This article misses the core reason people develop and contribute to open source; (1) to be able build something that never existed that the person thinks should exist and (2) to contribute to and a be a part of a community with a similar/same goal.
Not really comparable. Microsoft bought a unit with tens of thousands of employees, factories around the world, a (modestly) profitable featurephone business...
All that had some value in 2013 (although perhaps not the amount Microsoft paid for it). Microsoft's own decisions post-acquisition expedited the loss of value and resulted in them writing off the entire purchase price.
"50 told me, go 'head, switch the style up,
And if they hate then let 'em hate
And watch the money pile up"
- Kanye West (quoting 50 Cent)
Jokes aside, it's easy to say 'trolls will be trolls' and move on and some will even say that it's not even worth writing about hateful comments on the internet anymore, however, sharing experiences like these do help to empathize with others and act as reminders to everyone about their own biases when making comments (sexist, racist, or what not).
As for trolls and haters, I think there are many (both simple and complex) reasons why people try to lash out at others even if they're not of that personality in their offline lives. It's naive to think there's a single reason.
- I wonder if movie studios could use this for lighting scenes more naturally.
- Would be cool if you could use more than one for larger rooms and they worked with each other to distribute light evenly
- Also would be neat to have it paired to a phone/camera so where the camera focuses, the light is adjusted to get a better shot
- $199 is too much, even for early adopters.