Regardless of whether that's legally possible, saying Microsoft deserves to "pay" for their mistake does not imply that this guy is owed millions of dollars for sitting on this domain for decades. That's silly regardless of what MS did or didn't do.
He owns the domain, and it's worth millions of dollars because of Microsoft's mistake. He may not deserve to own something so valuable, but he does. If you owned something worth millions of dollars, would you just give it to Microsoft?
> He owns the domain, and it's worth millions of dollars because of Microsoft's mistake.
I think it's worth millions itself as a 4 character .com. It's value because of the mistake and potential that represents is likely orders of magnitude higher than that.
