I think much of that is due to the ASP.Net web team embracing open source. MVC and SignalR are both open sourced. They fully support things like jQuery, and even include it as part of the web project scaffolding.

It also goes further. Entity Framework is open source and Microsoft is one of the largest contributors to Git.


>Just last night I attended a packed ASP.NET session at MS in Phila. Part of it was given by John V Petersen, who I think once hung out here.
>The other speaker, Jeff Fritz, a lead developer at Telerik, is in the same league as JVP- top notch.
>Their focus was on MS's push to get all the disparate pieces of ASP.NET - MVC, Web API, Webforms and SignalR working as one framework more readily.
>HTML5 and jquery came up in passing, but some of the things they showed when all those things come together were impressive.
>The whole is more powerful than the parts.
>
>The buzz words were there in abundance, and there was the usual fluff, but one takeaway is that MS is listening for ways to improve ASP.NET and is reacting quickly.
>
>MS might be shooting itself in the foot in other areas, but ASP.NET could very well become its shining star in the world of business development.