6 ms·

Much as I'd like to see Boeing investigated for what look like systemic failures in their construction processes, I don't think a totally anonymous comment on s

Much as I'd like to see Boeing investigated for what look like systemic failures in their construction processes, I don't think a totally anonymous comment on some blog article on the internet really qualifies anyone as "a Boeing whistleblower".

ricardobeat 3y ago
That’s understandable caution, but would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? This is why we still need serious journalism by the way - a reporter would personally contact and verify the credentials of the whistleblower while protecting their identity, with their career on the line. Random news blogs or independent reporters will never replace this.
- stringsandchars 3y ago
  > would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? In my view, a "whistleblower" is someone who gives their information confidentially (not anonymously) to a responsible investigating authority. Not someone who writes a comment on the internet that you or I could write ourselves, with a little research sprinkled with credible-sounding 'insider chit-chat'.
  - civilized 3y ago
    Ordinarily I would agree with you, but the case of Boeing includes some extraordinary context. This company's incompetence killed 346 people in 2018-2019, and the postmortem revealed an unethically cozy relationship with their regulator, the FAA. Now, five years later, we are seeing more catastrophic failures that will eventually claim more lives, and once again the FAA is coming under scrutiny for being too lax in its oversight of Boeing. It seems to me that the FAA lacks some kind of either technical or organizational competence to regulate Boeing. Screws must be turned publicly until Boeing's financier-led culture is replaced with the original engineering-led culture. Anonymous insider comments are one reasonable way to do this, although it might be better to work as an anonymous source to a well-known journalistic outlet.
    - jakeinspace 3y ago
      It is very in-vogue to hate on Boeing on the internet. Deservedly, I might add, but it does mean that it wouldn’t be at all surprising for some random non-employee to make up some detailed post as a whistleblower.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        Right it's "in vogue" "to hate" rather than being concrete facts
      - zardo 3y ago
        Seattle Times verified with Boeing employees that the whistle blower is describing actual systems and processes used.
    - willk 3y ago
      > This company's incompetence killed 346 people It wasn't incompetence, it was greed. They said "no new training for pilots" in order to keep sales volume up and to ensure no new training they kept the MCAS system a secret from pilots.
  - g-b-r 3y ago
    For now it seems credible and can be at least kept in mind. Or maybe we could wait another 20 years: https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=213075 https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=213075
    - dm319 3y ago
      Well that is a prescient piece.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        Yeah, and you can't miss its comments
  - ricardobeat 3y ago
    See the second part of the comment. The anonymity is not the problem.
- Sebb767 3y ago
  > That’s understandable caution, but would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? On the other hand, wouldn't that also sound like something someone completely unqualified could easily make up and it would just fit our own bias enough to avoid thinking about it too critically? Complaining about Boeings quality, especially in the 737 Max department, is just an easy and cheap shot.
  - ricardobeat 3y ago
    Hence the rest of the comment. Journalistic integrity includes verifying your sources.
  - dahart 3y ago
    Isn’t speculating wildly on the internet that an internet comment is fake just about the cheapest shot there is? The comment does include many verifiable details…
    - Sebb767 3y ago
      I'm not making the accusations against Boeing, so I'm not the one who needs to provide evidence. I've also also given clear points on why I assume the comment to be fake and I did so with my known username attached - so no, it's not just a cheap shot :-) Also note that I never claimed that the comment is wrong (I have no private knowledge about Boeings processes), just that the comment could easily be fake.
      - dahart 3y ago
        I didn’t suggest you took a cheap shot at Boeing. FUD without evidence is always a cheap shot though.
  - lamontcg 3y ago
    It is "easy" because it fits perfectly with all the publicly accessible information that we have about the relationship between Boeing and Spirit Aerosystems. We know it was spun off out of Boeing in order to cut costs. We're also a forum full of engineers who have been inside companies that have done those kinds of things before in other industries and seen how it turns into a shit show. Yeah, this article is filling in the details that we fully expect to see around how the sausage is actually being made, to that extent it fits our preconceived biases. Biases can be entirely accurate. And even if this is a work of fiction around this particular incident, the reality may not be far enough off to matter. There's enough smoke that all the biased people rushing to assume there's a fire are likely more correct than the skeptics demanding to see the flames enveloping the building before rushing to any judgement.
- ajross 3y ago
  > would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? [...] This is why we still need serious journalism Exactly. I'd expect a whistleblower wanting to be taken seriously to be talking to a real journalist with editors and a publication with a history of getting things right, not a single-author mid-tier aviation blog. The temptation to spin things "just a little" and to fail to verify identity and authority, for a site like this, is just too high.
  - g-b-r 3y ago
    This is how it can go: https://www.kansas.com/news/business/aviation/article2620683.html https://www.kansas.com/news/business/aviation/article2620683...
    - voakbasda 3y ago
      Exactly. The problem is that whistleblower protections come from the government. The courts cannot be trusted to always have your back. Hell, I would go further and outright assume that they will blatantly favor corporate interests. I do not blame someone for not wanting to risk the exposure.
      - g-b-r 3y ago
        In this case I'd stress that the FAA itself cannot be assumed to "have your back", given their coziness with Boeing (although I can't know if the whistleblowers were truthful)
    - ajross 3y ago
      To be clear: mainstream major media publications use anonymous sources all the time. The point here is that the whistleblower be talking to the Times or the Post[1] and not "View from the Wing". No one is demanding they come out in public to tell us who they are. [1] And let's also be clear: journalists from both those organizations are surely on the phones full time right now trying to find dirt on Boeing quality processes. That would be a huge story if they could land it.
- jrockway 3y ago
  > with their career on the line Accessing the SAT system to re-read all the tickets to the reporter sounds like the easiest possible way to get fired. Obviously someone is going to review every access and be very skeptical of anyone viewing that data after the news broke. I guess there is always "use your coworker's computer when they go to the bathroom", though. Lock your screen!
Grimblewald 3y ago
While I agree in principle, as a society we don't have a great track record of supporting or protecting whistle-blower, so hard to verify shit like this is what we have to put up with in response.
magicalhippo 3y ago
While I agree, Blancolirio over at YouTube went through a recent lawsuit[1] which had some non-anonymous sources claiming quite serious incidents at Spirit. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSGujNq4bVM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSGujNq4bVM
fendy3002 3y ago
Because recently there's news that aircrafts from boeing has loose bolts, the claim isn't too far fetched off.
bertil 3y ago
What would make such a person an official one?

ricardobeat 3y ago

That’s understandable caution, but would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? This is why we still need serious journalism by the way - a reporter would personally contact and verify the credentials of the whistleblower while protecting their identity, with their career on the line. Random news blogs or independent reporters will never replace this.

stringsandchars 3y ago
> would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? In my view, a "whistleblower" is someone who gives their information confidentially (not anonymously) to a responsible investigating authority. Not someone who writes a comment on the internet that you or I could write ourselves, with a little research sprinkled with credible-sounding 'insider chit-chat'.
- civilized 3y ago
  Ordinarily I would agree with you, but the case of Boeing includes some extraordinary context. This company's incompetence killed 346 people in 2018-2019, and the postmortem revealed an unethically cozy relationship with their regulator, the FAA. Now, five years later, we are seeing more catastrophic failures that will eventually claim more lives, and once again the FAA is coming under scrutiny for being too lax in its oversight of Boeing. It seems to me that the FAA lacks some kind of either technical or organizational competence to regulate Boeing. Screws must be turned publicly until Boeing's financier-led culture is replaced with the original engineering-led culture. Anonymous insider comments are one reasonable way to do this, although it might be better to work as an anonymous source to a well-known journalistic outlet.
  - jakeinspace 3y ago
    It is very in-vogue to hate on Boeing on the internet. Deservedly, I might add, but it does mean that it wouldn’t be at all surprising for some random non-employee to make up some detailed post as a whistleblower.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      Right it's "in vogue" "to hate" rather than being concrete facts
    - zardo 3y ago
      Seattle Times verified with Boeing employees that the whistle blower is describing actual systems and processes used.
  - willk 3y ago
    > This company's incompetence killed 346 people It wasn't incompetence, it was greed. They said "no new training for pilots" in order to keep sales volume up and to ensure no new training they kept the MCAS system a secret from pilots.
- g-b-r 3y ago
  For now it seems credible and can be at least kept in mind. Or maybe we could wait another 20 years: https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=213075 https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=213075
  - dm319 3y ago
    Well that is a prescient piece.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      Yeah, and you can't miss its comments
- ricardobeat 3y ago
  See the second part of the comment. The anonymity is not the problem.
Sebb767 3y ago
> That’s understandable caution, but would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? On the other hand, wouldn't that also sound like something someone completely unqualified could easily make up and it would just fit our own bias enough to avoid thinking about it too critically? Complaining about Boeings quality, especially in the 737 Max department, is just an easy and cheap shot.
- ricardobeat 3y ago
  Hence the rest of the comment. Journalistic integrity includes verifying your sources.
- dahart 3y ago
  Isn’t speculating wildly on the internet that an internet comment is fake just about the cheapest shot there is? The comment does include many verifiable details…
  - Sebb767 3y ago
    I'm not making the accusations against Boeing, so I'm not the one who needs to provide evidence. I've also also given clear points on why I assume the comment to be fake and I did so with my known username attached - so no, it's not just a cheap shot :-) Also note that I never claimed that the comment is wrong (I have no private knowledge about Boeings processes), just that the comment could easily be fake.
    - dahart 3y ago
      I didn’t suggest you took a cheap shot at Boeing. FUD without evidence is always a cheap shot though.
- lamontcg 3y ago
  It is "easy" because it fits perfectly with all the publicly accessible information that we have about the relationship between Boeing and Spirit Aerosystems. We know it was spun off out of Boeing in order to cut costs. We're also a forum full of engineers who have been inside companies that have done those kinds of things before in other industries and seen how it turns into a shit show. Yeah, this article is filling in the details that we fully expect to see around how the sausage is actually being made, to that extent it fits our preconceived biases. Biases can be entirely accurate. And even if this is a work of fiction around this particular incident, the reality may not be far enough off to matter. There's enough smoke that all the biased people rushing to assume there's a fire are likely more correct than the skeptics demanding to see the flames enveloping the building before rushing to any judgement.
ajross 3y ago
> would you expect a whistleblower to not be completely anonymous? [...] This is why we still need serious journalism Exactly. I'd expect a whistleblower wanting to be taken seriously to be talking to a real journalist with editors and a publication with a history of getting things right, not a single-author mid-tier aviation blog. The temptation to spin things "just a little" and to fail to verify identity and authority, for a site like this, is just too high.
- g-b-r 3y ago
  This is how it can go: https://www.kansas.com/news/business/aviation/article2620683.html https://www.kansas.com/news/business/aviation/article2620683...
  - voakbasda 3y ago
    Exactly. The problem is that whistleblower protections come from the government. The courts cannot be trusted to always have your back. Hell, I would go further and outright assume that they will blatantly favor corporate interests. I do not blame someone for not wanting to risk the exposure.
    - g-b-r 3y ago
      In this case I'd stress that the FAA itself cannot be assumed to "have your back", given their coziness with Boeing (although I can't know if the whistleblowers were truthful)
  - ajross 3y ago
    To be clear: mainstream major media publications use anonymous sources all the time. The point here is that the whistleblower be talking to the Times or the Post[1] and not "View from the Wing". No one is demanding they come out in public to tell us who they are. [1] And let's also be clear: journalists from both those organizations are surely on the phones full time right now trying to find dirt on Boeing quality processes. That would be a huge story if they could land it.
jrockway 3y ago
> with their career on the line Accessing the SAT system to re-read all the tickets to the reporter sounds like the easiest possible way to get fired. Obviously someone is going to review every access and be very skeptical of anyone viewing that data after the news broke. I guess there is always "use your coworker's computer when they go to the bathroom", though. Lock your screen!

Grimblewald 3y ago

While I agree in principle, as a society we don't have a great track record of supporting or protecting whistle-blower, so hard to verify shit like this is what we have to put up with in response.

magicalhippo 3y ago

While I agree, Blancolirio over at YouTube went through a recent lawsuit[1] which had some non-anonymous sources claiming quite serious incidents at Spirit. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSGujNq4bVM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSGujNq4bVM

fendy3002 3y ago

Because recently there's news that aircrafts from boeing has loose bolts, the claim isn't too far fetched off.

bertil 3y ago

What would make such a person an official one?