I've worked in industry doing what I would consider "real ML" (i.e. shipping models that are core, revenue generating product features into production) for a decade at a range of companies from startups to fortune 500 companies and the part about needing a PhD is entirely nonsense (as is the majority of the content in this comment).

Maybe if you consider doing "real ML" exclusively working with Deep Mind or on Meta core research team, but there's a lot more to "real ML" than just these teams.

I'm curious how long you've been in industry and what types of orgs you've worked at to get this impression?

edit: In general the comments in this post are bizarrely out of touch with reality and have really shifted my perception of the avg HN commenter.