>I certainly understand how scandalous this looks to crowds like Hacker News.
I don't. I'm with the Microsoft employee who was pissed at how people think it's edgy to diss on Microsoft. What were the chances that Microsoft was openly doing that? Some dude who has now deleted his post said Microsoft was trying to "create a monopoly of web IDEs". These are clearly people who barely have a passing knowledge of how Microsoft works these days.
People think critical thinking means complaining endlessly. It doesn't. You can't think critically if you don't think clearly. And you can't think clearly if you're only looking for a reason to lift the pitchforks.
It took significant public outrage and press coverage before either of those were even acknowledged, a long time after.
> What were the chances that Microsoft was openly doing that?
After reading the above, is it really that edgy to be assuming the worst? If it's truly just recurring instances of different rogue employees, doesn't that speak to a systemic and/or cultural issue that needs to be addressed with additional internal safeguards and/or deterrents to prevent it from happening again?
To the credit of the relevant team here, today this was promptly addressed as soon as it got their attention. But it will take more than that to set to rest decades of precedence.
(I did not partake in the flaming and don't find it constructive or beneficial; just saying I have full understanding of the suspicion and understand that MS are still on probation)
To late to edit or delete my comment above but just to set it straight I just learned that the whole lerna debacle linked above was a nothing-burger aka fake news.
I certainly understand how scandalous this looks to crowds like Hacker News.
But this seems a little bit blown out of proportion, as if Microsoft just forked the kernel or something and put their name on the license.