[tombert]

Part of the annoyance there is that most research gigs are gatekept behind doctorates. I cannot tell you how many times I've been declined from Microsoft Research, despite having a bachelors degree and more than a decade of industry experience, specifically because I'm "not qualified enough" for a research engineer experience.

> That time could have been spent gaining experience, which IMHO, is extremely valuable.

I certainly agree that if your goal is to maximize earning potential, than there's no question that industry experience is substantially more valuable than a PhD.

[hedora]

MSR is pretty competitive. How many papers do you publish in a typical year?

[tombert]

None thus far.

To be clear, and I realize that the tone of my comment might come off as a bit more bitter than I intended it to, I don't blame MS for declining me. Obviously they're free to decline anyone they'd like, and I'm sure they get people with PhDs and industry experience all the time.