Maybe this is more of an internal fight between DevDiv and Windows. DevDiv's team had been stripped, their projects like WPF and Silverlight end-of-lifed, while the Windows team has made a fourth version of XAML.
The only for DevDiv to regain its honour is by reminding Windows Divisino that the oxygen Windows lives on is in DevDiv creating new developers. Given that VS11 Express is only a toy, and requires a presumed $99 annual subscription to deploy, it is going to be difficult for any students to justify.
This civil war is going to maim the Windows ecosystem at a time when it is especially weak.
This is a very insightful theory and I really, really hope you're wrong.
Regarding students, though, Microsoft has DreamSpark, which looks like BizSpark for students (all the way down to high school students, apparently). They can get free access to VS and at least some subset of operating systems.
The only for DevDiv to regain its honour is by reminding Windows Divisino that the oxygen Windows lives on is in DevDiv creating new developers. Given that VS11 Express is only a toy, and requires a presumed $99 annual subscription to deploy, it is going to be difficult for any students to justify.
This civil war is going to maim the Windows ecosystem at a time when it is especially weak.