Java jobs in a .NET city

I live on the east coast. The city I'm in has historically been considered a .NET town. In the past most of the jobs available were .net positions. I know there are still a lot of .NET shops, but there seems to be an increase in Java jobs.

There's a surprising amount of java openings compared to .NET. This might be anecdotal, based on one snap shot in time, and not a good representation of things. It got me wondering though.

Now, a lot of the MS technologies are "free". My understanding is this was done to be more competitive with the other stacks that don't charge a ton for licensing. While the MS stuff may be "free" upfront now, the licensing is probably extremely expensive for large companies.

Is Java becoming more common and gaining more momentum? If so, is there an explanation to why?