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I really do hate to admit it, but if BP had said "All of the easy sources of oil have been found fifty years ago. If the oil industry stops taking risks, many o

I really do hate to admit it, but if BP had said "All of the easy sources of oil have been found fifty years ago. If the oil industry stops taking risks, many of you would be out of work in less than a decade. We all want a future of clean energy, but no one sees a way to get there as quickly as we need to. We will do everything we can to clean up the spill, and to make things right with the Gulf economy." then I think I would feel better about the company than I do now.

prospero 16y ago
I think casting the spill as the inevitable byproduct of oil exploration, and not the result of carelessness, would be far more harmful to the oil industry in the long run.
- DLWormwood 16y ago
  > far more harmful to the oil industry in the long run. Given that this is a media driven news cycle type event, a short term fix may be the only thing that could work to deflect criticism. Besides, large corporations are not known for thinking in the long term usually, so your retort does seem a little odd to me. That does raise a question… Does this industry need to be harmed to make further progress elsewhere? (I don’t consider myself much of an eco-sympathizer; I tend to look at oil politics from a more conservative “national sovereignty” angle.)
  - prospero 16y ago
    Besides, large corporations are not known for thinking in the long term usually BP doesn't have to be thinking twenty years out to see the folly of admitting that there is an unavoidable risk in drilling.
- megablast 16y ago
  Good. We can only hope that the oil industry is damaged by this already, but probably not. Most people just do not care about this stuff.
- andreyf 16y ago
  Everyone in the industry knows they'll be transitioning off of oil in the long run. In the short run, this would take the fall off BP, and onto the oil industry, just as Apple moved the blame onto the phone industry.
DLWormwood 16y ago
I came here to post the same thing. As much I as hate America’s current dependance on foreign oil (BP is foreign, despite the technically local well), so long as we continue to use automotive technologies the way we do, oil acquisition is always going to be a high-risk endeavor. Here’s an ugly question… Given the choice, would you rather suffer a terrorist strike or an industrial accident to continue to operate some technical apparatus you rely on?
- jsz0 16y ago
  In this case I think domestic oil production serves as a failsafe against the doomsday scenario of a war in the middle east cutting off foreign oil imports. It's not nearly enough to meet our normal demand but it's enough to make sure thousands, maybe millions, of people don't starve to death when the trucks stop rolling. It keeps the military going so they can "stabilize" the situation. I'd argue the war in Iraq was for basically the same purpose. If that doomsday scenario happens we're going to look back at these events much differently.
briancooley 16y ago
They could have said that, but ultimately it would have been a mistake, I think. Mostly because of things that have been alleged about the incident, their safety record, and the fact that the average number of barrels spilled by thousands of other Gulf platforms (including numerous deepwater wells) was on the order of 1000 barrels yearly. No one would have felt small-minded to focus on those details, especially as the total number of barrels climbs toward 5 million. Bottom line, you need to be near the top of the hill to take the moral high ground, and by all accounts, BP was near the bottom.
- drivebyacct2 16y ago
  How is that different than me pointing out that Jobs had to ignore more than just one expert's opinion and delivered information that the phone was susceptible to this flaw?
  - briancooley 16y ago
    Because you can't put the oil back in the Earth or bring back 11 dead men as easily as you can take back an iPhone. They might appear to be logically equivalent[1], but one clearly has hope of gaining empathy from the public and the other does not, especially considering BP was already on the hot seat about their safety record. [1]I don't think they are - Apple's design decisions are no where in the same league as BP's ongoing record of putting the health of their employees at risk. The only entity benefitting from BP's decision would have been BP, whereas the antenna design supposedly gives better reception when the signal is not being attenuated by the user's grip.
    - drivebyacct2 16y ago
      The discussion wasn't about the magnitude, it was about willful ignorance. It's actually worse. BP was taking a risk by being cheap. Apple knew that the decision they were making would have consequences rather than just a chance.
  - drivebyacct2 16y ago
    Yes, I understand this is ironic and also against the rules but come on, downvoting this comment? I know that HN loves its iPhone vs Android debate. I know "we" all love to downvote people on the "wrong" side but really, really? And the only response was that it's on a different magnitude. The discussion wasn't about the magnitude, it was about willful ignorance. It's actually worse. BP was taking a risk by being cheap. Apple knew that the decision they were making would have consequences rather than just a chance.
MichaelApproved 16y ago
The BP spill isn't the inevitable outcome of drilling offshore and in deep water. This could have been prevented had they been more careful. We're already getting reports of a hurried job that cut corners. As the investigation continues I bet more will come out. The "risk" in drilling for oil should be empty wells, not massive uncontrolled spills. If BP did a proper job they probably wouldn't be in this mess.
- jbooth 16y ago
  Well, when you add offshore drilling, deep water, and a cultural determination to eliminate regulations as cases of "improper government interference in the marketplace" or whatever, it starts to look pretty inevitable to me. Why should they do a proper job? Nothing had gone wrong the way they were doing it, it was fine, right?
InclinedPlane 16y ago
The core difficulty with that statement would be that it's wholly false. The cause of the loss of the rig and the ongoing spill was not due to unexceptional circumstances it was due to negligence on BP's part. BP management overrode the better judgement of Transocean personnel and they ignored the established operating procedures and best practices of the industry. Had those procedures been followed there would have been no loss of life, no loss of the rig, and no spill. Instead, BP chose to cut corners in an attempt to save a tiny amount of cost on what was likely to be a hugely profitable operation regardless. There's no excuse for that.
- stanleydrew 16y ago
  The same could be said of the iPhone 4 issue as well though. It was negligent. At least one Apple engineer warned that it would be an issue and they released it anyway. No it wasn't to cut costs but it was meant to improve the marketing of the phone. Yes signal attenuation affects all phones if you hold them a certain way. But it's worse with the iPhone. So in that sense SJ is making the same kind of false statement that BP would have made with this response.
  - wvenable 16y ago
    I'd say in the iPhone case, it's a design trade off. If you just look at the antenna alone, you might claim it's negligent but in the context of the entire device is just a minor design trade off. The idea that it's a major flaw seems pretty unwarranted. I've had phones with major flaws, this is nothing.
    - nailer 16y ago
      Not being able to use a phone to make phone calls, when held in a normal way, is a major flaw. Other phones put their antennas in the base for a reason - the hand doesn't cover the whole area. Try as I can, I cannot replicate the problem holding an HTC Desire in a normal, comfortable grip.
      - 16y ago
thought_alarm 16y ago
> then I think I would feel better about the company than I do now I would adore BP if they said that. We all would. And then we'd suddenly be that much more motivated to support alternative energy. That's why they didn't say it.
- mrcsparker 16y ago
  BP would benefit off of alternative energy as well. They do quite a bit of alternative energy research and investment. It just isn't where it needs to be yet.
  - jbooth 16y ago
    I don't have dollar figures to back this up, but I'd be willing to bet that they spend more on hyping up a "clean" image than they do on actual alternative energy research. Xerox never supported computers because they thought it would hurt their core business, even after they invented everything at PARC.

prospero 16y ago

I think casting the spill as the inevitable byproduct of oil exploration, and not the result of carelessness, would be far more harmful to the oil industry in the long run.

DLWormwood 16y ago
> far more harmful to the oil industry in the long run. Given that this is a media driven news cycle type event, a short term fix may be the only thing that could work to deflect criticism. Besides, large corporations are not known for thinking in the long term usually, so your retort does seem a little odd to me. That does raise a question… Does this industry need to be harmed to make further progress elsewhere? (I don’t consider myself much of an eco-sympathizer; I tend to look at oil politics from a more conservative “national sovereignty” angle.)
- prospero 16y ago
  Besides, large corporations are not known for thinking in the long term usually BP doesn't have to be thinking twenty years out to see the folly of admitting that there is an unavoidable risk in drilling.
megablast 16y ago
Good. We can only hope that the oil industry is damaged by this already, but probably not. Most people just do not care about this stuff.
andreyf 16y ago
Everyone in the industry knows they'll be transitioning off of oil in the long run. In the short run, this would take the fall off BP, and onto the oil industry, just as Apple moved the blame onto the phone industry.

DLWormwood 16y ago

I came here to post the same thing. As much I as hate America’s current dependance on foreign oil (BP is foreign, despite the technically local well), so long as we continue to use automotive technologies the way we do, oil acquisition is always going to be a high-risk endeavor. Here’s an ugly question… Given the choice, would you rather suffer a terrorist strike or an industrial accident to continue to operate some technical apparatus you rely on?

jsz0 16y ago
In this case I think domestic oil production serves as a failsafe against the doomsday scenario of a war in the middle east cutting off foreign oil imports. It's not nearly enough to meet our normal demand but it's enough to make sure thousands, maybe millions, of people don't starve to death when the trucks stop rolling. It keeps the military going so they can "stabilize" the situation. I'd argue the war in Iraq was for basically the same purpose. If that doomsday scenario happens we're going to look back at these events much differently.

briancooley 16y ago

They could have said that, but ultimately it would have been a mistake, I think. Mostly because of things that have been alleged about the incident, their safety record, and the fact that the average number of barrels spilled by thousands of other Gulf platforms (including numerous deepwater wells) was on the order of 1000 barrels yearly. No one would have felt small-minded to focus on those details, especially as the total number of barrels climbs toward 5 million. Bottom line, you need to be near the top of the hill to take the moral high ground, and by all accounts, BP was near the bottom.

drivebyacct2 16y ago
How is that different than me pointing out that Jobs had to ignore more than just one expert's opinion and delivered information that the phone was susceptible to this flaw?
- briancooley 16y ago
  Because you can't put the oil back in the Earth or bring back 11 dead men as easily as you can take back an iPhone. They might appear to be logically equivalent[1], but one clearly has hope of gaining empathy from the public and the other does not, especially considering BP was already on the hot seat about their safety record. [1]I don't think they are - Apple's design decisions are no where in the same league as BP's ongoing record of putting the health of their employees at risk. The only entity benefitting from BP's decision would have been BP, whereas the antenna design supposedly gives better reception when the signal is not being attenuated by the user's grip.
  - drivebyacct2 16y ago
    The discussion wasn't about the magnitude, it was about willful ignorance. It's actually worse. BP was taking a risk by being cheap. Apple knew that the decision they were making would have consequences rather than just a chance.
- drivebyacct2 16y ago
  Yes, I understand this is ironic and also against the rules but come on, downvoting this comment? I know that HN loves its iPhone vs Android debate. I know "we" all love to downvote people on the "wrong" side but really, really? And the only response was that it's on a different magnitude. The discussion wasn't about the magnitude, it was about willful ignorance. It's actually worse. BP was taking a risk by being cheap. Apple knew that the decision they were making would have consequences rather than just a chance.

MichaelApproved 16y ago

The BP spill isn't the inevitable outcome of drilling offshore and in deep water. This could have been prevented had they been more careful. We're already getting reports of a hurried job that cut corners. As the investigation continues I bet more will come out. The "risk" in drilling for oil should be empty wells, not massive uncontrolled spills. If BP did a proper job they probably wouldn't be in this mess.

jbooth 16y ago
Well, when you add offshore drilling, deep water, and a cultural determination to eliminate regulations as cases of "improper government interference in the marketplace" or whatever, it starts to look pretty inevitable to me. Why should they do a proper job? Nothing had gone wrong the way they were doing it, it was fine, right?

InclinedPlane 16y ago

The core difficulty with that statement would be that it's wholly false. The cause of the loss of the rig and the ongoing spill was not due to unexceptional circumstances it was due to negligence on BP's part. BP management overrode the better judgement of Transocean personnel and they ignored the established operating procedures and best practices of the industry. Had those procedures been followed there would have been no loss of life, no loss of the rig, and no spill. Instead, BP chose to cut corners in an attempt to save a tiny amount of cost on what was likely to be a hugely profitable operation regardless. There's no excuse for that.

stanleydrew 16y ago
The same could be said of the iPhone 4 issue as well though. It was negligent. At least one Apple engineer warned that it would be an issue and they released it anyway. No it wasn't to cut costs but it was meant to improve the marketing of the phone. Yes signal attenuation affects all phones if you hold them a certain way. But it's worse with the iPhone. So in that sense SJ is making the same kind of false statement that BP would have made with this response.
- wvenable 16y ago
  I'd say in the iPhone case, it's a design trade off. If you just look at the antenna alone, you might claim it's negligent but in the context of the entire device is just a minor design trade off. The idea that it's a major flaw seems pretty unwarranted. I've had phones with major flaws, this is nothing.
  - nailer 16y ago
    Not being able to use a phone to make phone calls, when held in a normal way, is a major flaw. Other phones put their antennas in the base for a reason - the hand doesn't cover the whole area. Try as I can, I cannot replicate the problem holding an HTC Desire in a normal, comfortable grip.
    - 16y ago

thought_alarm 16y ago

> then I think I would feel better about the company than I do now I would adore BP if they said that. We all would. And then we'd suddenly be that much more motivated to support alternative energy. That's why they didn't say it.

mrcsparker 16y ago
BP would benefit off of alternative energy as well. They do quite a bit of alternative energy research and investment. It just isn't where it needs to be yet.
- jbooth 16y ago
  I don't have dollar figures to back this up, but I'd be willing to bet that they spend more on hyping up a "clean" image than they do on actual alternative energy research. Xerox never supported computers because they thought it would hurt their core business, even after they invented everything at PARC.