Squeeze play?

The Mac App Store (MAS) requires participating developers to pay Apple $99/year plus 30% of gross sales price; only apps which are approved by Apple may be sold via MAS.

Xcode4 was released today on MAS, for $4.99. It used to be included on the OS X distribution DVDs, as a no-extra-cost optional installation.

The beta distributions of OS X Lion is available only through the MAS. As far as I know it does not include Xcode.

Developers are not forced to sell their applications through the MAS. In fact, some types of software, those which require administrator privileges for installation, must be sold outside the MAS.

Still, Apple seems to be edging down a path at the terminus of which developers must pay an annual fee to sell software for use on OS X, and must have that software approved by Apple before it can be offered for sale.

I sincerely hope this isn't what they have in mind.

Thank goodness for Linux.