Having been an intern at both, and gone through at least the intern version of their interviews, I didn't see a huge difference. Can you solve problems? How do you approach different types of problems? Simply put, did your education (both formal and personal) teach you enough to know the important things that any software engineer should know? Communication is incredibly important, and your ability to communicate how you are solving the problems and dealing with issues factors in quite a bit.

Once inside, they do have different cultures, goals, focus, but as far as getting in, I feel there's very few people who would be hired by one, but not the other.

While interviewing for an internship with Google, one engineer I spoke to described what Google does from his perspective: Google once discovered a hose that money poured out of. Its name is online advertising. Now, they spend their time searching for either the next hose, or new ways to increase the flow rate of that first one.

Now, whether this is the Chrome browser, Google+, Google Docs, self driving cars, whatever- they have no idea if any of them will be worthwhile. But, they have some of the smartest people in the world tinkering around to try to find out. And if they spend $16 Billion to find a hose worth $100 Billion, or more, then they come out ahead. But, that's the thing about exploration- you don't know what you're going to find.

Well, that should be the final nail in the coffin for the Blackberry. I've been saying for the last 2 years: All RIM has going is the fact that they have a secure phone. All someone needs to do is offer an Android-based phone with the same level of security, and they will have lost the only real selling point remaining that they had.

They're making these things as cheaply as possible. Know what happens when you do that? #1: Shit doesn't work as well as it should. #2: Repairs to things that aren't mandatory, like security systems and fences, they don't happen.

Do you have to give the system training for the specific purpose and gesture? And could the microphone be on the opposite side of the surface? If so, I think I've got an awesome new way to unlock my door.

This is worse than realizing that the matrix came out in 1999.

I was an intern at Microsoft in 2009. Ballmer was scheduled to have this big talk for all the interns one afternoon, and at the last moment, cancelled on us. We were all a bit annoyed, but hey, he's the CEO, 'spose that's what happens. He rescheduled for a week later. When he started, he apologized to us for cancelling. He said "Sorry I had to reschedule you guys. It basically came down to this: for the last 10 years, we've been flirting with Yahoo, and they finally agreed to go on a date with us". He was pretty excited about the Yahoo thing, very gung-ho. Side note: That talk left me really impressed with the guy. I didn't stay on with Microsoft, but I still see Ballmer in a very positive light.

They did better than average for one month. I could buy a random subset of stocks, and still have a 50% chance of beating the average. Call me if they can maintain this for 12 months straight. Then maybe they can see some of my money.

Even with the moon full, I was sitting in a hot tub outside tonight, staring up at the stars, and saw a ton of them, bright and easily visible.

It's *easy* to yell and scream and do things to "protect" a child from scraped knees, cell phones, peanuts, etc and it has the added benefit of making parents feel like they've actively done something to protect their kids. It's also easy to give children junk food rather than proper meals, and to let them sit in front of a TV instead of taking them to sports teams, or better yet, go out for a run with them. Laziness is the problem. And friend, have we got a lot of it.

I spent most of my youth playing in the forest with friends, often miles from the nearest adult. I pity the kids who are afraid of going into dark places alone.

What, exactly, are people *doing* at Microsoft's website that would take 204 Billion minutes?