"Embrace, extend, extinguish" can be thought of as pattern of incentives, not just a policy that might be renounced. Embrace. We care about our developers and

"Embrace, extend, extinguish" can be thought of as pattern of incentives, not just a policy that might be renounced. Embrace. We care about our developers and customers. If someone somewhere does something that would be better for them than what we're doing now, of course we're going to pick it up and adapt it for them. Failing to do so would be to fail them. Extend. We care about our developers and customers. We want to improve the experience we provide them. Sometimes that involves extending standards with additional functionality. Just as everyone else does. We're not going to deny them those improvements while standards processes grind slowly, and especially not when those are retarded by competitors with interests other than the best well being of our developers and customers. And we value maintaining backwards compatibility. [...] Similarly for community infrastructure. Extinguish. We care about our developers and customers. If we can help that community grow and strengthen, attracting new members from elsewhere, of course we're going to do that for them. Helping competitors, their developers, and their customers, isn't where our focus is. Resources are limited. And if competitors think to steal our hard-earned intellectual property, of course we're going to stop them. (Ok, that last bit is policy.) "Windows Everywhere"... and scorched earth everywhere else. That systematically torching the surrounding valley, now has less prominence as policy, does seem an improvement. It remains to be seen how different the effects are, of say allocating available water based on the best interests of our developers, customers, and competitive advantage. One question is what Microsoft is willing to sacrifice for the common good. Taking a hit on DOC, for example, to avoid undermining ISO. Sacrificing the competitive advantage of offensive patent use. There doesn't seem much track record yet, in prioritizing the broader there's-more-here-than-Microsoft ecosystem and community and profession.