Does anyone feel like the new updates are just attempts?

It's not Microsoft it's Mojang. Microsoft really doesn't own Minecraft they own Mojang. Kinda like how Take Two Interactive doesn't own GTA V, they own Rockstar and have rights to the game and make money from it.

When Notch sold to Minecraft and resigned from Mojang, he said he never expected the game to become this big or this much of a money maker. I feel like he new Mojang would eventually just try and suck all the money out of Minecraft they can, which if you consider the fact they want to make Pocket Edition, Console Edition and Windows 10 Edition all "community edition" and place Microtransaction charges on skins, resource packs, builds, maps etc. it makes sense. Jeb said at E3 they plan on dropping support for Minecraft Java Edition (PC), if you think about it, the only reason they will is because they can't microtransaction PC Minecraft, especially for things that have been free and public for PC since full release. It's obvious they just want to get all the money they can out of the game and announcing at E3 they are dropping support of Java Minecraft made it crystal clear that's what they are doing.