Updated Feb. 22 at 3:50 p.m. with Motorola's comments.

Microsoft has gone on the offensive against all things Google.

The Redmond-based software giant published a blog Wednesday (Feb. 22) with the hyperbolic headline “Google: Please don’t kill video on the web,” after filing a formal competition law complaint with the European Commission against Motorola Mobility, owned by Google.

Microsoft has also produced a series of advertisements taking on Google apps and portraying Google as a slick, shady company bent on using its customers as "lab rats" as it develops, changes and eliminates its software while people are using it.

In its blog, Microsoft alleges that Motorola promised to “make their patents available on fair and reasonable terms, and would not use them to block competitors from shipping their products.”

Microsoft claims Motorola is demanding exorbitant licensing fees on the patents it owns for standard essential video. In the blog, Microsoft says that, for a $1,000 laptop, Motorola is demanding the company pay a $22.50 royalty fee for use of its 50 patents, compared to the 2 cents Microsoft pays to use the 2,300 other patents it licenses for other video technology.

“Imagine if every firm acted like Motorola. Windows implements more than 60 standards, and a PC supports about 200. If every firm priced its standard essential patents like Motorola, the cost of the patents would be greater than all the other costs combined in making PCs, tablets, smartphones and other devices.”

Motorola responded to Microsoft's complaint Wednesday afternoon.

"Microsoft's complain and blog posting today are simply tactics in the patent battle that Microsoft initiated with surprise infringement actions against Motorola Mobility in October 2010 accompanied by press statements making it clear the actions were aimed at Android," said a Motorola spokeswoman in a prepared statement.

Motorola alleged that Microsoft has "simply reversed its position," on these types of patents "in order to suit its latest litigation tactic."

The company said it remains open to resolving the patent licensing dispute in a "mutually beneficial manner" but would require that Microsoft "recognize the value of the Motorola Mobility patents it is using."

A Motorola spokeswoman said the company offered Microsoft the same licensing terms it has historically offered other licensees, but said Microsoft ignored the offer, "preferring instead to use the litigation as a weapon."

Microsoft has also recently teamed up with unlikely bedfellow Apple Inc. against Google.

Apple filed the same charge against Motorola for video standard patents on Feb. 18. The day before that, The Wall Street Journal reported that Google and other advertisers “used special computer code that tricks Apple's Safari Web-browsing software into letting them monitor many users.”

The WSJ story reported that Google circumvented the security features on Apple’s web browser, Safari, that prevent users from downloading cookies. Google uses the cookies for its smart searching technology, which provides search results and advertisements tailored for the searcher’s interests.

Google claimed that the WSJ “mischaracterizes what happened and why,” in a media statement that same day.

Microsoft then alleged that Google did the same thing with its Internet Explorer browser. On the company’s Internet Explorer blog, Dean Hachamovitch, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of Internet Explorer, wrote that Google bypassed requests by advanced users who have blocked cookies.

In a statement issued Tuesday, Google Senior Vice President of Communications Rachel Whetstone said it was “impractical to comply” with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer cookie request because it would prevent certain websites from providing a variety of features, including the Facebook “like” buttons and the ability to sign into multiple websites using a Google account. Whetstone said the standards Microsoft is accusing the company of breaking are “widely non-operational,” and that “thousands of sites” don’t use them.

Whether Microsoft and Apple will continue to put aside past differences and work together against a common enemy is unclear, but for the moment, the spin machines are clearly working overtime on all sides.

Emily Parkhurst covers technology for TechFlash and the Puget Sound Business Journal. She can be reached at 206-876-5441 or eparkhurst@bizjournals.com. Follow her on Twitter: @emilyparkhurst.