Just because they haven't yet reached the 'extinguish' stage of their strategy (and possibly never will), it doesn't mean that isn't the intended outcome. And going by their past behaviour; history would suggest that is their eventual end goal.

As for whether ASP.NET on Linux will ever attract many new developers; I must admit that I'm inclined to agree with you.

Quite easily, actually. If the majority of Mono / .NET developers are in house MS developers, then Microsoft still have all practical control over the project (just because something is open source, it doesn't mean people will develop for it nor fork it). Plus Mono not all of .NET is open source; such as the DRM extensions for Silverlight (there aren't even closed binary Mono libraries for that).

But that wasn't my point, I was commenting about how Microsoft support other platforms and standards to gain a foothold in that specific market; then introduce incompatibilities to lock people into their technology (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish). It's a well used strategy (and not just by MS). In fact, I almost sympathise with it's usage as it makes a lot of business sense - even if it does totally suck from a user perspective.

Also, why down vote me; then ask the question? Doesn't that seem a somewhat backwards approach to discussion and peer moderation?