Ultimately it isn't up to 343. Whatever Gates wants to happen, will happen. Three forty three wouldn't dare question the authority of the elite, they would lose their job faster than anyone could say, "I found Ling Ling's head!"
In the end Halo is destined to become the Standard Oil of the videogame empire, with Microsoft buying all these rights to put Halo cameos in every videogame and continuing to milk the Halo franchise for another 20 games or so with an eternal, immortal, godmodded, faceless killing machine of a main protagonist for the rest of time.
In the end Microsoft controls all, and there's nothing anyone of us can do about it at this moment.