When you're trying to incite emotion, you never want to give the impression of inevitability against your side. Even if you fully expected it to happen, you are still shocked, and possibly even appalled. It helps to give your readers an idea of what kind of emotions they should be feeling.
"Just as we expected, the patent was granted" - Bummer. Wish there was something I could do about it. Next article.
"Needless to say, we were pretty shocked when the patent was granted." - Oh my god! Even the experts think this needs to be handled! (I especially love it with the 'needless to say' part... it makes it sound so much more obvious that you should be outraged).
There's nothing wrong with writing like this (unless you're a serious journalist, I guess). I'm just pointing out why they stated the obvious the way they did. I'm pretty sure the EFF does the same thing in their patent posts.
"Just as we expected, the patent was granted" - Bummer. Wish there was something I could do about it. Next article.
"Needless to say, we were pretty shocked when the patent was granted." - Oh my god! Even the experts think this needs to be handled! (I especially love it with the 'needless to say' part... it makes it sound so much more obvious that you should be outraged).
There's nothing wrong with writing like this (unless you're a serious journalist, I guess). I'm just pointing out why they stated the obvious the way they did. I'm pretty sure the EFF does the same thing in their patent posts.