Confirming what our community has been saying for years, a Register article references Microsoft business group president Jeff Raikes [2] as stating that "If they're going to pirate somebody, we want it to be us rather than somebody else".
To summarize the hierarchy of what Microsoft wants.
- Use and pay for their software
- Use but not pay for their software (infringe copyright)
What Microsoft does not want to ever happen is that people switch to competing software, especially legal royalty-free FLOSS software such as Linux, OpenOffice.org or Mozilla.org.
This can be seen with the so-called "piracy statistics" from Microsoft controlled BSA/CAAST which doesn't adequately differentiate between those not paying for BSA member software and those who have switched to royalty-free alternatives.
See also: p2pnet [3], Ars Technica [4]