From my read of a Microsoft Patent application just published today, technology is being proposed that will make it impossible for users who download multimedia files to play these files unless advertising messages inserted within these files are viewed.
Defendants Sued The Most, October-December 2007 (through December 18)
1. Microsoft (12) 2t. Apple (7) 2t. HP (7)
[...]
Defendants Sued The Most, 2006-2007 (through December 18)
1. Microsoft (43) 2. Verizon (29) 3t. Target (28)
[...]
Patents, Patents and Microsoft
The GPL version 3 process was strongly influenced by Microsoft and its patents. While Microsoft has argued for years that Linux may infringe on Microsoft's intellectual property, it was in 2007 that Microsoft gave the infringements a number. Microsoft alleged that Open Source software infringed on some 235 of its patents. Steve Ballmer himself beat the patent drum telling people that Red Hat and others have an obligation to pay up.
Some did pay up.
Xandros, Linspire and TurboLinux all signed up for Microsoft's patent protection plan. The risk associated with patent infringement were all cited by IDC as a barrier to adoption for Linux.
At no time during 2007 did Microsoft actually name any of the patents. Some Microsoft executives did talk about interoperability and the need to build an IP licensing bridge with open source.
Microsoft itself crossed the bridge in 2007, the bridge to Open Source licensing. In October, Microsoft's Public License (Ms-PL) and the Microsoft Reciprocal License (Ms-RL) were blessed by the Open Source Initiative (OSI) as bona fide Open Source licenses.
Microsoft though wasn't the only company in 2007 to allege patent infringement in Open Source code. Patent holding firm IP Innovation alleged that Novell and Microsoft infringed on its intellectual property. IP Innovations has since stated that its legal challenge is not a challenge against Open Source itself.