In the wake of Thomson Multimedia’s announcement that they’re going to charge fees for MP3 decoding software and equipment, Emmett Plant of Xiph.org posted a cheerful and amusing Open Thank-You Letter. It’s probably too optimistic to think that this event will drive the masses to switch to Ogg Vorbis audio, but it certainly can’t hurt.

For the record, Thomson MM has for a few years now been charging license royalties on encoding equipment and software, but until now were content to let decoders remain free. And now, like Compuserve before them, they seem intent upon raking in the dough on technology they’ve been giving away for a number of years. Good luck, guys.