I think it is a forced move as you must stay competitive....I'm not bashing. If I were to create lite-c(or anything that I invest my time on) you can bet I would be selling it, there would be no "free" version...so a big thank you to JCL and staff.
as far as GS looking horrible, or not that great without shaders...think again, as a matter of fact look a WoW, and turn off the bloom/spec mapping/bump mapping...still looks fantastic, Torchlight doesn't use heavy shading and it looks fantastic...I can make some pretty neat stuff(I think)without the use of shaders.