> Instead, preserving it to study and learn things about game development at that time would be far more valuable for the common good.

Given the game recently went free to play and many people still play it, its not surprising blizzard are not releasing the source. If the game had been dead for 5-10 years, then sure, they should probably release the source. Its still going strong and shows no signs of stopping in the next 5-10 years, especially now due to the remaster.

There are plenty of other games out there to learn from using the source, if that's your goal.

> For goodness sake this thing is older than half of people on HN.

Are you saying that half of HN are younger than 19? I would have thought the average age on HN would be somewhere around 30. I would expect the average HN person was a kid or teenager when Starcraft was released.