@Michael Torbert -

Well said Michael. Thankfully I believe that Miroslav Glavic's stance on this is quite unusual. Almost everyone I've spoken with has been supportive of a low cost mandatory donation to help developers maintain and support their plugins. WordPress could do this very easily by redirecting each plugin page's download link to the developer's PayPal account. The developer could in turn redirect back to WordPress.org where the already logged in user could download the plugin and receive lifetime updates and support for $1. I don't think that's too much to ask and I'm betting at least 95% of people would agree.