This is probably going to be a controversial take and it might seem like I'm shilling for Microsoft, but perhaps their move here is not malevolent. I suspect they are doing this to crack down on the numerous "Free VLC Player" type clones (and the like--not picking on VLC at all) in the store that are open source software bundled with spyware or other unwanted software. In other words, projects taking or redirecting possible funding from the original projects they claim to be.
Is anyone really surprise Microsoft made this move? We already have large corporations making millions to billions on open source tools/platforms and give hardly anything back if any to those communities. There is tons of stuff "running" on opensource, but because they are hosted, I've yet to see a link to the source code with their changes (which in theory should be available to me).
Why not start an open source software store? You can still get them from other sources for free but you can also buy them all in one place, nicely organized, and for reasonable prices. You can even have sales like on Steam and events. Who says you can't market open source stuff and you can only go to Microsoft or other third parties? Maybe throw in some goodies like a booklet on a CD, only available for the paid version, people like that. Some games have this business model and they make a lot of money: free to play (and I don't mean the pay to win type) buy pay money for cosmetic stuff. Now I don't mean give VS Code for free and make the dark theme cost 50$, I'm not that evil... but maybe we can think of something that would work well for open source.
Microsoft just got the 4 Xs of 4X titles wrong. They thought it was excoriate, embrace, extend, extinguish instead of explore, expand, exploit, exterminate. Someone should just sit down with them and explain the difference. Then, Microsoft can start a new game and play properly, and maybe to better results.
This is probably going to be a controversial take and it might seem like I'm shilling for Microsoft, but perhaps their move here is not malevolent. I suspect they are doing this to crack down on the numerous "Free VLC Player" type clones (and the like--not picking on VLC at all) in the store that are open source software bundled with spyware or other unwanted software. In other words, projects taking or redirecting possible funding from the original projects they claim to be.
Is anyone really surprise Microsoft made this move? We already have large corporations making millions to billions on open source tools/platforms and give hardly anything back if any to those communities. There is tons of stuff "running" on opensource, but because they are hosted, I've yet to see a link to the source code with their changes (which in theory should be available to me).
A recent study revealed that the EEE method is sometimes used by big open source companies to extenguish free clones based on their operating systems.
Why not start an open source software store? You can still get them from other sources for free but you can also buy them all in one place, nicely organized, and for reasonable prices. You can even have sales like on Steam and events. Who says you can't market open source stuff and you can only go to Microsoft or other third parties? Maybe throw in some goodies like a booklet on a CD, only available for the paid version, people like that. Some games have this business model and they make a lot of money: free to play (and I don't mean the pay to win type) buy pay money for cosmetic stuff. Now I don't mean give VS Code for free and make the dark theme cost 50$, I'm not that evil... but maybe we can think of something that would work well for open source.
I'm pretty sure this breaks anti-trust laws. People should start writing AGs to take legal action.
Microsoft just got the 4 Xs of 4X titles wrong. They thought it was excoriate, embrace, extend, extinguish instead of explore, expand, exploit, exterminate. Someone should just sit down with them and explain the difference. Then, Microsoft can start a new game and play properly, and maybe to better results.