This is not a case of conflict of interest, but Microsoft admitting that Open Source is going to be an increasing competitor they'd rather make a buck off of that just growl about. In the past, MS has lost serious revenue by allowing third party products to initiate interconnectivity with competing platforms like Novell, etc. So, it only makes sense for MS to play nice in this case because their products can then designated out of the box as 'plays friendly with Open Source'.