The patent row between Redmond and Canadian firm i4i has been a patent disaster for the former. Microsoft’s remaining hopes now rest on the U.S. Supreme Court, which in November, 2010 granted Microsoft’s petition for writ of certiorari for review of the case. But i4i, which has been winning (feel free to replace with the recent neologism “bi-winning”) pretty much all the battles in this patent war, once again seems assured of victory.  According to the Canadian company, 22 amicus (or friend-of-the-court) briefs , including one by the United States government, have been filed with the U.S. Supreme Court in its support.

Sony has been dealt a severe blow by a European court in its ongoing patent battle with LG. According to the Guardian, the latter has been granted a preliminary injunction on the import of PS3 consoles into Europe by the civil court of justice in the Hague, thus requiring European custom officials to seize all PS3 shipments for at least 10 days. Hit the jump for more.

Denver-based patent pool outfit MPEG LA, which licenses the H.264 codec, has called upon holders of “patents essential to the VP8 video codec” to join the VP8 patent pool it’s trying to assemble. As some of you might recall, MPEG LA has time and again questioned VP8’s royalty freeness, all along threatening a VP8 patent pool. I guess you are familiar with the "hit the jump" routine.