It is an example of a symptom that has presented itself because of an underlying disease rotting away the core of Microsoft.
Or do you mean an internal cause?
Bashing MS just for fun isn't very smart (for all their sins, there's a few good things coming out of Redmond - and Microsoft Research is just fantastic for the most part), but Microsoft is just lowering itself to the level of their critics here.
While a large part of the public has a biased opinion of Microsoft, Microsoft also has a biased opinion of their users - otherwise their marketing wouldn't feel so out-of-touch. I don't see any winners here.