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Microsoft Research Fights Critics
coondoggie writes to tell us Network World is taking a look at why Microsoft Research has to fight so hard against critics. From the article: "When the word 'innovation' is tossed about many may look down their nose at the company sitting on top of the high-tech industry — Microsoft. [...] Microsoft Research incubates not only futuristic ideas but young minds, having hired 700 interns worldwide this year including 250 computer science PhD candidates in Redmond alone, which is roughly 21% of all the computer science PhD candidates in the United States."
If Microsoft were less predatory and less a bully in business maybe the rest of the world would stop looking down their noses at Microsoft's "research". As it is, it looks less like research and more like unfettered spending to find "yet another" way to dominate.
I welcome research from any company. I'm guessing I've probably used what amounts to "innovation" from Microsoft, derivative of work from their labs.
Unfortunately for Microsoft (but true to their character) they have tools for mouthpieces like Ballmer. Microsoft inks a deal in what could only be viewed with raised eyebrows, and Ballmer punctuates that with "they're infringing our IP anyway...". As long as Microsoft continues to be so hostile to the world in general, they get what they sow.
Their research may be golden, but it's ill-gotten gains, the world thinks so, and the world is probably right. The fact that Microsoft has such a corner on every market that they can hire 25% of the Computer Science PhD candidates only adds fuel to the fires of suspicion.
In the interim, it's a shame Bell Labs has gone from world leader to nothing... budget cuts, etc. (Lucent)... there was some real research there, and lots of it was shared with the world.
Large companies shouldn't hire these professions just to "push the envelope." Instead, I would hope that all companies diversified as their employee numbers grow. I work in a large IT company and have witnessed the above professions working effectively--especially in the R&D department.
- Psychologists
- Sociologists
- Anthropologists
- Medical Doctors
I'm actually shocked that list wasn't longer and more astonishing. No music theory majors to look at musical products like Guitar Hero's success? No athletic trainers to combat my country's obesity or offer and IT solution for it? No history majors toOne of the areas of studies the gets some of the most criticism from me. But you know what? When it comes to performing experiments on how people think and react to stimuli, psychologists are pretty damn good at it since all their data has been collected empirically from subjects. And who uses the code and devices we make in the end? Humans. And who better to tell you what the effects will be after a human has used your product for hours on end? You know, I've often wondered how many psychologists Blizzard employs because I can play that game for long periods of time with little or no fatigue on my eyes/brain.
As software becomes more and more decentralized and internet based, communities form around it. Communities identify themselves by it. For instance, I am part of the Slashdot community by merely posting on it. Think about how many sociologists that MySpace must employ to predict/track or protect people from social deviance. How do you handle that? How do you address that? Not really an engineer's department.
Now that's a word I hear thrown around a lot and abused to mean many things. But most importantly, it's the study of diverse kinds of people. If you're an international company, you need anthropologists to view your projects and make sure that you aren't inadvertently calling your product or displaying something that may limit your market or create bad press. Engineers focus on one type of person when they make their product and so you need people to make sure that it is still marketable to the world.
Most likely hired for the sheer fact that baby boomers are getting old. Huge market for healthcare. If you can make anything related to it and sell it, you're in the money for the coming years. I may be a horrible monster for saying this but things like Alzheimer's Disease are multi-billion dollar industries based on treatments. Gene therapy and computational techniques in gene sequencing just make the field all that more lucrative.
On top of that, you need to think of the disabled using your product and be conscious of their disabilities. Also, what medical problems might be associated with your product or how can you make it easier on the end user. You don't want a million lawsuits if I'm losing my eye sight or getting arthritis by playing WoW, do you?
Come on people, this is the R&D of the largest software company in the world. I'm shocked that I'm not more shocked on what they're up to.
My work here is dung.
Is the stuff that's going on at MS really all that interesting that 21% of PHD students want to work there? Or is the pay just that good? Or are they just looking for a nice shiny star on their resume? It seems to me that there would be a lot more interesting places to work than MS.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Well ... I wouldn't count it out yet. Singularity is only 3-ish years old. In fact, from what I understand they only recently reached the stage of having an interactive command line. IANA Computer Scientist, but I'm sure it's got a long way to go before even its base concepts are suitable for mainstream use. Hell, there's not even any clue as to whether development of Singularity into a mainstream OS would even be feasible.
Not to mention there would be an absolutely massive paradigm shift involved in moving from Win32/64 to a platform like Singularity...
Who doesn't like free music?