#2 wasn't always that. When I started at MSFT, many moons ago, there were also testers who solely provided end-user style testing and feedback on the product. W

#2 wasn't always that. When I started at MSFT, many moons ago, there were also testers who solely provided end-user style testing and feedback on the product. While their loss was less traumatic to my own division (DevDiv), during and after that transition it seemed that replacing those STEs with people who wrote automation (SDETs) caused some of my peer product units to lose out on the only people with real customer empathy. I guess in one way there are still STEs, but now they're called "customers."