I don't think profit is the core problem here. It's control. A non-profit Microsoft is just as susceptible to cooptation by a hostile foreign government as a for-profit organization.
Rather the key thing is having the source code, control of the deployment, and control of the infrastructure. There are plenty of places in there where profit is completely compatible with achieving full control.
> A non-profit Microsoft is just as susceptible to cooptation by a hostile foreign government as a for-profit organization.
Why did Microsoft follow the orders of the president, if it wasn't because they're afraid of payback in terms of "something that leads to us loosing money"?
Money perverse the actions of the for-profit companies, as suddenly you have someone like Tim Cook giving gifts to the president, as the survival of his company depends on a specific person having a good view of them personally.
If neither of these companies were so hellbent on doing everything they can for profit, and instead focused on providing reliable, trustworthy and user-focused services, they wouldn't have that worry anymore. But of course, this is a pipe-dream and not at all realistic in the current climate.
As someone who previously was part of the management of a small non-profit, we absolutely cared about things that lead to us losing money...
Now, we might have had good reason to pursue a plan that cost us money, but in general, threats to our funding are effectively threats to our existence.
> Why did Microsoft follow the orders of the president, if it wasn't because they're afraid of payback in terms of "something that leads to us loosing money"?
There exist other techniques to bring open source projects and their maintainers into line.
Non-profits follow the laws of the country where they are located. This means that if somebody like Trump decides to abuse their authority by placing sanctions on ICC prosecutors, the non-profit Microsoft will similarly follow local law, or be at risk of other enforcement actions against them.
Profit and money have nothing to do with what the ICC was reacting to. It's about power, law, and autocracy.