People Will Get Fed Up With Slop)
People are given "answers" from non-intelligence word dumpsters
Links 28/04/2025: Cyberattacks Happening, Chatbots Disappointing, and "Free Speech Under Fire"
Links for the day
Phone Adoption Very Low in Vatican, Windows Usage Fell Nonetheless
Even in places where people still use desktops/laptops most of the time (and have access to these) Windows is gradually losing ground
GNU/Linux 9% in Cuba, Vista 11 Waning, Android Dominant
Microsoft has pretty much lost Cuba
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, April 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, April 27, 2025
In 24 Countries Observed by statCounter Vista 11 is Still Less Than a Quarter of Windows Users Despite All Other Versions Being 'Expired'
They ought to move to GNU/Linux
Links 27/04/2025: Pope Goodbyes, "Politics of Fear", Slop Redux and More Google Shutdowns (Google Debt Had Grown This Year)
Links for the day
Links 27/04/2025: Serenity Dialectics, Hockey Jersey Ethics, and More
Links for the day
Links 27/04/2025: Death of Nest Thermostats, Death of Metaverse
Links for the day
Links 27/04/2025: Projects Workflow and Discovering Technology
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, April 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, April 26, 2025
Microsoft Isn't on the Map in USSR
To them, it's either Google or Yandex
In Central America Windows Became a Small Force
These are countries where Windows used to have well over 95% of the "market"
What's Very Vexing to GAFAM, EPO and Others Is That It's Incredibly Hard to Censor Us (and Nobody Ever Successfully Did That Before)
resist, do not capitulate
Site May be Even Faster Now
It basically takes less than a tenth of a second to serve the page
Receiving SLAPPs and Collecting Them Like Trophies (the SLAPPs Always Fail)
People who file lawsuits bring even more attention to themselves (or to embarrassing statements about them)
Year of GNU/Linux on the Laptop?
It's not happening only in Lenovo
What People Must Understand About the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
some facts about the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
Many of the Scandals Are Interconnected (Overlapping People and Corporations)
We're only getting started
More Copyright Lawsuits Against LLM Slop Providers and Suppliers of LLM Slopfarms Would Benefit Society
It's not just bad for the Web and for society; it's also legally dangerous
Links 26/04/2025: General Assassinated in the Town of Balashikha, US Promoting Seafloor Mining
Links for the day
Links 26/04/2025: Facebook Layoffs Again, Remembering What's Real, and Say No to Mass Surveillance
Links for the day
Links 26/04/2025: NOAA Budget Cuts and "Dog Days Ahead"
Links for the day
In defence of JD Vance, death of Pope Francis
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Three Years in Prison for Disney Employee’s ‘Menu Hacking’: The Economic Fallout of Digital Menus
Reprinted with permission from Ryan Farmer
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, April 25, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, April 25, 2025