Pros: Princeton office provides free lunch.

Cons: I received an oral offer as an R&D software engineer a year before my graduation. Three months later, their recruiter called me and reneged it, without caring or taking responsibility for the other offers and interviews I had declined for them. I received an oral offer over the phone after interviewing them on campus around the end of September 2015. Since I still had a year left in school and was only taking two master's courses, I asked for a part-time intern opportunity to work in their Princeton office, mostly to get familiar with their teams and development environment. Before the intern started, I told their manager about my availability constraints (only available this semester & winter, and would take time off during exams), and they told me it was fine and sent me a part-time intern offer letter to sign. On the contract, it stated, "Expected work hours per week: 10 hrs." Also, neither the manager nor the part-time offer letter mentioned anything about its potential impact on my full-time offer. Then I interned at a team throughout November 2015 - January 2016, working mostly 4 days a week, averaging 25-30 hours for the weeks I came to work. I took a whole week off during finals and another week during Christmas and New Year. The program itself was very disorganized: no intern/new hire training, no clarification of performance expectations, no assigned project, and no desk. Yes, I never had a desk assigned to me throughout the entire internship. I was told to fix bugs in their current production code, and I worked closely with my mentor on a daily basis. I managed to fix all the bugs they assigned to me, and my code went to production. After telling them I wouldn't be able to work part-time after my last semester started, as we had agreed upon before I started interning, I received a phone call from Bloomberg's recruiter a couple of weeks later. They said they would renege on my full-time offer. "Based on your review from your team, your technical ability has no problem, but it's the communication issue. Therefore, we decided to not give you a full-time offer." Later that night, I called my mentor, and he told me he knew what I did. He was satisfied with my performance since I was able to pick up their project and fix bugs quickly. He insisted on keeping me on the team, but their team lead, who never assigned anything to me or worked with me, claimed I was not dedicated to the company since I took days off during finals. The recruiting team did not take any responsibility for the other offers and interviews I had declined, insisted the decision was final, and that there was nothing I could do about it. I talked to my friends and professional engineers who had experience with Bloomberg. This company has a terrible record of reneging people's offers/firing new employees during their recruiting process. They basically don't care how it would affect your career as a software engineer. You are a new grad who is not experienced with employment laws/processes, and they will do whatever they need as long as they think it will benefit their company. Be very careful if you are considering Bloomberg as your full-time employer; they have reneged/fired people before they join, during their new hire training, even in your first six months. After all, this is a company that would say, "Technical ability is fine, but the team lead doesn't like your communication" to renege an incoming engineer's offer.

Pros: The benefits are good. The health insurance plan is generous. There are other perks related to fitness plans and transportation.

Cons: Long hours are expected of employees. Mid-managers are often in meetings of doubtful benefit. Some software is built using poorly designed in-house tools.

Pros: Nice building, nice fish, free snacks, good benefits, socially conscious, stable job.

Cons: There are those that love it, and I can only speak from my own experience: what you find will vary greatly from team to team. What I found is absolutely no career path or advancement potential of any kind for technical people. You are a "programmer bee," and that's the extent of what the company wants and expects from you. Much of the work is tedious and menial. There's a fanatical dedication to proprietary tools and methods (which, as an experienced senior hire, I really wasn't impressed by), no project management, and poor planning. It's a stifling, oppressive place that cripples all their best, most creative people. R&D is a massive sweatshop that relies on a constant stream of incoming H1Bs and fresh college grads they can get to before they learn anything that might make them attractive to another company. All in all, I'd say that if you're an experienced programmer with skills in legacy systems, or a recent college grad that can't find work, or you need the stability and benefits to support your family, then it might be worth it.