It's a legitimate point, but the linkbait title just irritates me. This is something that developers only have to deal with once every year or two. $5 is not a lot of money for a 4.5GB development package, regardless of whether you think it should be free. It certainly shouldn't be any kind of tipping point in platform choice for developers.
The article makes a very valid point that people download XCode not because they care about Mac/iOS development, but only because Unix systems assume you have a compiler available as part of the software installation process. Folks like Ruby developers and MacPort users will not be happy to have to pay $5 to install something, when the equivalent Windows binaries are available for free.
This is going to cause major disruption in how certain Mac software is distributed. The problem will not simply "go away" as trolls are distracted.
Most likely Macs will move to a Macs move to a Windows-like model of binaries instead of build-scripts. However, someone could recreate the Mac toolchain and distribute it for free in an easy to install package. That's a lot of work to save someone $5 however, so there will be a lot of bitching-and-moaning in the short term.
