Reading the discussions over the last week, I have to conclude with saying that, to an extent, Blender is only where it is today because the commercial vendors raised prices, tightened EULA’s, increased bugs and bloat, and reduced R&D to the point where there was no longer enough value to justify that level of spending over what was becoming a decent FOSS solution. Yes, that statement is in part my view of what makes some FOSS solutions successful, but things are more complex than that.
That is not say that the BF did not do anything to earn it, because it obviously was not so far behind that such an expensive subscription still looked good in comparison. There is a rather clear reason why you do not see the GIMP, Inkscape, or LMMS in large production houses and still remain the domain of those who will rather stick with free options if they do what they need, being in markets that still contain very nice options at somewhat low prices with no subscriptions (to note, I have the GIMP, but I use Mixcraft 9 Pro for DAW-related stuff).
If we were in fact able to prove that Blender just steamrolled everyone simply by way of merit, we would not have 1000+ page threads like the one below pointing out where the BF is going wrong in development in the hopes that someone is listening. The death of the midrange alone was of benefit to Blender simply because of the extreme gulf it produced between free and what is now the cost of entry if you want a complete solution.
What is the most bat-guano-insane thing in Blender that you can’t believe they haven’t fixed yet? - General Forums / Blender Development Discussion - Blender Artists Community