Bonum Certa Men Certa

EPO Protest Tomorrow at The Hague

Strong choice of picture from The Register this morning

Firing Battistelli



Summary: As Dutch politicians start to pay closer attention to the violations at the EPO and unions are being busted at The Hague staff intends to step out in protest

AS EXPECTED (known within some internal circles for a while now), tomorrow there will be another protest at The Hague. British media has already covered something related to this, with a kind of header image that only serves to justify Battistelli's paranoia. To quote:





The central staff committee at the European Patent Office (EPO) has asked again for the organization's Administrative Council to take action against its president Benoit Battistelli, citing the dismissal of the secretary of its staff union as the final straw.

"We are skeptical about the real motives behind the dismissal of yet another elected staff representative and union official," the open letter [PDF] to the 36 members of the EPO's top body reads. "We are also very concerned that four more staff representatives and/or union officials are (allegedly) going to be targeted soon with investigations that may lead to further disciplinary procedures."

As a result of Battistelli's actions, the EPO "remains in a state of social turmoil and perceived lawlessness that risks compromising irremediably the reputation and continued existence of our Organisation," the letter argues, adding that the council "has to take action: this can no longer be delayed."

The firing of Laurent Prunier after more than a year of disciplinary proceedings has set off a firestorm of frustration with EPO management. Staff protests at EPO offices have been joined by national politicians and the Dutch government is due to hold a special debate on the matter.

Even the staunchly neutral trade press seems to have had enough, with editor of Intellectual Asset Magazine (IAM), Joff Wild, writing a damning article urging the EPO's Administrative Council to "get a grip of this situation" and wondering out loud whether he had been wrong to give EPO management the benefit of the doubt.

Meanwhile Battistelli – whom we have dubbed King Battistelli due to his persistent belief that he is above both national laws and his own organization's independent review boards – is unrepentant, and continues to claim that his targeting of staff that have opposed his reforms is a result of their own actions.



A protest/demonstration is just 24 hours away.

Please take photos of the demonstration and send these to us (we'll protect anonymity of senders and those pictured, as usual).

Here the original announcement from SUEPO. To quote the whole thing:



On 4 November Mr Battistelli, President of the European Patent Office, dismissed Laurent Prunier, elected member of the Central Staff Committee and Secretary of SUEPO The Hague, against the will of the Administrative Council as expressed in its March 2016 Resolution. In 2016, Mr Battistelli dismissed three elected Staff representatives and SUEPO officials and downgraded another one, a first in the world of International Organisations. Other investigations/disciplinary proceedings concerning SUEPO officials are ongoing.

On 24 November we will demonstrate our solidarity to Laurent and other dismissed / downgraded / targeted Staff Reps and SUEPO officials. We will gather at the "Plein 1813" at 12:00 and march to the "Lange Vijverberg", in front of the Office of the Dutch Prime Minister.


As Dutch Parliament is discussing these issues, high attendance level will be important. The weather should be reasonably good.

Recent Techrights' Posts

The Week to Come
Planning ahead
LLM Slop Has Only Been a Boon for Misinformation Online
The very same companies that were supposed to maintain quality (again, not limited to Google with PageRank) are now actively participating in generating and spreading slop
When They Tell You It's Free, Does That Mean No Charges (If So, Who's Paying and Why)?
there's "no free lunch"
Pushers of systemd Rewrite History (Richard Stallman Said UNIX "Was Portable and Seemed Fairly Clean")
Unlike systemd
Trajectory of The Register: From News Site/s Into "B2B"... and Into Microsoft Salespeople
Something isn't right at The Register
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 27, 2025
We're Going to Focus Less on the Molotov Cocktail-Throwing Microsofters and More on Patents
We can get back to focusing on what we wanted to focus on all along
Just Trying to Keep Web Sites Honest (Journalistic Integrity)
the latest articles in LinuxIac are real
Links 27/07/2025: Political Affairs, Data Breaches, Attacks on Freedom of the Press
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: Hot in Japan and Terminal Escape Codes
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: More Microsoft Layoffs Coming, Science and Hardware News
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: FSF Hackathon and "Hulk Hogan Was a Very Bad Man"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: DAW Mixer Chains and Simple Software
Links for the day
The Register MS is Inventing or Giving Air Time to New Conspiracy Theories so as to Distort the Narrative As High-Profile Agencies Fall Prey to Microsoft Holes
But the problem is holes, i.e. Microsoft making bad products; the problem is Microsoft
Most Editors at The Register Are American, Including the Editor in Chief, a Decade-Long Microsoft Stenographer (Writing Prose to Sell Microsoft)
It's not easy to tell where the site is based (we tried) because it's hiding behind ClownFlare and CrimeFlare hasn't been well lately
"New Techrights" Soon Turns 2 (A Few Days Before the FSF Turns 40)
We have a lot more to say about LLM bots
When Silence Says So Much
Garrett, a 'secure' boot pusher, will need to defend himself in the UK High Court
The Register in Trouble
There is not much that can be done at this point
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 26, 2025
Misinformation in Social Control Media
Social control media passes around all sorts of tropes
Slopwatch: Fake Linux 'Articles' and Slopfarms With "Linux" in Their Names/Domains
throwing bots at "Linux" to make some fake articles
Links 26/07/2025: Amazon Shutdown in China, Russian Economy Slows
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: History of Time (1988) and Gemini Games
Links for the day
Links 26/07/2025: 50 Percent Tariffs in Amazon, Dying Intel Offloads Network and Edge Group (NEX)
Links for the day
Doing My Share to Tackle Online Slop and SPAM
Trying my best to 'fix' the Web
Blaming Programming Languages for Users' and Developers' Bad Practices
That's like blaming cars for drivers who crash into things
Slopwatch: Fakes, FUD, Duplicates, and Charlatans Galore
The Web as we once know it is collapsing. Some opportunists try to replace it with low-quality slop.
The Register UK Seems to Have Become American and Management is Changing (Microsofter as Editor in Chief)
The Register 'UK' is now controlled by the Directions on Microsoft guy
Many People Still Read Techrights Because It Says the Truth, Produces Evidence, and Does Not Self-Censor
Unlike so many other sites
The Register is Desperate for Money, According to The Register
I decided to check how they're doing as a business
Microsoft Finally Finds a Use Case for Slop?
Create low-quality chaff to shift the media's attention?
Microsoft Windows Lost 400 Million Users in a Few Years, Why Does The Register Double Down on Windows With New US Editor?
days ago they hired a new US editor
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 25, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 25, 2025
For Libel Reform One Must First Bring (or Raise) Awareness to the Issues and Their Magnitude
I myself know, from personal experience
Links 26/07/2025: Rationed Meals in the US and TikTok Repels Investments (Too Toxic)
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: "Bloody Google" and New People in Geminispace
Links for the day
Response to Solderpunk (Father of Gemini Protocol) About the Gemini Community
Solderpunk responds to non-sequitur
HTML and the Web Used to be Something a Child Could Learn, "Modern" Web is a Puzzle of Frameworks, Bloat, and Worse
When the Web was more like Gemini Protocol