The big difference here is that Microsoft owns a large segment of consumer OS, something that IBM did not (was stolen by Microsoft) in the past.
While I've heard or read prediction/assumption/guesses/perspective of MS smells like IBM 10-15 years ago (and they are legit, I'm not saying it has no merit), that difference alone is a huge (and fundamental) one.
Speaking of "great ones", there are plenty of great ones that work at MS, just like there are plenty that work for Google. It's just that the "great ones" solve different problems in different domain: most people only heard about smart people working at Google solving problems at scale, while the .NET team (Visual Studio, Compiler, IL, Libraries, etc) are not necessary "trendy" any more.
Judging MS engineers as "average" engineers are simply naive or too cocky without proper education at best.
While I've heard or read prediction/assumption/guesses/perspective of MS smells like IBM 10-15 years ago (and they are legit, I'm not saying it has no merit), that difference alone is a huge (and fundamental) one.
Speaking of "great ones", there are plenty of great ones that work at MS, just like there are plenty that work for Google. It's just that the "great ones" solve different problems in different domain: most people only heard about smart people working at Google solving problems at scale, while the .NET team (Visual Studio, Compiler, IL, Libraries, etc) are not necessary "trendy" any more.
Judging MS engineers as "average" engineers are simply naive or too cocky without proper education at best.