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Do you have a source for this story about paying Borland's engineers to sit on their thumbs? I knew a few ex-Borland engineers that came to Microsoft and they were all doing awesome things on Microsoft's (many) compiler projects. Most of them moved because they wanted to work on awesome stuff.

Which is not to say that Microsoft didn't abuse their monopoly, but this particular story.... I've never heard it and it doesn't sound right.

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I doubt you'll find any authoritative sources on the full extent of the abuse, as the ensuing lawsuit was settled out of court under the typical terms that sequestered the evidence backing Borland's claims and gagged the truth. However, I agree that not every Borland engineer sat on his or her thumbs; many simply felt under-utilized in the wake of a Microsoft hiring spree that was obviously designed to kill a competitor as opposed to fill open positions. It's no secret that some of those hires were lured from Borland with signing bonuses that reached 7 figures... for compiler engineers.

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