The Hague NL: The European Patent Office
Someone Else's Tax Dollar at Work
The European Patent Office occupies a multi-building campus in the Rijskwijk suburb of The Hague, at the “Patenlaan“ tram stop.
I met with one of the EPO administrators in the tower about the process.
As you remember from ICIP, patents are territorial, unlike copyrights which are global. To get global patent protection, you need to file separate patent applications in every country – and you need to do it all within 12 months of the first filing. The EPO allows you to file “one” application using one of its three official languages for its 37 member states. Unlike the USPTO, the EPO is open from 7am to 9:30pm!
The EPO does not replace the patent offices in each of those member countries, much in the way the UK parliament does not replace the king. The EPO is quite popular and many multi-national corporations were in the ring surrounding the campus.
Had a eurofishsandwiche with my host in the circular EPO building which also houses the 1000 seat auditorium and the training centers for the 1500+ examiners from all over Europe (there are 4 other EPO sites). Per gave me the real lowdown on the election that was still all the talk.
The “liberals” are conservative, at least in comparison to the socialists and labour. The Christians are the real conservatives, but they lost over half their seats. The anti-immigration PVV made a frightening gain, but he reminded me the votes are somewhat in sympathy for assassinated Pim Fourtyn (2002), whose only crime was “expressing mean thoughts” and not necessarily for PVV’s Mr. Wilders (the Tom Tancredo of Holland.) Someone else told me its wasn’t that polite -- Wilder is extreme (proposed tax on headscarves he calls a “rag tax”) and people are voting for it. Wilder’s quote in the paper today: “Less crime, less immigration, less Islam.”
Spoke with an examiner from Portugal. Told him it was interesting that a small country like Portugal has an enormous country like Brazil speaking its language. He went on to list the other Portugese-speaking countries – duh – like Angola and East Timor (and a list of others of which I was also ignorant.) His Netherlands’ native cube-neighbor said, “no one ever remembers Holland has Indonesia.” (He was right, I hadn’t.) Considering Indonesia has the world’s largest Muslim population, some type of Dutch point was made.
