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Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

wsj.com

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Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#401

Post by safety1st »

flkiwi wrote: post #257
SirHumphrey wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bit ironic though because the CEO of Boing during their best years was William McPherson Allen, a lawyer.

One of the most exceptional CEOs I've worked with was a lawyer. I still think the proverb is largely correct, along with the other proverb about the exception proving the rule.

Well, the proverb doesn't necessarily attribute the death of the company to the lawyer.

If a company is dying (aka winding down), you most likely do in fact want a lawyer in charge, whatever their job title may be. For instance why would you put a scientist or engineer in charge of negotiating your acquisition?

It's a great proverb and in particular the "accountants in charge to extract maximum value after maturity, lawyers in charge at the end to wind it down or sell it off" part is accurate of many businesses in general. No company gets to live in the startup and growth stages forever. At a certain point shareholders decide to get everything they can out of their investment and move on.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#402

Post by whatevaa »

silverquiet wrote: post #45
Esophagus4 wrote: post #40

I hope they design and build the airframe properly this time. A plane that needs [cheaply outsourced] software (that relies on one sensor) to correct bad behavior at the flight envelope is just not acceptable. I still refuse to fly on the 737 MAX. I know it’s probably fine given what pilots now know about the how to control the thing, but I just refuse to support Boeing’s malicious negligence or any carrier that enab…

I read "Airframe" by Michael Crichton probably twenty years ago, and it was around ten years old at that time. I remember that that book talked about how the planes were unstable by design and required software to maintain proper flight characteristics, and that this was so because it was more efficient. The book is fiction, but I doubt it was far off the mark at the time. I suspect that there is no going back from t…

Passenger aircraft are stable by design. Fighter jets are unstable as this reduces drag and increases maneuverability.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#404

Post by ahoka »

parineum wrote: post #308
flkiwi wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the most exceptional CEOs I've worked with was a lawyer. I still think the proverb is largely correct, along with the other proverb about the exception proving the rule.

That's not what "the exception proves the rule" means. It means, when you see a sign that says an exception, "no parking Wednesdays between 8 and 12", it proves the rule that parking is allowed otherwise.

Attributed to Cicero, who was basically a lawyer.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#405

Post by ahoka »

cgio wrote: post #318
parineum wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what "the exception proves the rule" means. It means, when you see a sign that says an exception, "no parking Wednesdays between 8 and 12", it proves the rule that parking is allowed otherwise.

A phrase does not mean anything by itself. People mean something when they use it. You could argue that expressions carry some meaning, by virtue of shared use. But your definition does not align with the meaning most people make of this specific expression as you can witness above.

A lot of people say a lot of stupid things, it does not make them less stupid and incorrect. Unless a million flies can't be wrong!

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#406

Post by qzw »

willvarfar wrote: post #389
riffraff wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ooooh that's why nimrod is an insult! Now it makes sense! Thank you! Btw, let me add my personal pet peeve: "egregiously" somehow went from meaning "very good" to mean "very bad" in American English. In my native language "egregiamente" still has the original meaning so I was confused for a long time.

I'm still momentarily paused when kids today say 'shit' to mean 'good' etc. Yeah some words shift in meaning and other words swap in meaning.

Shit (meaning “how true”), shit is veritably the aladeen of words. It can basically mean anything depending on usage, context, attitude, or tone of voice.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#407

Post by mattmaroon »

bigiain wrote: post #271

Boeing today is so obviously a different organisation to the one that built their rapidly dwindling reputation. The 747 was an amazing engineering marvel. They started designing it in '65, the first one rolled off the production line in '68, and they were still making and selling them right up to 2023. I have a book here somewhere that talks about how so many of the design decisions were based on cold hard physics fa…

To be fair, they did not operate in today’s world. The airlines they sold to back then before deregulation had government-guaranteed profits and so were much less focused on cost cutting than in today’s deregulated environment.

For decades after deregulation the total net profit of all airlines was negative. (Might still be, I’m not sure.) The industry got really cost competitive, and so the planes they purchased had to as well.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#408

Post by chithanh »

pavlov wrote: post #182
scrlk wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to this & the Jobs interview - an oil industry proverb: a healthy oil company has a geologist in charge, a mature one has an engineer in charge, a declining one has an accountant in charge, and a dying one has a lawyer in charge.

Nokia’s CEO between 2006 and 2010 was their former chief lawyer. It’s like they knew they were dying even before Apple delivered the actual blow.

It is just an urband legend that Apple caused Nokia to fail. Apple didn't even compete in the price range where Nokia sold most of their smartphones.

When you look at where most Nokia customers defected to, it is Samsung and Android.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#409

Post by flkiwi »

parineum wrote: post #308
flkiwi wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the most exceptional CEOs I've worked with was a lawyer. I still think the proverb is largely correct, along with the other proverb about the exception proving the rule.

That's not what "the exception proves the rule" means. It means, when you see a sign that says an exception, "no parking Wednesdays between 8 and 12", it proves the rule that parking is allowed otherwise.

God Internet pendants are exhausting. I KNOW, but it's a harmless rhetorical device. This begs the question of why you care. There you go, that's a good one to get fired up about.

Re: Boeing has started working on a 737 MAX replacement

#410

Post by Gravityloss »

nostrademons wrote: post #21

It'll be interesting to see if they still can design and build a new ground-up airplane design. The last all-new design was the 787, initiated in 2003 and launched in 2009, and its design was fraught with problems. Before then was the 777 in the early 90s (pre-McDonnell takeover), and the 757/767 in the early 80s. There's a phenomena that ofter occurs with large organizations where once their markets mature, everybod…

But is there room for innovation in the airliner industry anymore? Let's have a thought experiment

If you use the same engines from the same vendors, same aluminum, same carbon fiber, same landing gear. Almost everything just like the others, can you really differentiate anymore? Or if you are a component vendor, can you really innovate that much anymore?

Ie maybe it can be argued it is the correct move, from the board's and investors' point of view. The machine is already pretty close to optimal, and has been since the nineties. Don't change the machine, just milk it. Fire most engineers, move production to the lowest cost non-unionised place, outsource as much as possible to vendors that you compete viciously against each other etc.

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