Old FUD (Score 1)

...along with (much-needed) licenses to use patent-restricted codecs.

The "much-needed" part is old FUD. With the possible exception of some pro applications, the free codecs punch their weight just fine nowadays.

If your device or software doesn't play them, install one of these and complain to $company_trying_to_lock_you_in:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockbox
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlc
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux