AT&T Labs' Brain Drain

Frisky070802 writes "The Newark Star-Ledger has an article on the brain drain at AT&T Labs, which laid off close to half its researchers two years ago this month, another good fraction last spring, and has lost many of the rest through voluntary departures. The article claims that only Microsoft might have the money to fund basic research as Bell Labs did years ago, though many (including me) would put IBM in the same camp. It cites problems at AT&T, ranging from researchers paying their own way to present at conferences to a loss of free espresso and bottled water. Many luminaries, such as Lorrie Faith Cranor, Avi Rubin, and Bjarne Stroustrup, are quoted --- with Stroustrup saying the lab was "mugged" by Wall Street. (Rumor has it that the losses haven't stemmed, with more top-notch researchers going to academia in the coming months.)" (Non-registration ZIP and age demographic collection.)

Comments

Re:What do you expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

With spelling like that, it doesn't look like primary schools have been too productive in your lifetime either.

Re:Academia

[irokitt]

AI, Graphics and the like (SIGGRAPH for instance)...cutting edge work from Microsoft Research
So for AI, we have Microsft Bob (Clippy).
And for graphics, we have..um...Luna? (the Windows XP interface).
And for innovative products, we have the Tablet PC?

I'm sorry about the negativity, but I really don't see anthing truly innovative having come out of Microsoft in the past, and something tells me that things will remain that way for quite some time. It takes a long time for research to begin to pay off, and Microsoft is still new at that realm of computing. Oh well, $0.02.