Noone, either familiar with the state of the art in codec or not, has come up with a reasonable set of patents that Theora's ancestor codec from 2001, VP3, could have possibly been infringing. Individuals are free to believe whatever they like, but there hasn't been any evidence of infringement beyond the MPEG LA's CEO making vague assertions.
The MPEG LA has a financial interest in keeping the patent situation around Theora murky, which they've clearly done well.
The MPEG LA has a financial interest in keeping the patent situation around Theora murky, which they've clearly done well.
Just so it's clear (and some of the quotes by the MPEG LA's CEO make more sense from this page http://www.streamingmedia.com/article.asp?id=11746):
* Theora is a patented codec (ie: there are active patents today on the concepts used within VP3)
* One of the MPEG LA's patent holders, On2/Google does hold those patents
* On2 has, however, licensed those patents globally, indefinitely and royalty-free, making the above two points true but entirely a non-issue