The Microsoft Visual Studio team has been oddly quiet today. Right now, I think that the managers and whatnot are in meetings right now trying to figure out what changes, if any, they should make to the message that they're trying to express to the developer community.
The pricing decisions on MSDN have effectively pissed off everyone. Small ISV's are upset that the features that have been so attractively previewed for them over the last year are now priced outside of their reach. People like myself who purchase retail versions of the Visual Studio products are pissed off because the Team System stuff is only available via overpriced subscriptions unless we purchase 5 copies or more. Larger development houses who already architecture investments are upset because to get the productivity enhancements they were expecting from Visual Studio, they're going to have to pop for the Team Editions. And everyone who does not do software development like Microsoft does is upset that they're being forced into the Microsoft "Division of Responsibilities."
Well, I wish the Developer Tools Division luck in refining their message. Just remember that the development community is now very close-knit due to your efforts with Channel 9, INETA, blogs and the like. Because we're more close-knit, we are more likely to take on the cause of our more vocal members, because if you slight one of us, you slight all of us.
So while you work on your message, ask yourself this. Is your message that you are all about the developer or not? Because the message we got was that you're all about the developer...as long as you can get to the developer's bank account.
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