I think it is the latter. The community has beggin for years for better clouds, a better weather system and overall a much more realistic rendition of the sky/atmosphere. What did they change from xp10 to xp11 ? they made their ugly 2d clouds white instead of grey...WOW!
Look at all the addons that are out there! ASXP, FSRWG, SKYMAXX, UWXP, XAMBIENCE, XENVIRO (and many more) all trying to alter the rendition of the sky. And they all fail (to a certain extend) because of the bad underlying structure of XP I mean shouldnt this number of addons that are targeting more or less the same area tell you something as a developer ? No ? Well I know what I would be developing...
I think it is really sad to hear that you guys have no opportunity (as it seems) to have a constructive dialogue with them.
Xplane has some really good things going for them, night lighting is very good, the whole mesh system and osm data is good, the standard airports, you name it...but with msfs2020 around the corner and beeing a part of the tech alpha I think they do indeed need
a Royal Straight Flush in their hands...