10.14.15
Gemini version available ♊︎EPO Completely Loses It and Starts Banning Even More Sites Ahead of Today’s Demonstration, UPC Proceeding Behind Closed Doors
Summary: The wrath of Benoît Battistelli reportedly leads to an expansion of bans (outright censorship), once again blocking sites that write about patents, prior art, and other relevant matters (to EPO examiners)
A BLOG which sometimes covers EPO-related matters is the latest victim of EPO censorship. Florian Müller told me he “just got an email from someone that the EPO has blocked my latest post, allegedly per presidential order” (that would be Benoît Battistelli). These bans by the EPO are not hard to circumvent, e.g. by going to a CDN or some caching service such as Google Cache. Censorship is monkey business and the EPO clearly does not understand the Streisand Effect.
There is a protest in an hour and it’s already being suppressed if not crushed by Battistelli’s bulldog, Željko Topić.
The EPO has plenty to hide right now as there are articles coming and suppression of sources is a priority. As one commenter put it last night, “did the investigation unit investigate the microsoft’s and other big “clients” kickback scandal? For an outsider this should have precedence over the futile and counterproductive measure of destroying the epo workforce’s motivation.”
There are other bad things that the EPO is doing right now. It is doing politics and makes no pretence about it (pro-UPC statements). It’s against what’s acceptable, but then again, the EPO disregards rules and laws anyway. So do some solicitors in European member states by the way.
“It’s not about science and technology but about conspired-for protectionism.”Annsley Merelle Ward, a UK-based maximalist of patents as we noted just over week ago, shows that the UK is now ignoring/bypassing the law for UPC (in secret, no voting), as it had also done with TPP and other treasonous deals (negotiated by the rich for the rich). Watch the antidemocratic nature of it. When it comes to patents, ‘public debate’ apparently just means speaking to people who profit from patents, not the rest of them (profit first, for few people, at the expense of everyone else). What an echo chamber.
Here are some details: “The session was organized by AIPPI’s UPC and Unitary Patent Standing Committee who are tasked with exploring issues that are important to the operation of the UPC and recommending potential solutions to resolve or clarify matters. Over the past year the Committee of 28 members from 18 countries has prepared four papers. Two of these papers have addressed the uncertainty surrounding the jurisdiction and applicable law during the transitional regime under Article 83. The other two papers have asked a series of survey questions to AIPPI’s National and Regional Groups and Indpendent Members. The first survey relates to how various national courts interact with EPO oppositions (i.e. whether national revocation proceedings are stayed pending the outcome). The second survey relates to how national courts treat court fees in patent actions. The purpose of these surveys is to identify common themes on how these issues are addressed in order to inform and make recommendations to the Preparatory Committee and Member States on these issues.”
Where is the general public in all this? It is being occupied by patent lawyers and other patent profiteers, such as the EPO. This is a betrayal or a departure from the very premise (or promise) of today’s patent systems. It’s not about science and technology but about conspired-for protectionism. █
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