With few exceptions like JUVE (Germany) and The Register (UK)

Summary: The EPO's bribes to the media (e.g. Les Echos) continue to pay off as paid-for puff pieces continue to outnumber actual news about the EPO

THE management of the EPO can seemingly get away with anything, including deaths, corruption and so on.

Who can stop Battistelli and his French successor (whom he picked)? Who can compel French media to actually do its job and properly report on the many scandals? Watch this new 'article'. Battistelli gave this publisher a share of the EPO's budget to write puff pieces. They (Les Echos) still obey and the EPO then sends them traffic, along with others. People (readers) will fail to understand that this article was 'produced' by a media partners (i.e. paid 'journalism') of the EPO. And the article itself is about the EPO.

"Who can stop Battistelli and his French successor (whom he picked)? Who can compel French media to actually do its job and properly report on the many scandals?"This has become a hallmark of the EPO in recent years. Literally millions of euros are being wasted on corrupting the media. It's all about painting Battistelli as some sort of a genius. And who pays for all this? Users of the system...

The EPO just loves distracting from real journalism. It relies on corruptible publishers, academics and journalists. "Pay to say" is what it is; Les Echos alone we have already written many articles about. It's one of many. Recently, the EPO also passed money to German media. It also passed money to some British academics for UPC propaganda, which earlier today it cited while saying: "This [EPO-sponsored] study investigates [sic] the role played by patents in supporting trade and FDI [just like the EPO asked when paying] in the #EuropeanUnion."

Add to this the latest from Bristows. Earlier today Gregory Bacon sought more "good news" regarding UPC, but what the post (and accompanying tweet) fail to say is that the Belgian parliament was already in it anyway. So this is totally insignificant. It probably won't be long before Bristows embeds itself in some blogs with actual readers (like Kluwer Patent Blog or IP Kat) to amplify this nonsense.

"According to The Register, Judge Corcoran is being lied about. We already knew that, but it's good to see it in Britain's largest technology news site. "Suffice to say, the investigative media (what's left of it) won't touch the subject as it's rather complicated to grasp.

Where does that leave us? Possibly reading anonymous comments from insiders. According to The Register, Judge Corcoran is being lied about. We already knew that, but it's good to see it in Britain's largest technology news site. Corcoran is still besieged; he has still not been paid, either. Maybe Battistelli and his 'bulldog' just want to bankrupt him (legal fees) before justice can be attained (there are more ILO decisions coming next month). Here is what one comment said today:

Surreal. The former accused is now a non-person, being still absent from the internal phone book. Shameful.

Yes, we wrote about that more than a week ago. "Does this suggest that the AC may have decided the case in an illogical (and perhaps illegal) manner?"

So said the following comment:

So we are to understand that "the Council took a final decision in a disciplinary case".

Interesting. Given the Enlarged Board and ILO decisions, the only logical decision would have been to withdraw all "charges" in the disciplinary case, thereby terminating the proceedings.

However, it would seem that the situation may not be that simple. This is because only if there are pending disciplinary proceedings is there any obligation of "confidentiality" that would prevent Carl Josefsson from discussing the AC's decision.

Does this suggest that the AC may have decided the case in an illogical (and perhaps illegal) manner? Or does it instead suggest that someone is trying to pull the wool over our eyes by pretending that the matter is "confidential"?

Later in the day someone wrote that "it appears that “someone” is impeding the implementation of the ILOAT decisions."

No way! Who can that possibly be?

Comment seen on Kluwer Patent Blog :

According to reliable sources at EPO, Patrick Corcoran, the during close to 3 years, unduly suspended DG3 judge, has today 20th Dec. 2018 (12 days after the ILO-AT judgment in his favour) still no computer or access to his e-mail account. His phone number has not been restored. His salary transfer for December was still based on the reduced salary.

So it appears that “someone” is impeding the implementation of the ILOAT decisions.

Also

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/21/euro_patent_office_accountability_case/

This latest comment suggests that the whole affair can be excused using "confidentiality" (not true), but it correctly states that Team Battistelli already colluded with Dutch and German media to defame the judge and violate "confidentiality" principles in the process. To quote:

As a general principle, not just at the EPO, the details of disciplinary proceedings ought to be kept confidential both before and after a final decision. They certainly are where I work. This is mainly to protect the employee who is the subject of the proceedings.

Of course, Mr Battistelli breached that general principle a while back, by leaking lurid details to the press. Mr Corcoran then asked the Enlarged Board to hold their proceedings in public, apparently so that his side of the story could also come out. But instead the Enlarged Board declined to hear the case at all.

I don't think you should read anything into the fact that the Admin Council is following the general principle of keeping the details confidential. Just because we'd all be interested in knowing doesn't mean that it ought to be made public.

We are still hoping that someone will fetch information about the case/s (in Croatian or German) so that we can shed light on the "other side". It's definitely in the public interest. ⬆