Microsoft Closes Its $7.5 Billion Purchase of GitHub (techcrunch.com)

Microsoft has official closed its acquisition of GitHub, the Git-based code sharing and collaboration service with 31 million developers. "The Redmond, WA-based software behemoth first said it would acquire GitHub for $7.5 billion in stock in June of this year, and after the acquisition closed it would continue to run it as an independent platform and business," reports TechCrunch. From the report: The acquisition is yet another sign of how Microsoft has been doubling down on courting developers and presenting itself as a neutral partner to help them with their projects. That is because, despite its own very profitable proprietary software business, Microsoft also has a number of other businesses -- for example, Azure, which competes with AWS and Google Cloud -- that rely heavily on it being unbiased towards one platform or another. And GitHub, Microsoft hopes, will be another signal to the community of that position. In that regard, it will be an interesting credibility test for the companies. Nat Friedman, previously the CEO of Xamarin, will be the CEO of GitHub on Monday. He says the site will be run as an independent platform and business.

"We will always support developers in their choice of any language, license, tool, platform, or cloud," he writes, noting that there will be more tools to come. "We will continue to build tasteful, snappy, polished tools that developers love," he added.

Comments

Re:"neutral partner" my arse

[Kaenneth]

You mean GNU?

Microsoft Electron

[tepples]

GitHub made an application framework called Electron that is essentially a copy of Chrome hardcoded to view one website. Applications built with Electron, such as Slack, Discord, and modern Skype, tend to be RAM hogs, well into the triple digit MB per application. On laptops with 4 GB or less RAM, the swap pressure caused by running more than one Electron application at once makes Emacs look like "Eight Megs And Constantly Smooth".

So I guess with the purchase of GitHub made official, we can officially refer to this as "Microsoft Electron".

Re:Microsoft Electron

[thePsychologist]

Electron may be a resource hog, but with it Microsoft produced Visual Studio Code. It's free, available on Linux, and the first text editor that I have actually been able to use aside from Vim. Aside from Vim keybindings, it's just pure fun to use, and wouldn't exist on Linux without Electron.

Now ...

[PPH]

... you can unplug it.

Time will tell.

[nimbius]

The fact that Nat Friedman is heading this up is cause for me to lower my machete and molotov. Nat is a smart guy, and if given the opportunity hes shown he knows how to deliver what the community wants.

the canary for Microsofts acquisition however is, also, Nat. Once he resigns its an impossible act to follow for Microsofts dyed-in-the-wool chain of command. Theyll need to continue the momentum, redouble their commitment to the community and maintain good communication. Gitlab and Sourceforge are too readily available, too easy to use, and have all the same features as github. Microsoft is literally banking on their ability to curate a very perceptive userbase...something they have failed to do time and time again

Re:Time will tell.

[TFlan91]

I don't think so.

Even if this investment never reaches black, M$ will view it as a win.

This is about vertical integration, pure and simple.

Control not only the productions systems (read Azure), but also the development systems (read GitHub). CI/CD is starting to become a must-have feature among GitHub, GitLab, and others, which only further reinforces reliance on a particular system/structure

Build those walls, ensure you support the entire workflow process from start to finish, then close the gates.

Gitlab

[Anonymous Coward]

Hello Gitlab

Re:Gitlab

[Anonymous Coward]

Gitlab saw its all time high on project movement count the day Microsoft bought Github.

MS and skype went bad. And now?

[OFnow]

I hope MS does right by linux users, but...I'm sceptical given
the skype experience.

Re: 7.5 billion fucks given

[jd]

It'll be the license, modified so that you give permission for Microsoft to use anything you've put on GitHub in a closed source product, regardless of any license you use, and to make Microsoft co-owners.