Probably, but that's a legitimate concern. Even with Microsoft's recent open source moves (which I think are pretty awesome), we've had a history of having Microsoft force languages and extensions down our throat in an attempt to usurp the open web and standards: ActiveX, VBScript in IE, .hta's, Silverlight, etc.
The counter to that is that TypeScript is Apache-licensed. However, you can't erase history by throwing up a Github repo.
Moreover, I'm hearing more people say they don't trust relying on a big corp for their client-framework. I think many don't disagree with that idea, but more or less trust Google, so they embrace Angular with prejudice. Anything with Microsoft's signature feels less open, and may push some past that tipping point.
Ironically your comment could be taken as a classic example of the kind of FUD Microsoft used to spread. You give examples from the past that, you admit, clearly don't apply. You talk about "feels less open" when it is factually not. You speculate on others (who are they?) being pushed past a tipping point. Doubt, doubt, doubt and fear, fear, fear when in fact there's nothing you can point to in reality to back it up.
Your response seems defensive. I'm not speaking to Microsoft's motives, but to the psychology of developers who have been exposed to "embrace, extend, extinguish" for many years. They don't deserve trust just because "we're nice now, we promise".
The same way that Google's shuttering of services over and over earns them a bit of discomfort amongst their users.
"deserve's got nothing to do with it". The source is open and licenced. If you make technical decisions based on this kind of emotion you will waste a lot of time going round in circles. Because once you start looking for the spooks they're everywhere.
Technical forums ain't what they used to be. The problem for me is that this kind of Tarot card thinking is also now to be found in your local workplace. But there really isn't time for this if you are trying to build things. Do you want type checking in a language that's very close to js or not? If so then just get on with it.
Look at the list of contributors to the project (both in terms of numbers of committers and commits). Overwhelmingly Microsoft employees. Until it gains some serious momentum where it could successfully be forked and seriously maintained by the open source community at large, at this point it's a Microsoft product, and you have no choice but to trust their support and openness, so you can't hand wave away the trust issue as "Tarot card thinking".
Uhhh...lots of Microsoft employees working on Typescript is a good thing. Pulling the old, "We're happy to leave this in "the community's" hands would be a bad thing for obvious reasons.
You're right, no open source projects that weren't developed in the majority by a single large corporate benefactor have ever succeeded. We can trust those corporations: they have our best interests at heart. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to my successful career building applications for the Google Glass.
Microsoft is currently in the middle of a push to get more developers onto their proprietary platforms. Microsoft isn't doing these things because they are just so friendly and selfless. These are strategic moves.
Not only are these strategic moves, they are strategic moves by a large company aimed at competing with people like me who develop software on multiple platforms and contribute, unpaid, to an open software ecosystem.
The counter to that is that TypeScript is Apache-licensed. However, you can't erase history by throwing up a Github repo.
Moreover, I'm hearing more people say they don't trust relying on a big corp for their client-framework. I think many don't disagree with that idea, but more or less trust Google, so they embrace Angular with prejudice. Anything with Microsoft's signature feels less open, and may push some past that tipping point.