Bonum Certa Men Certa

Culture of Terror at The European Patent Office Escalates Thanks to Dutch Government's Complicity

By refusing to play a role in investigation and enforcement (against the EPO's flagrant disregard of the law), in spite of overwhelming evidence, the Dutch authorities have made themselves increasingly liable

Concerns over 'terror' Patent Office



Summary: The unaccountability of Team Battistelli, emboldened by immunity even in the face of criminal charges, makes one wonder if Europe has created a 'monster' in the EPO

WE STILL TRY TO CATCH UP with comments in IP Kat, in particular because anonymous posters dump some information about the EPO over there (albeit a lot less frequently since the site stopped covering EPO scandals). There is a culture of censorship and self-censorship at the Office. Techrights, for example, is permanently banned by the EPO and IP Kat was banned for a day, whereupon it stopped covering the EPO scandals (self-censorship). The culture of fear, moreover, leads a lot of the employees to self-censorship and the union has almost gone 'underground' (barely any updates, not to mention resignations).

I have been an activist for free speech for a long time; we have in fact received about 35,000 comments in this site and I never deleted even one (even utterly rude and abusive comments). A fortnight ago somebody attempted to silence me with legal threats (this made it into the media [1, 2, 3, 4] and got some comments [1, 2, 3]), but it backfired, just as when the EPO attempted similar tricks. As far as we know, it's likely that the EPO bullies quite a lot of publications/journalists/bloggers with threats; we know for a fact it also did this to SUEPO. Now it tries to gag staff by a culture of terror and intimidation, as we noted here the other day.

"Latest IU victim," told us a source regarding this new example, causes so much fear inside the Office that other people are silenced. The Dutch media recently called it the ‘terror’ patent office (Telegraaf) and here is the information we have about it:

I hereby confirm that yet another colleague became victim of the IU. He works in The Hague, and he is not a union leader. There is hardly any SUEPO union leader left, so the IU needs fresh victims to prove their existence.

It is sad that the IU annoys yet another innocent man, a friendly and appreciated colleague, father of 3 kids. EPO staff are increasingly scared. This is mental torture for us all, and the Dutch high court recently decided that it would not protect them.

For Battistelli this must be a sweet dream, using mafia tactics to punish some so that all others shiver and work harder. Sure the administrative council will pay him another fat bonus.


Looking at the latest from IP Kat (comments of course, as IP Kat is too terrified to even mention the subject), we have this:

It is clear that the Dutch court has (conveniently!) overlooked ILO-AT's judgement 1542, which stated that: “a complaint is receivable only if it is about an individual official’s status as an employee of the organisation, not about the collective interests of trade unionists".

Maybe the Dutch Supreme Court ignored ILOAT 1542 because it wasn't brought to their attention by the lawyers pleading the case?


Another person wrote: "Just as you should never confuse the law with common justice, intelligence should not be confused with common sense. Some of the brightest people in the world have no idea how to cross the road!"

We are very sadden to see the Dutch authorities succumbing to a lunatic dictator like Battistelli and we already wrote about it in the following posts (among more):



The EPO scandals have helped expose serious abuses in international bodies, in Germany (watch what Maas is -- or isn't -- doing), in the Netherlands, and by extension in Europe. If EPO is allowed to get away with it and Battistelli's boss acts like his pet chinchilla, what will the world think of Europe?

Recent Techrights' Posts

Richard Stallman is Usually Right Because He Thinks "Outside the Box"
he is able to observe society (mores and norms) as somewhat of an outsider
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"
 
Nonfree Software in My Bank, by Richard Stallman
Updated 8 hours ago
Links 28/07/2025: Science, Health, and Conflicts
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Healthy Self-Image With Autism and a "New Life"
Links for the day
Links 28/07/2025: COVID-19 Sped up Brain Aging, "Circumvention is More Popular Than Compliance"
Links for the day
LWN Has Been Down for a Long Time, Another Casualty of LLM Bots?
Time will tell. How much time though?
Slopfarms Versus 'Linux' (and Against People Who Write Real Articles About GNU/Linux)
LLM slop in slopfarms by Brian Fagioli and Redazione RHC
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Running pkgsrc in a FreeBSD Jail
Links for the day
Microsoft Turns News Sites Into Spamfarms
Is the site The Register MS the next IDG?
The Register MS/The Register US
On Saturday I contacted them for a comment (before issuing criticism)
Hacking revelations at Vatican Jubilee of Digital Missionaries
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
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
Pushers of systemd Rewrite History (Richard Stallman Said UNIX "Was Portable and Seemed Fairly Clean")
Unlike systemd
"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
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: 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