Absolutely, this is not just a random tangential comment! With a bit of searching, any time criticism of VSCode comes up, it's shrugged off with "it's OSS!". Even from people who use Linux, a substantial proportion of programmers bring out the OSS card to deflect criticism of these exploitative practices.

(Example here: https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxmasterrace/comments/v3n8w4/wou... but this sentiment is really ubiquitous)