I think Sony shot themselves in the ass w/ the release of the PS3, specifically not putting enough units out to cover the initial demand. I don't think of myself as a fanboy but i always preferred the PS until the PS3 release. The prices they were getting on e-bay were beyond insane. Enough said on that, back to topic.
For a company as big as MS, $50mil isn't such a big deal, especially if they spend it to corner a market. They buy an exclusive
on a hot title & they know people will buy their console to get the exclusive content. In turn, the sales of their consoles go up.
Now a lot of people have a console they spent a bunch of money on so they buy other games for it. On top of that, they claim
the original $50mil as advertising & write it off on taxes.
In the end they get it all back + more.
As Homer Simpson said, "Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand."
Either way, I'd hate to see MS get control of R*.