> a survival decision

Do you know if the .net team had they authority to make that decision, or did they need the backing from the Azure team to persuade the top leadership?

  > Parallel to it, note how Microsoft also plays a role in Python based tooling nowadays.

Yes, I do. I feel MS doesn't even know the distinction between "pragmatic" and "negligent" anymore. The last language they ever should push is that non-typesafe, self undefining, non-optimisable, compute wasting language called Python. I know, shouldn't mention it, programming langues and religion... I am sorry in advance, but I think MS given their PL research accolades should show taste and technical judgement, rather than endless go-with-the-flow pragmatism.