What should I glean from an Internship?

by Prashanth

I am thinking of applying for summer internship. Considering that I am in my 3rd year (say with another 3 years to finish my program), what should I be looking for from an internship (other than the extra cash)? I have been spending grad school focusing on 2 rather disparate fields:

  1. Identifying how information technology can solve problems in the energy sector.
  2. Designing technologies that safeguard the privacy of data stored in remote servers (my advisor hates the word "cloud").

Very preliminarily, I am thinking of applying to Microsoft Research and Google. What other places would be enticing for a graduate student? I am also deeply interested in possibly engaging in something entrepreneurial activity once I graduate. Would interning at a startup be helpful?