It certainly doesn't help that development and distribution on Linux sucks ass, so porting to Linux is a huge time-sink compared to porting to OS X. Unless you pick a specific distro and *only* support that, in which case the Linux fans who yesterday were begging you to port the software are now bitching that you built it for the "wrong" distro.

Then your support costs run up the roof, because even in the "correct" distro people can install the "wrong" windowing system or sound subsystem or what-not, which becomes a support nightmare. So you pay more to port, then you pay more to support the port, then...

when you're done, nobody buys the thing anyway because "information wants to be free" and, shockingly, a community based primarily around a free-of-cost OS and making their own free clones of commercial products doesn't like paying money for things.

This stalemate isn't likely to change unless there is a major cultural shift in the Linux community.

Ok so you don't like the gun.

And that makes harassing and threatening this person acceptable because...?

A Tor developer? Being paranoid? Shocking!

No, I'm sorry, when I say "evidence" what I mean is, and try to follow along here, "evidence". Not anecdotes. Not scary bumping noises in the night. Evidence.

'The NSA has been pressuring free software projects and developers in various ways,' the group says.

Did they provide evidence for this claim?

Well, in the case of Linux, it appears the answer is: "constant in-fighting and general incompetence." Next question? I'm an expert at these ones!

I agree that Visual Basic .NET is a lot less "learnable" (for lack of a better word) than old-school Visual Basic.

But what feature do you think the Express version of Visual Studio lacks for this use? (Ignoring for a moment that students generally can get a full version of VS for very cheap or free through their school.) Why the all-caps on the word "FULL"?

Hell, from my experience, most actual dev shops don't even use the FULL ("Ultimate") version of Visual Studio, the standard edition is fine for 99.9% of use-cases.

Would Microsoft want to get kids hooked into nice wholesome activities like MS-SQL, C#, .net or VB

They already give away all that. Plus a restriction-free copy of Visual Studio, to boot. They have been for decades. Your FUD is decades out-of-date and I hate you.

Should Microsoft be forced to support XP? Should Microsoft give kids Office? Should Microsoft start making hybrid cars out of farm waste?

Maybe a better question should be: does any decision-maker at Microsoft give a tenth of a fuck about what any Slashdot poster has to say? I'm wagering the answer to that one is: no.

What stopped you from upgrading to Windows 7 anytime in literally the last 4 years? ... for that matter, what's stopping you from upgrading to Windows 7 tomorrow?

I don't know what model you drove, but my Fusion Hybrid does not behave that way. The only time it'll do regenerative braking without the brake pedal down is if its coasting downhill and would otherwise be gaining quite a bit of speed, and frankly in that situation I don't mind it applying a tiny bit of brake for me since I'd end up having to do it myself anyway.

Allot of negative comments here. I see how this can go bad too. Oculus seemed hellbent on providing great consumer level VR. That is what they do, and it's the *only* thing they do.

They do? They've done nothing but release development kits.

These machines are built by Diebold. Do you honestly, truly, believe that Diebold engineers can do a better job of securing a system than Microsoft engineers? Truly?

Right; let's ignore the 47 strong claims in the article and focus on the one weak claim. Then we can dismiss the weak claim, and suddenly the other 47 fade away into the ether and you have earned your debating wings, little angel!

Sexist claims aside, the critique that a non-employee is allowed to hang-out in the office and harass employees-- and is still there even after being repeatedly banned from that area of the building-- that is a real HR problem, and that alone would be enough for me to quit a company.

But if customers are still finding enough value to pay MS to support it,

I highly doubt enough of those XP users would be willing to pay for support to make it worth Microsoft's time. Approximately none of the home users would, I can guarantee that. And most of the corporate users still on it are on it because their IT departments are some combination of cheap and incompetent, I doubt they'd be writing checks either.

The real point is: why would you assume this is an "arbitrary decision" from Microsoft? They know a lot more about their business than you do, and whatever you think of their products, there's no denying that Microsoft knows their business.