eclipse@thefiringline.com
Please review the PDF, which is an image file so the text can't be copied and pasted and use the .xls (Excel) format to respond. Many thanks to Gunner (and Norman) and to all of you in advance for your replies. And if anyone wants to suggest a better way to distribute this, let me know.
eclipsecriticng@gmail.com
Vern has personally provided specific postings from each of the targeted Bloggers to support his claims that some or all of them are engaged in a vast conspiracy to violate Eclipse INDA’s. Our position is that his Declaration actually supports OUR position that he’s on a fishing expedition with nothing less than the First Amendment on the hook.
Please review the attached Declaration for comments Vern has attributed to you. Where appropriate, fill out the Excel spreadsheet titled Blogger_Response.xls, using the same format as Vern’s Declaration. (See the example provided in the spreadsheet)
We don’t need to respond to each of Vern’s claims to demonstrate that he is shot-gunning any negative comment about the company or the plane. Many of the Eclipse-provided posts are self-explanatory.
When crafting a response, avoid long editorial, personal opinion, sarcasm, grandstanding, armchair lawyering, etc. If your original comments stem from publicly available information or simple personal opinion backed by experience and/or publicly available info, say so in a concise, straightforward manner.
Above all, save Blog-appropriate commentary for the Blog. Avoid making this personal. Recognize that your responses and comments may be relied upon by the Judge in this case and he’s not interested in your opinion.
Unfortunately, commentary cannot be copied from the PDF, as it’s in image format. You will need to retype your original comments onto the spreadsheet or copy them from the Blog using the time stamp in Vern’s Declaration to locate your original posting.
All responses must be returned to eclipse@thefiringline.com in the attached spreadsheet format by Thursday evening, June 5th. We will not be in a position to use or respond to comments offered in any other format.
Vern Declaration here
Please review the PDF, which is an image file so the text can't be copied and pasted and use the .xls (Excel) format to respond. Many thanks to Gunner (and Norman) and to all of you in advance for your replies. And if anyone wants to suggest a better way to distribute this, let me know.
eclipsecriticng@gmail.com
Vern has personally provided specific postings from each of the targeted Bloggers to support his claims that some or all of them are engaged in a vast conspiracy to violate Eclipse INDA’s. Our position is that his Declaration actually supports OUR position that he’s on a fishing expedition with nothing less than the First Amendment on the hook.
Please review the attached Declaration for comments Vern has attributed to you. Where appropriate, fill out the Excel spreadsheet titled Blogger_Response.xls, using the same format as Vern’s Declaration. (See the example provided in the spreadsheet)
We don’t need to respond to each of Vern’s claims to demonstrate that he is shot-gunning any negative comment about the company or the plane. Many of the Eclipse-provided posts are self-explanatory.
When crafting a response, avoid long editorial, personal opinion, sarcasm, grandstanding, armchair lawyering, etc. If your original comments stem from publicly available information or simple personal opinion backed by experience and/or publicly available info, say so in a concise, straightforward manner.
Above all, save Blog-appropriate commentary for the Blog. Avoid making this personal. Recognize that your responses and comments may be relied upon by the Judge in this case and he’s not interested in your opinion.
Unfortunately, commentary cannot be copied from the PDF, as it’s in image format. You will need to retype your original comments onto the spreadsheet or copy them from the Blog using the time stamp in Vern’s Declaration to locate your original posting.
All responses must be returned to eclipse@thefiringline.com in the attached spreadsheet format by Thursday evening, June 5th. We will not be in a position to use or respond to comments offered in any other format.
For your Excel sheet, Gunner has posted the location in the fourth posting on the blog. Please click on the link he has provided there.
296 comments:
1 – 200 of 296 Newer› Newest»i know it is of no-use to be an "armchair lawyer" ...
but , i found the vernperator's declaration quite comical :
1° me vern , bla ...bla... i have Personal knowledge of the FACTS ...
2° = say nothing as facts , but about probabilities ...
3° say nothing as facts , but about potential probabilities ...
4° say nothing as facts but planting the decorum why it can fail ...
5° say nothing as facts , but about an under-estimation(or appropriate wording = after all 1 Billion is a "few" hundreds millions) on once again a potential remaining to be proved
6° if i say a lie , anybody believing me can be considered as being right ?
7° say nothing about facts , but is it an attempt at "blackmailing" ?
(if you do not agree , we won't offer thousands well paid jobs ...
wait a second ... we said we are off to Russia : so what is definition on "Where are the jobs supposed to be " and "what is a well paid job" ?)
pathetic !
Many thanks to Shane for his assistance in this effort. We really could use input from the Chosen Few regarding the source of some of the Blog musings which Vern claims as confidential and proprietary. But we need those in the Excel format we've provided, if we're to collate and prep them for Friday's hearing.
Fred-
I think the Blog is very much a place for the type of observation you've made. Vern's Declaration is one of his most bizarre and schizoid statements as to info that he would prefer to hold as "confidential"; and one of his most damning admissions of "proprietary(?)" info he would prefer the world not see.
One can't argue the violation of INDA without the tacit admission that each of the Blog posts in his Declaration reveal rather ugly truths about Eclipse Aviation.
Gunner
Click the following to download:
Vern's Declaration
Blogger Response Spreadsheet
Gunner
thanks , gunner !
yes , looking at the matter from far , it doesn't make ANY logical answer to any question ...!
thinking of the "why" and "how" , i came to the conclusion vern is probably such a "manipulative megalomaniac arsonist " ...
if you try to link together events , i would bet than anyone trying such loophole would be in for a massive headache ...
to the point (i wrote it before , and yes ,vern, it's a personal opinion !) if anyone would ask me who has played who in the Roel/Vern relationship , i would be in great pain to answer ...
like this court-case , it is so weird that it is either something made as :
1° a commanding from a megalomaniac who believe he could have been god ....
2° a "programmed failure" or an excuse for vern to "push away" responsibilities from his deeds or some influentials friends actions ...
3° the court-case is absolutely not important (thou everything is made at loosing the case in order to not have to answer on more tricky business practices ) but it is a clear "subliminal message " to investors err.. sorry depositors :
"if you want your money back , we won't spare you of any stupid rubbish preventing or trying to prevent you from doing so ..."
if i am right on such , may be the best trick we could do on vern's foolishness would be to all publish our name and IP adress on this blog
that would be real annoyance (even if for "potentially some" it could be a bit "funny" ! )
Thanks guys.
I note that my post is from Jan 07, but how do I open that post to copy it? I seem to be only able to open back to Feb 08.
Jan '07 would be on Stan's original Blog, FJT.
Thanks for the help.
Gunner
Thanks. I just realised that after I sent my post. Duh!!!
I can't open Stans site anymore. I just get the Blogspot header, but no content.
Verns attack on my post is that the 21 days for the AvioNG update was company internal information. I believe the Blog became aware of this due to either a press release or a Letter from Vern to the owners becoming public. Since I can't get into Stans site, and am busy typing out they post I made, I would really appreciate if someone could look up the source of us knowing that AvioNG was planned for 21 days, reducing to 18. Thanks.
FJT-
Here's your post:
Has anyone out there ever had a significant Avionics upgrade + Annual + Airframe mods done on any plane in 21 Days? You know, the rip out the silver crown stack and add a 530 / 430 /MX20 plus Mode S kind of deal.
Eclipse management thinks they will be able to plan this process, start at 21 days and get down to 18.
My maintenance experience is that some of these planes are going to sitting snuggly in those hangers for a few months at least. The fact that the first planes were built without a PC, would have me believe there will be differences in the routing of wiring harness, in the installation of clamps, in the alignment of bracket etc. Lots of little things which add up and take time and nerves.
I would guess to do this job you will need to stip out the entire cabin furnishings - Eclipse will need a repair line set up to fix all the fit in finish problems there.
I would expect that the maintenance crews will detect at least one significant problem simply because they will be looking much closer at the airframe than you normally would a one year old jet. (Chaffed harnesses, cable runs rubbing or interfering, cracks maybe).
The size of the plane will lead to very little parallel work. Until the cabin is out you can't start on anything, once the cabin is out, there is likely no more than can work in the panel area at a time.
After the work is "Completed" (Trademark Eclipse Aviation), their will be a lengthy trouble shooting on some planes.
Don't know how it is in america, but good avionics guys in Europe are a rare and expensive breed. A Part 66 B2 licences is a lot harder to get than an A&P, but at the end of the days it is the years of experience you need and that is going to be just as differcult to get in the states. It's the experience which will be needed to sort out all the little issues which will mount up.
Do you cut and splice a new harness to make it fit, or send it beck to ABQ and ask them to make branch X 3/8" longer.
For the first A/C they won't hit 21 days. For the second they might, using their dream team and flogging them to peak morale.
No way in hell are they going to have 6 dream teams all making 18 day turn around. Once the focus is off this area, once the dream team have had a guts full and start heading for greener pastures, it all falls apart.
This retrofit will never stablize on 18 days. It will flop around sometimes taking two months sometimes taking six. Those customers with the best contacts and pushiest personalities will get their retrofits through faster at the expense of those who are too trusting and patient.
It would not surprise me if a partial eclipse has a birthday in maintenance. When things start going wrong, a year goes fast.
Of course, none of this matters, because the retrofits for most A/C will not be performed by Eclipse, as they will be bankrupt....
Thanks Gunner. I have to run (dentists appointment - probably more fun :).
I'll send my comments after I get done.
FJT:
I believe you may have drawn from the Eclipse letter of Jan 6, 2008 regarding retrofit schedule:
Go Here and search for the term "Jricciardelli"
Gunner
Ricciardelli's letter stated:
"The first aircraft after the SB is released will take 21 days and we anticipate the cycle time can be reduced to 18 days after each bay has done 3 upgrades."
Gunner
What I find REALLY interesting is that none of the ADMITTED ex-employees and suppliers are listed in the legal battle. On the old web site, the original Stan Blankenship blog, there were many ex-employees that stated very clearly what their positions were, who they knew, who they worked with, where they worked, what meetings they were involved in, dates of events, dates of hire, dates of leaving or firing, etc. Perhaps Eclipse already knows who these individuals are, but they are not listed on this hit list. That would have been a much easier target for the Eclipse lawyers than the individuals listed here.
Turn-and-Burn
Vern's "goal" is to silence this blog and anyone that says anything negative.
Does Vern perjure himself in the declaration?
I am thinking about billing Vern for my time to 'prove' my innocence - what a colossal waste of time and resources.
This takes actual time aay from my actual business, costs me actual money and results in actual damages - what a tool.
Eclipse customers, investors employees and BoD, THIS IS HOW YOUR WOULD-BE CEO SQUANDERS AND WASTES THE PRECIOUS RESOURCES OF TIME AND MONEY YOU HAVE ENTRUSTED HIM WITH.
F'ing pathetic.
I am stunned by the claims of inside information in most of the claims as it is CLEAR to anyone but a paranoid idiot that the information is either available on public sites or is speculation.
Turboprop_pilot
Should our foreign critics say
"FU Vern, I'm not covered by your weak privacy laws. Come over to the EU, where we still believe in individual rights" ?
Turboprop_pilot
CW and TP-
It's unfortunate that, in the USA, anyone who can afford an attorney is granted respect by the Courts.
Personally, I believe in a truly JUST world, Vern's Declaration should become the focus of the Court's attention; for the intellectual sloth of it, the number of times he shoots himself in the foot, the possible perjury and the blatant attempt to use the US Court System to cover up business practices that this very system should be exposing.
Pretty amazing stuff, really.
Gunner
I am stunned by the claims of inside information in most of the claims as it is CLEAR to anyone but a paranoid idiot that the information is either available on public sites or is speculation.
Or was chosen by a precision hyper-spatial algorithm developed by our fine Russian mathematicians, Eugene Taits and Alex Khmelnitsky.
Code named Whack-A-Blogger Version 2.0ng(TM)
Oh crap, I probably just disclosed Eclipse proprietary information…again…
If I were the Vernster and had so many people with aviation experience making good suggestions and comments as are on this blog, I would have them down to ABQ for beer and pizza and be trying to hire them instead of making a serial ass and laughing stock of myself by this lawsuit. I hope their airplanes are screwed together better than their legal department is.
turboprop wrote :
"Does Vern perjure himself in the declaration?"
you naughty boy ...! ;-)) you'll end -up on Vernperator's hit list !
oha , you're on it already ...
honestly , this is the weirdest stuff i have seen in some times ...
he perjure himself blatantly only in 6 of the 7 first article of his "declaration"
madness ...
gunner do you need i quote the source i was referring to ?
since i am a foreigner , living in a foreign country (countries) it is pretty obvious i cannot have links with EAC ...
i came into the story when "eventually" interested of becoming a jet-pilot myself
( when listening to the then-nice music from EAC : jet-pilot ? no problem we'll train you ! jet-plane ? no problem , we'll make you one cheap to own and cheap to fly ! flying IFR ? no problem , on our bird everything will be automated !)
and read some stuff from EAC and other Die-hards that was portraying European Union as their own backyard ...
then the same was repeated for Russia ....
and i fear that some of the source may be prejudicial to his highness Vernuts , at least 2 of them are the kind it's much better to have on one's side than against ...
Wow! The press and media should read what Vern has to say. Vern's document should be distributed far and wide. Vern has personally confirmed how poor of condition Eclipse is in as well as all sorts of other problems happening at Eclipse. I hope Vern is taken up on his offer to personally testify how bad of shape Eclipse is in!
I hope Eclipse VP John Ricciardelli has a new job lined up an employment lawyer since Vern appears ready to throw him under the bus for violating the NDA regarding the 21 day retrofit. It appears that working for Eclispe is very risky and anyone working there might want to at least have an employment lawyer on standby.
Also it appears that Eclipse only answered the motion to quash for half the originally named bloggers, so it would appear the number of defendants has been cut in half if this is challenged in court. I haven't seen the other filings by Eclipse, but at least with Vern's document it only cites some but not all the original bloggers.
I couldnt help but chuckle (quite a bit) at parts of the declaration. Page 1, #2 is the best. By the time he had finished his document, it was already out-dated by talking about the 500 and it being so cheap. Guess he finished it before his big announcement about the price increase. The whole first 2 pages are like a big advertisement to the judge. (Always selling)
The whole first 2 pages are like a big advertisement to the judge. (Always selling)
I thought it was very cheesy. It's like he went to Marketing to help write his motion rather than to Legal. Eclipse is really scewing up with poor legal representation. First they couldn't get a proper subpoena to the California court for a month and then they've got this badly written self-destructive filing by Vern admitting how bad a shape Eclipse is in and how poorly Eclipse is performing. No wonder Vern has been on the warpath against transparency.
After reading Vern's delusional ramblings should he be tested to see if he's fit to stand trial? Oh yea, that's right, he's just making the accusations.
And NO I don't have access to Vern's medical records!
Fred-
Let's get this foreign citizenship issue out of the way.
You're not subject to US law. But you can't demonstrate that to a US judge except by submitting to the subpoena and allowing Vern a minor victory. Your other choice is to let us fight this battle on US Constitutional grounds. For that, I'd ask that you respond to the Vernster's Declarations. OTOH, you can't very well respond if he hasn't mentioned you.
All others:
I couldn't agree more. Vern's Declarations, made only days ago, are already outdated. The claims that the E-500 is available at fraction of the cost of its competition is a bald faced lie, in light of the new pricing....unless, of course, he admits that the FPJ is NOT in the same class as the Mustang. Of course, then he'd be lying because he'd have to admit his competition is really the Moller Pipe Dream which remains much cheaper.
The press REALLY needs to read this sworn document, submitted by Vern Raburn to the US Courts. It is the single most damning document I've seen in regards to Eclipse's "business plan".
I'm tellin' y'all. Webster needs to put this guy's picture next to the word "tool".
Gunner
The press REALLY needs to read this sworn document, submitted by Vern Raburn to the US Courts. It is the single most damning document I've seen in regards to Eclipse's "business plan".
No kidding. The sworn statements by the Eclipse CEO are 10X more damaging than any post by anonymous bloggers. Eclipse's CEO has personally validated as true in a sworn legal document what had merely been speculation before.
Anyone considering either staying an Eclipse position holder or becoming a position holder should now be given considerable pause given the poor state of Eclipse's finances and poor performance in other areas...
Ok, having now read through this non-sense, the hands-down winner goes to…
wait for it…
Niner Zulu! – his one-and-only posting to be singled out by Mr. Vern himself (In response to a depositor frustrated at being asked to pony up more cash) (caps are his):
Exhibit B, Page 3: “HELLO! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN, OH, THE LAST 2 YEARS OR SO! WHY ARE YOU SO SURPRISED? DID YOU NEVER DO YOU(R) HOMEWORK, PERHAPS READ THE ECLIPSE AVIATION CRITIC WHERE YOU COULD HAVE LEARNED YOU’RE BEING SCAMMED!”
Eclipses formal legal response:
This information is “Commentary based in part on confidential information, not available to the public”.
Signed by Vern Raburn himself, coversheet page 4.
So there you have it, finally. A fully legally documented admission by Vern himself that this whole thing is a scam.
Eclipse = Scamtastic (Sue me Vern)
2 things...
Cessna apparently sold $750M worth of planes at EBACE, including
24 Citation Mustang very light jets... impressive.
- I can't seem to open the PDF. I've tried and checked and rechecked... even had someone else try - anyone else have this issue?
The suspense is killing me.
gunner ...
tomorrow , i will write down the source of various post ...
i have to ask permission to name peoples BEFORE doing so !
just for for the fun of it :
if i am not subject to US laws , not living in USA , how comes a US court can dispose of my privacy ?
(don't get mad at me , it's only a sad joke !)
i just have some regrets about this ...
now it is pretty obvious to me:
the shame the world is not "a bit more " filled with the same kind of individuals one can find around here ...
NO , vern , i am not talking about you ...!! ;-))
ATM-
Yours is the third complaint about the PDF, though I can't duplicate the problem. Please help us out by downloading the latest version of Acrobat Reader and letting us know if that works.
Gad and Whytech:
The same goes for you two, please.
Gunner
Yours is the third complaint about the PDF, though I can't duplicate the problem. Please help us out by downloading the latest version of Acrobat Reader and letting us know if that works.
I've had the same problems as well. I didn't get it to work right until I downloaded the latest version and opened it within Acrobat rather than letting Explorer open it.
Latest from Capt Zoom:
By the time the weekend ended, a number of things were certain... that in the Eclipse 400, there was a new jet in town, that the company was on better footing than it had ever been, and that the end appeared to be in sight for those remaining issues needed for Eclipse to complete all the commitments it made for the revolutionary Eclipse 500... the first of a new generation of exciting jet aircraft.
If that isn't drinking the Kool Aid, I don't know what is.
The only reason Eclipse has survived this far is the delusional state of its customers.
Gentlemen,
I had the same problem with the PDF... on two different computers. They both froze and refused to open the document. I found relief as follows: Press the link for the declaration and give it a while to download. When 'Done', don't try to scroll down but save in My Documents. Open from My Documents with Adobe reader.
Flyger, don't forget the traditional aviation media abdicating their responsibility to shine the light of truth onto claims made.
If Vern was under true media scrutiny I am not sure things would have gone this far.
A review of the NASDAQ collapse and bubble shows one thing for sure - it took the financial media a long time to get back to their roots and then when they did they turned on the biggest target (Enron) resulting (in part at least) in the collapse of Enron.
History repeats itself and those not aware of it are doomed to repeat it - this means you Vern.
Darth Campbell checked his objective media credentials at the door when he agreed to take exclusive first shot at all Eclipse stories.
Furthermore, a review of the fluffboy pieces Darth Campbell posted about the origin of the e-CONjet clearly show his direct involvement, including flying chase, being aware of flight test and development. It may take a while for Flying, AOPA Pilot, etc., to take Vern to task for his obfuscations and other shenanigans but you will not likely ever see Mac or similar flying chase in a flight test or exchanging their objectivity for exclusivity.
F'ing pathetic!
I just noticed this how Eclipse again attacks Brian Skupa:
The results of Eclipse's internal efforts, to date, resulted in the discovery of one employee who was caught "red handed" sending confidential business information outside the company. The employee has been terminated, and a court in New Mexico that his home computers be reviewed by computer experts to determine the extent to which he has been disseminating ECLIPSE confidential information.
Hopefully Skupa's lawyer know about these allegations. Vern is lying about the other case. Skupa has not been found guilty/liable and the court did not order the computers be reviewed to determine the extent of guilt/liablility. The court might eventually find Skupa liable and what Eclipse obtains from his computer would be used as evidence in determining that, but to state the court are looking at the computers only to determine the extent of the liability is false.
Eclipse damages both their Eclipse V Doe case by lying about results in another court case and for the same reason they damage their Eclipse V Skupa case by submitting false court filings about it elsewhere. Eclipse has a credibility problem outside the court system and they'll quickly develop a credibliity problem inside the courts as well.
Also interesting tidbits include that Vern isn't an at-will employee...they can't just fire him without having to still pay him. Also that Eclipse admits that the confidentially agreement doesn't apply for what has already been said to the general public or to third parties who aren't party to an NDA.
I'd also like to second that I can't wait for Eclipse to explain why they dragged in 9Z for calling Eclipse a scam. They also nail ATM for calling Eclipse a Ponzi scheme. No, Eclipse's lawsuit isn't a SLAPP lawsuit *ha!*
I found that right click on the link and "save as" to my desktop worked.
All I have is an excel viewer and it won't let me edit...any tips?
There is something broken in the PDF.
Right click, save as, then open the saved file. That was the only way I could view it.
More bad news for Eclipse/DayJet:
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2008-06-03-small-jets_N.htm
ATCs are raising safety concerns about VLJs...
Air Traffic and Airline Pilots complain about Dayjet
"...like following a farm vehicle"
Like following a farm vehicle.
LMFAO!
Hey Vern, do you think they think your tractor's sexy?
When it rains it pours - I love it - you just can't make this stuff up.
MetalGuy-
There's nothing "broken" in the PDF if even one person can read it. It's amazing to me that you guys carp about E-Clips yet spend your money on WinDoze op systems.
Open the PDF with the latest version of Acrobat Reader, not with a Microsoft Product.
Eclipso-
Send me your part in clearly understandable format and I'll put it into the spreadsheet.
Thanks much-
Gunner
Gunner,
I will do that...thanks...disregard the last email on that subject
I was pretty happy. That post that Vern took offense to was actually one of my better ones (I thought:) I would have thought my comments would have been quite helpful to Eclipse with the differcult task of planning and performing the AvioNG retrofit.
I have completed the spreadsheet and sent it in. Please let me know if you don't receive it.
To Verns Declaration:
2: Isn't Vern on record stating that Eclipse is not a manufacturing companies? Here he says they are.
In 5 he even wants to be a fully fledged manufacturer.
10: Are we allowed to quote Verns press releases? It seems to me he is our biggest source of "leaks".
11: Why didn't Eclipse post here asking us who we are?
12: Eclipse has no way of determining who is leaking info? The post of mine they choose to supeana is in reply to a John Richardelli letter posted on Stans site the day before. Do they want to know who the leak was or fish for who I am? Looks like they should have been looking for who passed Richardelli's letter on to Stan. My bet would be on that being a customer.
Vern - you need to start suing your customers!
15: Cool we critics can "have at it". In my opinion your company is going bankrupt. Straight to chapter seven.
16: Eclipse draws the line at employees releasing financial information. How does that fit will Mike press quoting Vern: “they are not out of the woods yet!” regarding the financials.
I wonder whether Vern read the statement " I declare under under penalty of perjury laws of Calif and N.M that the foregoing is true and correct. I wonder if he hesitated on that sentence. To be far, there is nothing in that declaration which looks to me like you could nail him with.
Do you guys think Vern signed one of those NDA's? Do you thing he meets clause 1?
Will that fact be brought to the judges attention in the "Doe's" case? It seems he was trying to sway the judge by saying "well, the NM courts agree with EAC, so you should too."
I don't know, but in light of Vern's sworn claims regarding the Skupa case, I went and checked out the status:
http://www.nmcourts.gov/caselookup/app?component=cnLink&page=SearchResults&service=direct&session=T&sp=SD-202-CV-200804029
All that has been granted is an ex parte temporary restraining order (TRO). The courts have not granted either a Preliminary Injunction or a Permanent Injunction...the permanent one is the only done as a form of relief after a civil trial. A hearing on the Prelimnary isn't even until tomorrow. There's a huge difference between an ex parte TRO and a post-trial Permanent Injunction...Eclipse might get it eventually, but the key thing is that Eclipse categorically doesn't have a court ruling granting an injunction as equitable relief against Skupa.
Eclipse has no way of determining who is leaking info? The post of mine they choose to supeana is in reply to a John Richardelli letter posted on Stans site the day before. Do they want to know who the leak was or fish for who I am? Looks like they should have been looking for who passed Richardelli's letter on to Stan. My bet would be on that being a customer.
It looks like either Mr Richardelli is going to be given his walking papers or Eclipse is going to be showing how Eclipse customers cannot discuss what's going on with their plane or else they'll get sued.
I believe this statement in the related SCO lawsuit best exemplifies the business mindset of Eclipse, so all customers, employees and suppliers should be warned that signing any kind of contract with Eclipse could subject them to considerable grief:
Contracts are
what you use against parties you have relationships with.
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/05-28-2003/0001954689&EDATE=
I believe those who are considering working with Eclipse would do well to compare Vern Raburn with Darl McBride...both of them are good at using PR and raising funding, but are horrible managers who are very litigious. There is also a relationship between them via Iacobucci.
Coldwet, I always doubted your opinion that Eclipse burnt through 1.3 Billion greenbacks. But Vern seems to thing you have insider knowledge of that.
Vern should have supeaeona's all of us. Don't forget that, as a group, we nailed the exact number of partial eclipses which were "Delivered"tm last year.
Vern was way off.
Maybe you have more accurate knowledge if you don't work there?
There’s a sad day coming up for a respected aviation organization. On Friday the Aero Club of New England (ACONE) is awarding Vern Raburn its top prize, the Cabot Award. ACONE claims to be the second oldest aviation club in the world.
ACONE’s award committee apparently got into the same Kool-Aid consumed by the National Aeronautics Association in picking their recipient of the 2005 Collier Trophy. It’s hard to believe these outfits lead such a sheltered existence. They’ve gone from venerable to vernerable.
I questioned one of the Club’s officers and he said rather weakly, “Vern’s got a lot of friends in Boston.” Most of the folks I know have consciously made other plans for lunch on Friday. It’s a little late but maybe we could organize a blogger’s table with Gunner and Norman as special guests.
Eclipse Aviation should be worried about this event because of a dreaded disease known as MCS – Magazine Cover Syndrome. It has brought down the unwary time-and-time again. Your company’s CEO is on the cover of an important business or trade magazine. Your product wins best-in-class at the big industry trade show. It is the beginning of the end – your company has jumped the shark.
Think Dennis Kozlowski - on the cover of Business Week in 2001 as “The Most Aggressive CEO” and again in 2002 as “The Rise and Fall of Dennis Kozlowski”… from hero to zero in a year.
Did the CIA sue the plane spotters who busted them for flying special rendition flights illegally through friends airspace on "civilian" aircraft?
Did the CIA sue the plane spotters who busted them for flying special rendition flights illegally through friends airspace on "civilian" aircraft?
Seeing how they didn't, I feel its safe to report that the 400 prototype was built on government property...NASA's Wallops Flight Facility to be exact. When Eclipse goes BK, hopefully this will help put in end to such waste and abuse...using govnernment facilities strictly for private enterprise (it's not like the jet was built under NASA contract or was a classified military project).
FJT - my 'inside information' is that I can add up the publicly reported investment rounds and compare that to public statements made by Vern about how that 'puts them where they need to be' to complete the project - on each of half a dozen or so different times.
Of course, I also have the 'inside information' that almost 20 years experience in aerospace provides.
I also have the 'inside information' that being a fan of Teal analyst Richard Aboulafia provides.
Then there is the 'inside information' of press releases issued by Eclipse.
There is also the 'inside information' provided by fluffboy hero-worship interviews of Vern by Darth Campbell as well as the credentialed media.
Don't forget the 'inside information' of reports from folks who talked to people at various aviation events attended by Eclipse (SNF, OSH, AOPA, NBAA).
And the 'inside information' provided by reviews of the Internet Archive Wayback Machine that aloows one to review archived webpages for the catalogued websites like eclipseaviation.com.
There is also the 'grapevine' of hiring managers, headhunters, staffers and contractors I know at most of the OEM's and Contract Houses in the aerospace industry who are not subject to NDA's with Eclipse when seeking placement of folks who may have been at Eclipse.
I also had the 'inside information' of the great work of other bloggers here. Yes there may have been some circular references based on inferred conditions at Eclipse and such but it would seem to me that Vern's statement and the provided Appendix B are definitely suggesting that our speculative valuations, addition of publicly available numbers, and such have been ACCURATE, and now, the self-annointed champion of 'transparency in aviation' has essentially confirmed our guesses and opinions.
Wow.
Thanks for the validation Vern, even I had no idea how right I really was.
Vern has quoted a post from Shane (post 2) which is dated after the subpoena was filled.
Vern has quoted a post from Shane (post 2) which is dated after the subpoena was filled.
For some reason I've noticed that cash arsonists (Raburn, McBride, etc) aren't good at hiring competent legal help despite their spendthrift ways. Too bad Vern can't legally be declared a spendthrift:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spendthrift_trust
Does anyone have any stats on delivering 20 aircraft per month?
Or actually flying to 41000 feet.
Just a hunch, but if one or the other does not exist, well...I don't think I would swear to it on a deposition...Maybe they did deliver 20 in one mont...or maybe the "experimental" went to 41000...Anyone know?
folks,
I AM baffled and insulted.
I posted a lot of insightful stuff, here. Some would even accuse me of being an "insider" which I am of course, NOT!
It took me about 3 hours to figure out how to download the PDF, but it was simple coming to the conlusions I posted here... using my own little inquisitive mind.
The posts by which I am occused of somehow breaching an NDA are completely innocuous.
WTF?
-sorry, but I will post my replies to the spreadsheet, but I fear I will need help understanding what in the world could be construed as a breach of an NDA?
Now for a bit of humor:
ATTORNEY: Are you sexually active?
WITNESS: No, I just lie there.
____________________________________________________________________
ATTORNEY: What gear were you in at the moment of the impact?
WITNESS: Gucci sweats and Reeboks.
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And in what ways does it affect your memory?
WITNESS: I forget.
ATTORNEY: You forget? Can you give us an example of something you forgot?
_____________________________________
ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning?
WITNESS: He said, 'Where am I, Cathy?'
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan!
______________________ ________________
ATTORNEY: Do you know if your daughter has ever been involved in voodoo?
WITNESS: We both do.
ATTORNEY: Voodoo?
WITNESS: We do.
ATTORNEY: You do?
WITNESS: Yes, voodoo.
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isn't it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn't know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: ; Did you actually pass the bar exam?
____________________________________
ATTORNEY: The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?
WITNESS: Uh, he's twenty-one.
________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Are you shittin' me?
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time?
WITNESS: Uh.... I was gettin' laid!
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: She had three children, right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?
WITNESS : Are you shittin' me? Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a new attorney?
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death.
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Now whose death do you suppose terminated it?
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard.
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?
WITNESS: Guess.
_____________________________________
ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition notice which I sent to your attorney?
WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people?
WITNESS: All my autopsies are performed on dead people. Would you like to rephrase that?
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: ALL your responses MUST be oral, OK? What school did you go to?
WITNESS: Oral.
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 P.M.
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at t he time?
WITNESS: No, he was sitting on the table wondering why I was doing an autopsy on him!
____________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Huh....are you qualified to ask that question?
______________________________________
And the best for last:
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law
Which of these are EAC's Attorney?
(messed up my last post)
"For some reason I've noticed that cash arsonists (Raburn, McBride, etc) aren't good at hiring competent legal help despite their spendthrift ways."
Maybe a modified Miranda Rights for the Vernster: "If you can not afford a competent lawyer for your absurd civil lawsuit the court will appoint you one."
I think it is a smart move to practise suing us first, and then start suing the customers.
If you made any mistakes suing the customers it could have a slightly negative impact on marketing.
"Commentary based in part....blah...blah
WHICH part? Doesn't he know what his own INDA says? I think that would have to be more specific..i.e. Part 23 (a) (1) xxx
On friday, Al Petrofsky filed a media request to record the Friday hearing on behalf of his Eclipse-vs-Does blog.
Eclipse has responded with an objection, on the grounds that Al and his blog "do not fall within the definition of media or media agency".
Apparently (if Angela Storey is to be believed), gathering and aggregating news of public interest, and then disseminating it worldwide falls outside the definition of "media".
Fast forward two years: Vern Raburn, despondent at finding the bottle of Ripple empty in his refrigerator-box-home under the I-40 bridge, yells out to nobody in particular, "And I'd have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for those pesky bloggers!".
IAN,ANHB,TPOW
‘Whether to laugh or cry, I know not. ‘Have I been complemented? . . . or accused ? . . . an ongoing mystery! Up until now, I simply “read” what’s in print, or “on the internet” . . . ‘most info coming from the “top” . . . and make my comments.
**************
Last night, for the first time, ever, my wife and I met a young couple with their “baby” in McDonald’s , and I noticed that the young husband had an “Eclipse” work shirt, and his “ID” tag. What a fantastic opportunity to extract information from an “inside source”, and he wouldn’t even know what he revealed. So I proceeded . . . and here is everything I learned:
He likes his job. He works twelve hours per day, three days . . . then, four days. He mentioned that Eclipse is coming out with a new “jet” . . . a “composite”. (I mentioned that I, too, had heard that.) And somehow the “Russians” are going to be involved in the future. He’s young, enthusiastic about what he does. And he has a good wife and baby.
And I gave him some advice: . . . get all the training that is offered, and learn to do his job well. What he learns now, will stay with him for the rest of his life.
My conclusion? . . . There are probably many such folks out at Eclipse that are depending on the “success” of Eclipse for their future, and the future of their families. They’re enthusiastic, eager to do a good job, excited about the future, and they “believe” what they are being told (and I would not for an instant, do anything to inform them differently . . . they’ll learn the truth soon enough).
Well, there you have the “latest” inside information.
gadfly
(Informant, extraordinaire!)
Apparently (if Angela Storey is to be believed), gathering and aggregating news of public interest, and then disseminating it worldwide falls outside the definition of "media".
Storey isn't exactly a good lawyer for Vern to have hired for this. She might be better representing an Eclipse customer over construction defects as that seems to be what she's best at:
http://www.millermorton.com/attorneys/afs.html
She doesn't really seem to have much legal experience in either the internet, aviation or employment law and she's not even a partner. She might be a decent lawyer, but if I was initiating a case that was receiving worldwide coverage, I'd go for an employment law specialist who had engaged in internet-related cases before and was a partner instead of an associate.
Her response actually begs for other agencies to file to record Eclipse cases.
Gunner Said:There's nothing "broken" in the PDF if even one person can read it.
Crikey man, Adobe 8 reader locks up with it when viewed from IE. What did you use to create it in? Macdonose OS?? (Peace-out man, apple rules, IBM sucks. We all know.)
Dave-
If you can get a message to Al:
S.W.A.T. Magazine will gladly commission him to cover the procedings. We are a worldwide news stand publication and anyone who believes the Bill of Rights is not a subject near and dear to our hearts has never checked out what we stand for:
Check it Out
Regards-
Rich Lucibella
Publisher
SWAT Magazine
I live about 5500 miles from ABQ. I have never seen a Partial Eclipse, except in photos, yet I was last year able to predict their production better than the CEO.
One day the Eclipse vrs Does case will be taught in MBA schools as an example of how not do manage your internet image.
There are a couple of forums I frequent where a producer is deeply involved, provides product support, product releases, discusses design features, and sometimes has to face critic. It doesn't take long before such a person has a whole army of customers sticking up for him, his ethics and his products.
the solution to the PDF is to paste it to a folder, before downloading it. I have emails confirming this is the bst was, if you have trouble, like I did. It worked for me.
Gunner, did you get my spreadsheet?
the REAL ATman
freedon,
lawsuitNG
makes sense to me.
perhaps vegtables that begin with the letter Q?
I sit and ponder how to email this in (with attachment), without disclosing my email address and therefore identity.. I hate to create a new email account just for this purpose. hummm
Gunner,
I can call Al at his number listed on his motion (650-520-0626):
http://petrofsky.org/misc/legal-docs/Eclipse/Eclipse-vs-Does-CA-2008-05-30-media-request.pdf
But I've never spoken with him previously or met him outside of the public message boards...not even personal emails. That being said, I've known him for years.
Dave
I sit and ponder how to email this in (with attachment), without disclosing my email address and therefore identity.. I hate to create a new email account just for this purpose. hummm
It's really very easy to get an email account at like Yahoo. I've used multiple email accounts along with disposable email accounts for years if for no other reason than to reduce spam and to compartmentalize different types of emails.
went back and read the exhibits...
CW, NICE JOB MAN!
Apparently "if I had to guess" doesn't count for much WHEN YOUR OPINIONS, DEDUCTIVE ABILITIES AND INDUSTRY KNOWLEDGE MAKE YOU RIGHT ABOUT EVERYTHING!
Man, I kinda wish I was taking credit for your posts, right about now. Especially the financial accounting showing how financially dismal things are at EAC.
Nice job, thats for the opinions and insight. I'll be sure to pay more attention.
Funny thing is, Vern seems so pissed - makes you THINK he never wanted anyone to really know the situation over there. Its obvious, nothing proprietary was breached, its just confirmed dead nuts on.
now...
Tin Man
Chill out! Download the "latest and greatest" Adobe Reader, version 8.1.2 ("Windows" . . . or whatever on your "Mac") and you should be up and running in no time. Yeh, it's over 20MB . . . but it's "free" . . . but after download, and when you "run it", check off that it is the "default reader" for all "PDF" files, incoming. After you "re-boot" your computer, it should do "just fine". Try it, you'll like it!
gadfly
(And thank "Gunner" and "Shane" for making all this possible.)
ATM said:
perhaps vegtables that begin with the letter Q?
Is Quash a vegtable?
FC,
all due respect, you DA MAN.
Apparently, using flightaware, and keeping fastidious track of PR and painting a picture of what things are REALLY like, is against some NDA.
Once again, you get the people's choice award for coming up with real data, and logging the PR statements to paint a gruesome image of the reality at EAC.
FOLKS. Watch this guy - he's got a Stanford (Stan, get it?) degree in statistics, and an eye for detail that makes th like of Vern Raburn cringe.
"Someones actually watching and keeping track" this CAN'T be good.
Once again, I am sure Vern would rather the likes of FC just go away. Its so hard to BS the world when guys like this are actually keeping track.
REMEMBER FOLKS, FC's info is dead nuts on - worthy of a lawsuit for breaching an ECLIPSE NDA.
quince... but I like the cross between Quince and Squash.
Nice one.
FG,
I guess no one remembers the public statements regarding PW paying Eclipse some money as part of the engine deal.
OH well, until now, I thought this was just speculation.
Good to know - I am sure the UT sharehoolders and perhaps the Canadian and Quebec taxpayers would love to know where the money went.
Probably ammortized over 1000 engines per year or more, for say 10 years.
Not gonna happen. My peronal opinion, here, of course.
Sworn Eclipse financial information as given by Eclipse's CEO (anyone thinking of doing any business with Eclipse had better keep this in mind):
$1,300,000,000 in Liabilities
$20,000,000 in Assets
$25,000,000 in Warranty Claims
and for the cherry on top Eclipse acknowledging their vaporware order book
Dave,
I am still shaking my head.
I wish that EE505 would tell us how his exit interview went. He said that he was going to talk to Vern and Peg.
Gad,
Because you live in ABQ and were one of the first to question how your tax dollars were being spent...does that make you an insider?
Normally, the “gadfly” likes to stick to technical issues. But it occurs to me that 6 June 2008, is the “64th anniversary” of the “D-Day” invasion of Europe. Without making too much of all this, “D-Day”, 6 June 1944, spelled the beginning of the final end of the “Third Reich”. And in a strange way, 64 is a “binary” number that may spell the beginning of the end of another enterprise, that lost its way early on. In both cases, it was all based on a “better way” to launch into the future . . . yet had basic flaws that from the start spelled their own doom. Now, I’ve already made too much of all this. But in each case, “pride” seems to be a common denominator that brings down many big dreams. If you forget everything else, there remains one “gotcha”: Pride!
Well, in the next few days we’ll learn a little bit more about the little jet that still remains a dream, “un-fulfilled”. And you still remember that not a single aircraft has yet been delivered that meets even the basic promises . . . no, not one!
gadfly
(Right now, some folks out at ABQ wish they had a big flyswatter!)
(Chickasaw: You may have noticed that my "new" source of "info" is at McDonald's . . . at Central and Tramway . . . and while munching on two green chili burgers, french fries (large), and coffee, I learn all I can . . . while my wife holds the baby of an Eclipse employee . . . Hey, you do what you have to do to get the inside "scoop". And that "little guy" was a cute one.)
I really would have expected a much more refined and honed attack from their legal team if they really intend to get Google to release names – the bar is very high for this to occur, which they surely know.
This seems like just a shotgun “anything with a vendor name or numerical amount”, list it approach, which dramatically reduces the probability of success. I feel like I’ve been hit with a wet sponge.
Where does Vern really think he is going with this approach??
It’s so inept in fact, you have to assume he knows he will not succeed with Google, and is just doing it in an attempt to intimidate people by using the legal system.
Metalguy,
I am willing to bet that Vern did not expect the blog to have the resources to fight back. So you are most likely correct in thinking that this was an effort at intimidation.
Without the Chosen fighting back, Vern would have had another PR success.
It’s so inept in fact, you have to assume he knows he will not succeed with Google, and is just doing it in an attempt to intimidate people by using the legal system.
It's a combination of wishful thinking and incompetence, which we've seen for years from Eclipse and can be traced to Vern. Vern seems to think all he has to do is say it and it becomes true...but suffers from horrible execution. Look at Eclipse saying they'd be making 1000 units per year by now versus their actual execution. Now look at it in the legal context where they already claim they've already won against Skupa even though the case has only just begun. It's like Vern is so sure that he'll succeed he doesn't think you have to actually put for the effort to accomplish it.
I am willing to bet that Vern did not expect the blog to have the resources to fight back
I'd say that was his first mistake, but he's made so many already that I've lost count. Suing bloggers on any message board on any topic is stupid unless you have a rock solid case. If the bloggers themselves can't afford to hire their own legal representation, there's plenty of groups out there who are glad to take on the case pro bono. Suing anonymous bloggers is particularly risky because its an asynchronous fight with the advantage for the bloggers...you don't know who you are suing, what resources they have at their disposal and what skeletons in your closet they'd be inclined to reveal if they felt pushed by you suing them.
Well, now we know what Vern really doesn't want discussed out in the open:
From Coldwet:
"This decision was surely made because Honeywell pissed Vern off by demanding higher prices due to the vaporware volume not being present - imagine the nerve, pointing to the low volume pricing in a contract.
Shortly after that happened, JRC probably received a 'new' specification control drawing from Eclipse, that probably looked strikingly similar to the Honeywell RDR2000 system. May have even gone so far as to have the Eclipse logo covering up the Honeywell logo. Stranger things have reportedly happened."
All Mr. Fish's speculation. If it's untrue, Eclipse had the option of simply disavowing it any number of places - including here on the blog. Given that they instead chose to pursue the "source" of the speculation leads me to wonder: where there's smoke, is there also fire?
Is there a grain of truth to it that Eclipse would prefer that Honeywell not contemplate too much? Has Eclipse maybe engaged in *just a little* theft of Honeywell technology? Are they mad at the blog because a substantive portion of the "disruptive" business model on which the enterprise is based, involves misappropriation of technology that belongs to others? Did that also underly their unsuccessful Aspen lawsuit?
Relying heavily on high school & college Psychology courses, I seem to recall a concept called "projection". The short version is that people tend to project onto others the flaws they know about themselves. And that really noisy executive types who fail at actual-real-live business are masters of it.
That Vern bloviates about others violating his precious NDAs suggests to me that perhaps he has exercised a casual disregard for NDAs that he is obligated to adhere to. I am not a mental health professional, so chuck that baby out with the bathwater as you see fit - I'm just sayin' these may be the things that keep Vern awake at night...
IAN,ANHB,TPOW
Is there a grain of truth to it that Eclipse would prefer that Honeywell not contemplate too much? Has Eclipse maybe engaged in *just a little* theft of Honeywell technology? Are they mad at the blog because a substantive portion of the "disruptive" business model on which the enterprise is based, involves misappropriation of technology that belongs to others? Did that also underly their unsuccessful Aspen lawsuit?
Given Eclipse's association with SCO and the strong similarities between the two CEOs, it wouldn't surprise me in the least. The Raburn and McBride seem to be in a contest to see who is the worst CEO...saying that stealing another company's IP is a trade secret is beyond stupid.
Also given Vern's Mircrosoft background, I wonder how much Eclipse will pay to make the lawsuit they started to go away. This lawsuit has put Eclipse in a no-win situation thanks to Vern and its a question of how much damage the board wants to take.
Vern knows he's a bad CEO, which is why he required special employment treatment at the company he founded...he's one of only two non at-will employees at Eclipse. If he really thought he did such a good job and didn't face the threat of termination from Eclipse's board, he'd have the same type of employment agreement that all the other Eclipse employees have.
This is probably an unpopular post, and I will gladly refrain from making subsequent ones if it irks too many, but...
There are several posts in the deposition of posters claiming (or even bragging) that they are in contact with former and current Eclipse employees who are providing a lot of inside info.
So that alone, makes those blogger the valid target of a subpoena seeking to identify employees leaking proprietary info.
In addition, there are posts claiming the need to be carefull to protect the identities of those leaking out info.
This might be construed as being engaged in a conspiracy, but more likely will be treated by the courts more like a reporter seeking to protect his/her sources. So lets dismiss this part.
But on the first part, I really don't see how a court can dismiss someone clainming to be receiving info from current and former employees that are being very careful to protect there identities, and exclude that person from a subpoena seeking indentity of the poster so the poster can be deposed.
I am far from being a judge, but if I were rulling on this (without benefit of the oral arguments), I'd grant the subpoena, but ONLY for the posters that are on reccord claiming to be in receipt of inside/confidential info.
"Raburn and McBride seem to be in a contest to see who is the worst CEO"
Oh, I don't know - Carly Fiorina has a pretty gaudy resume in that regard. I'd say Vern is leading the competition with Darl, though - he's squandered investor equity at a level Darl has only dreamed about.
"saying that stealing another company's IP is a trade secret is beyond stupid."
Vern's comments about the Coldwet post I cited did not include "it's untrue" - they say "Commentary based in part on confidential information regarding Eclipse's negotiations with suppliers".
If the notion of Eclipse stealing Honeywell's technology isn't "not true", but is "confidential information", then Vern just testified under penalty of perjury that it's true.
Redefining: "that's stupid".
IAN,ANHB,TPOW
so, if Gadfly reported on this blog, that say some guy he ran into at McDonalds, who had an Eclipse shirt and badge (won't say his name because his kids are cute) told him the new eclipse plane is a 4-place made of composite, this is somehow a breach of a NDA, and worth deposition?
I don't think so. 4-place, we all know this is coming... speculation that its composite... already saw a prototype that's composite, so what's the big deal - its in the public domaine.
And, anyway, I suspect Vern is right - there probably ARE alot of employees breaching their NDA's. So many, that its hard to recall any of their names, or who told what to who.
** I put most of the LEAKS in this category... stuff that is innocuous, stuff that is easily deduced, stuff that's opinion, rumor, or stuff that probably caused ZERO harm to eclipse.
I think most of eclipse's problems have been self-inflicted.
All of this is just my personal opinion, of course. And if someone at HOneywell, someone who used to work for Peg Bilson, told someone, who told someone, who told someone.... who told CWMR a bout eclipse stealing their IP... and somehow Vern admitted it was true under oath...
I rest my case.
There are several posts in the deposition of posters claiming (or even bragging) that they are in contact with former and current Eclipse employees who are providing a lot of inside info.
So that alone, makes those blogger the valid target of a subpoena seeking to identify employees leaking proprietary info.
To some degree I agree with you, but taken that at face value that everything said in said post is true that would necessarilly mean that the ones posting didn't violate an NDA, know what the NDA said or even know that there was an NDA. The first anyone saw of the Eclipse NDA was in their court filing after the fact.
This same matter is further compounded by the Eclipse CEO saying publicly that bloggers are not privvy to inside information and are just pretending. This means that Eclipse has to [suicidally] prove the posts in question were indeed accurate and then establish that there was no other possible source for said information.
Though I haven't read it as thoroughly as I could, the NDA itself seems vague and poorly written. Having read the NDA it's less clear to me now that there's been any violations of it than prior to having read it but having been aware there was one. The basic premise of the NDA is that an employee cannot reveal anything unless "the Company" has already revealed it publicly. Any employee could violate that at any time...frankly violating the NDA as it is written would actually be required by many employees in order for them to do their job. Any Eclipse employee who has a customer-facing role would have to violate the NDA in order to serve the customer by providing them information on their delivery or retrofit. Eclipse has both willing and unwilling revealed this contradiction by citing something revealed by the VP of Customer Support (21 days to retrofit was revealed by him) as well as by Brian Skupa who was lower on Customer Support (we don't know what he revealed). This also applies with HR because they interact with other organizations besides Eclipse employees. The causal loop is that employees cannot reveal anything until the company does, but the company is made up of employees as "the Company" is not a separate sentient entity.
All these things now appear to fall into violating the NDA even though they are innocent are intended to help the company:
* You belong to an industry trade group and to help Eclipse you talk to members to help find potential recruits for open positions
* You're in customer service and a customer wants to know when their retrofit will be complete
* You're in HR and you contact a recruiter to fill a position
* You're a rank-and-file employee and you tell your spouse your morale is low
* You're a former ranking employee at Eclipse and you send your resume listing your Eclipse job as your former position.
So basically the Eclipse NDA is poor - particularly if they're trying to use this as a one-size-fits-all document for all positions within Eclipse. I don't think a blanket statement can be made that even if something was heard from an Eclipse employee, it doesn't mean that the Eclipse employee did anything wrong. Its too vague and general that employees cannot do their jobs and simultaneously follow the NDA. "The Company" isn't defined as far as I can tell in my browsing of the document.
dave ivedorne,
Regarding what you said about the psychological syndrome known as "projection". After some reflection, I realized that I do this, too.
But, I also figured out that pretty much everybody else does it, too.
G
AT, you are missing the point.
Eclipse and its CEO have a right to be paronoid and delusional and use the legal system to depose people that may have information on employees leaking confidential info.
The courts have little latitude here. If Eclipse shows it is reasonable to depose the bloggers to try to identify leaker employees, the courts will have to afirm the subpoena.
The current subpoena is to seek info to aid in identifying a potential witness/deponent in a law suit.
If identified, and Eclipse attempts to depose a blogger, the blogger can still ask the courts to qash that subpoena. If that fails the blogger will have to answer questions under oath, produce emails, etc or face sanctions.
For example, Shane would have to produce the tons of emails he claims Eclipse employees are "bravely" sending to him every day. BTW Shane, if Eclipse were to spend enough $$$ you could, by by-laterla treaty be deposed under a UK court procedeing.
Either way, this is just a huge waste of time and energy for all involved. No benefit can possibly come of this.
The fix for this is for Eclipse to release audited quartely reports and have open communications about developments.
For crying out loud. Make your order book, the purchasing agreements, the project true status openly public.
Eclipse has accomplished more than any startup company that attempted to certify/produce a light jet.
If your order book is 400 that is still awesome. If AvioNG will be done in 6 months with G400s with a future G1000 retrofit in 2 years, that is OK too. If the aeromod+Avio+FIKI is taking 42 days instead of 21, that is fine - customers and industry observers are not stupid nor infants, they can handle the truth.
What is not palatable is this hunker down in secrecy attitude. This is not an NRO or DoE W78 update project. It is a nice light jet project.
Yes, releaseing more info may marginally aid Cessna and Diamond and Embraer to compete against Eclipse, but it will remove such a dark cloud around the company that will pay long dividends.
Maybe somebody with more knowledge of the legal system can explain to me how this works:
Suppose that a citizen of another country is subpoenaed to testify in a U.S. civil lawsuit.
I doubt that anyone could compel them to travel from another country to the USA to testify.
However, if that person should enter the USA while the subpoena is still active, would Immigration assist in carrying out the subpoena? Would they be held by the authorities until they gave a deposition?
Inquiring minds want to know.
G
Dave said... This means that Eclipse has to [suicidally] prove the posts in question were indeed accurate and then establish that there was no other possible source for said information.
No it doesn't. All Eclipse needs to show is that there is a reasonable basis to depose the blogger. Nothing more, nothing less. Since some bloggers oppenly boasted of receiving info from Eclipse insiders and openly said they needed to exercise care and edit emails to "protect" the identity of these insiders, it is a slam dunk case.
Now Google may file a motion and a court may have to balance Google's need to protect blogger's privacy vs Eclipse's need to depose witnesses. I doubt Google will do this, but they might. Still, Eclipse's burden will remain the same - show that deposing a blogger is a reasonable approach (not the ONLY approach, but a reasonable one). It may require showing that they already exhausted trying to identify leakers by other means. That is why they cover that base in the declaration they filed.
However, if that person should enter the USA while the subpoena is still active, would Immigration assist in carrying out the subpoena? Would they be held by the authorities until they gave a deposition?
I think Immigration would only be involved if there was a criminal warrant. Generally speaking its up to the moving party to personally serve a subpoena...like if you got a traffic ticket, the cops wouldn't tell you that there's a civil suit that somebody wants to serve you with.
Breaking a bit from legal issues...
ASM said ... Well, Dassault makes three different three-engine jets with "S" ducts, the latest, the 7x,
Yes, and it is the ONLY civilian jet maker currently doing it and needing a healthy dose of government "incentives" to survive. Furthermore, only 33% of the air entering the power plants makes the turns. In the D-Jet it is 100% of the air that has to turn.
For comparisson to your 200 orders figure for the 7X, the G650 alone has 600 LOI before even being offered for sale - just to show you what a competitive design with no air turns can do. ;)
The E-400 just looks like it will have GC range measured in millimeters.
Yes, it does, doesn't it. In addition, the configuration is not amenable to easily fix a CG extention. You can't just make the tail 4 inches higher or move it 4 inches back. I hope the aerodynamic engineers really did (are doing) their job.
Still such a small cabin with only 4 loadable stations it is hard to mess it up.
Gorak said ... Suppose that a citizen of another country is subpoenaed to testify in a U.S. civil lawsuit.
Gorak, the procedures are quite simple. Lets say Eclipse files a law suit and the courts issue a subpoena for him to testify in a civil case. Under internatinal treaty, a lawyer is Ireland or wherever Shane happens to be, will file a petition to depose Shane with a copy of the US lawsuit filing/subpoena. The filing party will arrange to have Shane served with the subpoena, and Shane would have to either fight is or submitt to the deposition under the jurisdiction of the local (to Shane) court.
Shane could not be compelled to travel to the US - that would only happen under extradition treaties that don't apply here. But he can indeed be compelled to testify/submit to a deposition in his own country. The expenses are rather trivial for Eclipse to do this - just hire a local law firm to file it. No mistery there.
No it doesn't. All Eclipse needs to show is that there is a reasonable basis to depose the blogger.
I stand by what I said and that is a reasonable basis. If no NDAs are being violated there's no reasonable basis to get people's IDs. The reasonable basis is established by proving that said posts are first of all true or else no one's ID could be protected because there would then be no requirements to be met. There's considerable protections for people's anonymity and to overcome that barrier you can't just say you want someone's ID because you didn't like what they said.
Since some bloggers oppenly boasted of receiving info from Eclipse insiders and openly said they needed to exercise care and edit emails to "protect" the identity of these insiders, it is a slam dunk case.
Earlier today I received an email from an Eclipse employee. I have to exercise care to protect the employee. The Eclipse employee told me EA400 would run on green cheese instead of JetA....now is it a slam dunk case that Eclipse can obtain my ID? You have to first of all establish that an NDA was violated by showing that confidential information was leaked. If there was nothing confidential leaked, there was no violation of the NDA and without establishing a violation of the NDA there's zero justification for getting someone's ID. Eclipse has to prove these things are first of all true unless the defendants stipulate the matter.
show that deposing a blogger is a reasonable approach (not the ONLY approach, but a reasonable one). It may require showing that they already exhausted trying to identify leakers by other means.
Baron, you are pre-supposing there was anything at all leaked. Saying that there were leaks is conclusory and as such it has to be established first. Just because Eclipse says in there were violations of the NDA doesn't automatically mean that is so. See my comments on Skupa as it pertains to what Eclipse said in their filing here...the same applies. To say that there were violations of the NDA is conclusory so it has to be established first. That means Eclipse must prove the posts true. Eclipse cannot simultaneously publicly say the posts are false while telling the court they are entitled to obtain people's IDs without proof what the underlying posts said was true.
From https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=3817101653623448889&postID=7793215887032551148
DayJet is expected to announce in coming weeks that it is joining with the FAA to conduct tests on new air-traffic technology,Raburn said. Iacobucci declined to discuss the agreement.
One could be excused for thinking this is Vern stealing Ed's thunder...SM
Well,
The 727 served for decades with an S" duct for the center mounted engine, as did the L-1011, so I really don't know where you are coming from. Lately airliners have goten away from fuselage mounted engines of any kind primarily because of the safety issue: You have to run fuel from the wings throught the fuselage to the engine(s) in the tail. In a single engine jet it pretty much has to go in or on the fuselage somewhere, or on the vertical stab as in Piper's design. Designing an "S" duct or two shoulder-mounted ducts on the fuselage is not that big a deal. It also allows the centerline of thrust to be in-line with the center of gravity of the airplane which eliminates wild pitch changes with power changes. I don't know of anyone, except Eclipse, that would tack an engine on to the top of the fuselage. It is certainly ugly visually and how does it facilitate maintenence, servicing, or even pre-flight inspections? The V-tail is another huge problem waiting to bite the pilot. Can't Eclipse learn from the mistakes other manufacturers have made? It's not just that they are constantly reinventing the wheel, it's that the damn thing is never round when they finish their reinvention.
The armchair lawyer in me thinks there are three relevant points in regard to Eclipses ability to succeed in this manner:
1) In reviewing previous cases where the identity of anonymous individuals is concerned, I get the impression that the bar is very high for the plaintiff to justify a case for the waving of first amendment rights. To have these rights waived so that a given blogger can be deposed to –try- to figure out where the actual leak occurred, seems very very improbable. My first impression would be that the Judge would instruct Eclipse to address this as an internal HR issue and not attempt to violate the rights of ordinary citizens on the street in order to enforce an internal company policy.
2) There is a fairly strong chance that given the overly broad allegations that the NDA was breached based on simple hearsay, rumors, guesses, etc.. that the judge will see this for what it really is – an attempt to silence a critical blog through legal intimidation. If this happens, the entire thing may very well be thrown out, even if there are threads of actual NDA violations woven through the fabric. Is Vern proceeding in “good faith” in this matter? If the judge thinks not, then the whole thing may be out.
3) There may be some bar for showing damages. There has been no disclosure of how Eclipse has been damaged by these postings. Again, this may be a requirement to grant the disclosure.
Dave said ... I stand by what I said and that is a reasonable basis. If no NDAs are being violated there's no reasonable basis to get people's IDs.
You have things out of sequence. No court is going to address the question as to weather NDAs are being violated at this time. We are a long way from any court making that factual determination.
Eclipse is simply seeking identifying information so they can depose bloggers that have posted in a public forum that Eclipse insiders are sending tons of info.
So the order is as follows:
First file to obtain identifying info.
Second, once a blogger of interest is identified, file to depose the blogger.
Third, if the deposition plus other means point to a viaolation of INDAs with actual harm, Eclipse can file a law suit against the insider.
Only then, will any court be interested in trying the facts to make a determination that NDAs were or were not violating.
You seem to want the court to jump to square four and conclude that no NDAs were violated, therefore no subpoena should be granted.
The legal system just does not work that way.
There is only one basic question before the court. Is seeking idenfying information about these bloggers via a subpoene to Google a reasoble request by Eclipse while it contemplates legal action against inseders leaking info in violation of valid agreements. That is it.
Eclipse is not obligated t oeven file a law suit.
My first impression would be that the Judge would instruct Eclipse to address this as an internal HR issue and not attempt to violate the rights of ordinary citizens on the street in order to enforce an internal company policy.
Speaking of HR, I considered Eclipse's HR-related blog posts to be amongst the weakest claims for NDA violation. Saying that there were company vacacies is about the weakest thing around. Companies want to fill vacancies and in fact many companies pay bounties to employees who help fill vacancies. Eclipse doesn't list "staffing," "personnel" or "human resources" amongst things that are considered violating the NDA.
If this happens, the entire thing may very well be thrown out, even if there are threads of actual NDA violations woven through the fabric. Is Vern proceeding in “good faith” in this matter? If the judge thinks not, then the whole thing may be out.
Yes, the penalty for doing unjustifiably overbroad litigation is that the baby can be thrown out with the bathwater. It looks particularly bad that Eclipse is claiming a violation of their NDA for saying Eclipse is a scam and stole another company's intellectual property - Eclipse either comes off as engaging in a SLAPP lawsuit if it says there's no scam or IP theft or they end up where the cure is worth than the disease because then they'll be potentially facing criminal charges in addition to civil lawsuits from Honeywell, investors, etc.
3) There may be some bar for showing damages. There has been no disclosure of how Eclipse has been damaged by these postings. Again, this may be a requirement to grant the disclosure.
I think to some degree it is. If there's no harm in what was done, then there's nothing to remedy. Eclipse is ultimately putting themselves on trial because of what they have to establish. Of course their lawyers are perfectly willing to do whatever Eclipse wants to get the billable hours even if it is stupid.
Metal guy said... There is a fairly strong chance that given the overly broad allegations that the NDA was breached based on simple hearsay, rumors, guesses, etc.. that the judge will see this for what it really is – an attempt to silence a critical blog through legal intimidation.
Yep. You are right on this one. Eclipse should have limited themselves to the very few bloggers that have posted that they have/are receiving insider info on factual and relevant matters. But they couldn't resist having their CIO run a search on the Blog and thining the more is better. ;)
There may be some bar for showing damages.
Again true. There may be a need to show a cause for action. An internal employee discipline matter likely will not qualify. Eclipse may need to show cause for an possible/eventual civil action.
Anyway, the Judge is being paid to make these decisions. Lets see what comes out. A huge waste of time. But hey, that is what most civil litigation is.
"G650 alone has 600 LOI before even being offered for sale - just to show you what a competitive design with no air turns can do."
No even close. Gulfstream is withholding the number of orders they have recieved for the G650 according to their president who was interviewed last month.
You have things out of sequence. No court is going to address the question as to weather NDAs are being violated at this time. We are a long way from any court making that factual determination.
Eclipse is simply seeking identifying information so they can depose bloggers that have posted in a public forum that Eclipse insiders are sending tons of info.
No, I'm not skipping ahead. Courts can't be used for fishing expeditions. Eclipse's CEO has said the posts were "lies and rumors" by people pretending to be outsiders. That would mean the proper course of action would be a defamation lawsuit and to obtain someone's ID for purposes of suing them for defamation.
You can't just freely say you don't like anonymous critics so you want the courts to tell you who your critics are.
The courts don't automatically grant giving away people's anonymous IDs simply because you asked for it in court. The movant has to establish proof to justify the ID that either defamation occured if the ID was required to seek damages based on the falsity of a statement or establishing that something was factual and confidential in an NDA lawsuit.
If anonymous IDs were just given away, there wouldn't be multiple examples of plaintiff's losing their case to seek someone's online ID. There's significant barriers to overcome as courts do not give away anonymous IDs lightly.
Per the dave and baron discussion, if I understand what you guys are talking about, I don’t think there is a right or wrong on that one:
From another legal web site:
…As explained in our post last week, the primary question in cases seeking to uncover the identity of an anonymous defendant is how to balance that defendant's First Amendment-protected interest in engaging in anonymous speech against the plaintiff's interest in pursuing a valid cause of action for the effects of nonprotected speech. If a court chooses too permissive of a standard, then anyone can unmask an anonymous critic by simply stating that he has been defamed or claiming that his copyright has been infringed. If a court chooses too demanding of a standard, then a plaintiff will find herself forced to litigate her claim before knowing the identity of the defendant and without the benefit of ordinary discovery.
Unfortunately, courts have been all over the map on this question, and a number of competing standards have emerged.
(Dated Sep 2007)
Thanks to all The Chosen who have responded to our request so far. If you sent e something, you should have heard back from me.
Gunner
baron95 ...
i don't agree with your conclusions about shane HAVING to testify ...
(may be out of his own will , but to say he WOULD HAVE ? just no way !)
you may know : a door has to be open or closed !
if a foreign citizen living abroad is not subject to US laws , how comes he HAS to testify for some US court-case ?
if a foreign citizen is subject to US laws = please let me call the justice minister of the countries where i am living ...
they do not need to spend ANY tax-payer money on something useless as the US tax-payers already kindly provide for a world wide system ... !
(by the way , you know USA has NOT signed the treaty of International Court of Justice )
the thing would have to be organized to be "allowed " by the juridic system of the country of residence of the person "having" to testify ...
who would pay for those "extra-costs" ? = Vern and EAC = what a money-drain ...
no , the whole thing should be treated for what it is : BS !
it is only a (bad) show meant to satisfy the paranoid-narcissist ego of some schmuck ...
About Dassault getting "government incentives " :
WAKE-UP ! it is a firm which DOES NOT NEED to subsidized ...
(think a bit : Dassault has plant in the US , how comes French Gov. pay some in to "entertain" US workers ?
last time Dassault had to get certified [plant or birds] did they have to lie about what is going on in some far away places ?)
they are EXACTLY what Vern claim to be (in his own dreams?)
a PROFITABLE and SUCCESSFUL firm !
yes , they didn't promise to "darken" the sky ..
yes , they didn't promise to make a jet "so cheap" it would "revolutionize " the whole industry ...
yes , if you want one of their bird , you've got to have a big wallet ...
yes , they do not rely on promises , you ask for something = they tell you "Yes or NO " if it is yes , it 's going to cost you dearly ...
may be this is what so different in between all others and vern :
they live in a real world , not in Disneyland ...and they respect very much theirs clients , firm , management , employees , past employees , just all ! may be it has something to do with the way they treat peoples ...
(sorry for Walt D. , such a disgrace to have your name put aside with this a..... !)
gunner ...
i was granted from 2 of my sources
(on the Russian front) the promise that they would testify thou their legal system that we had talks on the concerned matter ...
the said testimony would be deposited as an affidavit legalized ...
they are willing to confirm they are NOT binded to anything with EAC or even Etirc ...
that few statements "touted" were blatant lies ...
"Yes, and it is the ONLY civilian jet maker currently doing it and needing a healthy dose of government "incentives" to survive."
Really, trying to smear Dassault is too much! You don't think the parent company of Gulfstream, General Dynamics, is not receiving government "incentives" by sucking on the federal defense teat for all its worth? What parallel planet are we living on today? How about Learjet? They were looking at bankruptcy a few years ago before Bombardier when the USAF just "happened" to make a quantity purchase. Or Bombardier itself who sells quite a few aircraft to the Canadian government. Or Embraer, who does the same thing for the Brazilian government? Or Pilatus and the Swiss government? Or Beechcraft before it was Hawker-Beech? It wasn't that many years ago that Gulfstream was staring bankruptcy in the face when it was controlled by Frostmann-Little. Gulfstream is a wonderful company, but to even say the word "Dassault" and (insert name of New Mexico farce here) in the same sentence is to risk a lightening bolt from above.
Let me play the "Devil's Advocate" for a minute. Let's say that one of the bloggers is truly an insider or at least has a good line to an insider. Let's say that the blogger posted something detrimental to EAC, couldn't Vern then decide to take his lumps about that info, and admit it was true and try to put a positive spin on it and then sue the blogger.
Just askin'.
chickasaw...
yes to a "certain" limit NDA has a positive side ...
but where is the limit in between "someone blindly following" because of NDA ...
and someone who at a certain point think he HAS to say "STOP the Madness " ?
this is very controversial , i am afraid it is a vern's interest !
was it an artist who said " let the peoples say bad things about me , at least they still talk about me !"
so if you were a depositor would you like to have inside knowledge ?
would you consider that the sale rep. has some degree of responsibilities when you handed over the check to him ?
that can be applied to lots of stuff ...
without going this far , it SHOULD be a duty to the legal system to make sure EVERYBODY respect the rules ...
then the question would be :
in our matter of interest , do you think "they" obey to the rules ?
in other word : not saying the truth to a liar , is it supposed to be a lie ?
and then "can anybody granted the right to use a system to his own benefit , while not respecting the system himself ?"
airsafety ...
yes , i agree putting the name of " NM farcical scmuck" and the name "dassault" in the same sentence , is quite an outrage !
if vern would ever have a tenth of the merit of the guy who fonded the firm ...
it start by a simple fact , marcel dassault was the designer of the propeller used on war-plane in WW1
which prove in itself , at least he knew about aviation ...
he was not a "golden boy" trying to change the standards of something he had no clues about ...!!!
Baron95,
You threads are a hell of a lot more valuable than any of the faithfulls threads ever were. Thanks for contributing.
I had come to a similar conclusion to you. If Eclipse were serious about going after (in their eyes) NDA violators, then there are enough clues here to indicate which specific persons they needed to subpeona.
It looks to me like the guy Vern delegated sifting through our thousands of post to did a half arsed job. By netting a bunch of people who at In his defense he probably didn't have the time to read the whole enchilada, didn't have the knowledge of what he was looking for, and doesn't know enough about aviation to understand what he was reading.
I agree with Dave that there is simply too much basic information available in the public domain to have a very strong case to prove NDA violation though.
I don't know what the legal standard for defamation is, but some of the posting here are pretty raw. I would guess that the line between criticism and defamation, is legally tricky.
As am outsider to your system, the US legal system has long given the impression that the best lawyers win (even flawed cases).
The Eclipse legal team seems weak.
The don't seemed to have done a thorough job of defining their goal, and paring down the material to only that which supports their case.
Although the stated aim is to go after NDA Violators, they have left too much in there which indicates a sense that Eclipse feels they have been defamed (which from our perspective is fishing trip to silence valid criticism).
Hopefully the Eclipse legal team is reading this Eclipselegalteamcritic.blogspot.com so that we can help them, like we have tried to help Eclipse.
Metalguy said ... …As explained in our post last week, the primary question in cases seeking to uncover the identity of an anonymous defendant is how to balance that defendant's First Amendment-protected interest in engaging in anonymous speech against the plaintiff's interest in pursuing a valid cause of action for the effects of nonprotected speech. If a court chooses too permissive of a standard, then anyone can unmask an anonymous critic by simply stating that he has been defamed or claiming that his copyright has been infringed. If a court chooses too demanding of a standard, then a plaintiff will find herself forced to litigate her claim before knowing the identity of the defendant and without the benefit of ordinary discovery.
Absolutely right. No clear cut right or wrong. A judge will have to look at the facts and balance it out. My take is that Eclipse will, at most get the go ahead to obtain ID info for the bloggers that actually claimed, in the posts, inside info.
FJS said ... The don't seemed to have done a thorough job of defining their goal, and paring down the material to only that which supports their case.
Although the stated aim is to go after NDA Violators, they have left too much in there which indicates a sense that Eclipse feels they have been defamed (which from our perspective is fishing trip to silence valid criticism).
Yep. They have a double barrel shotgun, but it doesn't seem like they have decided which barrel to fire from.
Barrel One - Eclipse insiders leakid confidential and demaging info - we need to depose the bloggers who said they received the info to identify the insider and pursue a civil case. [If this is kept very narrow it may have legs]
Barrel Two - conspiracy theory of encouraging NDA viaolating leaks, combining that with distortion and detriments coment (defamation). [This has no legs]
I do hope that the judge throws the whole thing out, just so that the blog and Eclipse can stop wasting time.
Eclipse needs to do a better job communicating with the "public" and this blog needs to [and has in the past few weeks] mature and focus on valid substantiated criticism with no blind insults.
baron:
"Since some bloggers oppenly boasted of receiving info from Eclipse insiders and openly said they needed to exercise care and edit emails to "protect" the identity of these insiders, it is a slam dunk case."
I personally don't think its that simple. Example: Mike Press...was an "eclipse insider" so to speak, and if someone was told something by him... before he executed the NDA, perhaps they just wanted to protect him from some uncalled for backlash.
Who is an eclipse insider? It does not have to be an employee, or someone under an NDA.
I think eclispe, at the very least should have to show there was no way for anyone who did not sign an NDA to know the details/facts/rumors being claimed as inside information.
Also, if someone claimed they heard something from an indsider, and it was not true, that's a different issue.
Finally, if the insider was wrong, mistaken, or deliberately providing false information/disinformation, thats another issue.
I do not think its as simple as you say.
I think a judge might have to weigh the dammages of any of the statements, even first get a definitive statement from eclipse that the statements ARE true, and precisely which statements are true, to have a case.
Vern is trying, in his sworn statement to make the judge think he's developed some revolutionary, really important product, which is in the public interest, will create employement etc.
If I were the judge, I'd ask about moving thos jobs to Russia? I'd ask about competing products that will fill the gap when eclipse is gone, and I'd ask why his silly little aeroplane is so darn important? Finally I'd ask him to compare what was delivered and what was promised.
Glad I'm not the judge.
Fred,
Thanks for your comments on Dassault. I was trying to have a discussion about "S" ducts and point out that Boeing, Lockheed, and Dassault seems to make them work just fine, and further point out that sticking an engine on a stick on top of the fuselage between an outsized V-tail in an already high drag area was very poor design. Baron95 then had to smear Dassault and then misrepresent Gulfstream's order book. I don't think a company (Dassault) with an EIGHT BILLION dollar backlog for ONE model of aircraft needs government charity.
My take is that Eclipse will, at most get the go ahead to obtain ID info for the bloggers that actually claimed, in the posts, inside info.
My thinking is somewhere along those lines. There are certain posts cited where the post is clearly a guess - it's neither defamation nor NDA violating because its pure speculation. I'm completely surprised with how poor a job Eclipse did by naming the finance post estimating Eclipse's assets and liabilities. Now Eclipse has turned that post of clear speculation into something of verified sworn fact in their attempt to SLAPP bloggers and get their IDs.
What is interesting is that Vern's declaration is inconsistent with what he has said to the press. According to Vern, the blog comments were "lies", yet his own declaration states "Commentary based upon confidential information, not available to the public". That would seem to indicate that the posts were, in fact, not a lie.
In other words, the liar here is Vern. He lied to the press to cover his arse and his true motive, which clearly is just to silence the blog.
Again I'm back to comparing Eclipse's CEO to SCO's CEO. Having a liar CEO is a huge liability. Hopefully Eclipse's board can terminate Vern for cause and not have to pay him a golden parachute. Vern's public statements versus court filings are an albatross around Eclipse since they are so diametrically opposed to one another. Publicly claiming defamation (posts are false by bloggers wrongly claiming inside knowledge) while being janus-faced in court claiming NDA violation (posts are true by bloggers who have inside information).
Really, trying to smear Dassault is too much! You don't think the parent company of Gulfstream, General Dynamics, is not receiving government "incentives" by sucking on the federal defense teat for all its worth? What parallel planet are we living on today? How about Learjet? They were looking at bankruptcy a few years ago before Bombardier when the USAF just "happened" to make a quantity purchase. Or Bombardier itself who sells quite a few aircraft to the Canadian government. Or Embraer, who does the same thing for the Brazilian government? Or Pilatus and the Swiss government? Or Beechcraft before it was Hawker-Beech? It wasn't that many years ago that Gulfstream was staring bankruptcy in the face when it was controlled by Frostmann-Little. Gulfstream is a wonderful company, but to even say the word "Dassault" and (insert name of New Mexico farce here) in the same sentence is to risk a lightening bolt from above.
Maybe that didn't come out right. I had no intention to smear Dassault. As an aviation enthusiast, I much enjoy seeing different designs. I should have stopped at the comment that they are the only ones still doing a tri-jet and the only ones still burying an engine in the fuselage, high off the ground.
Are you aware that modern turbofan engines are designed so even a HSI can be done without removing the engine from the plane? Hi/burried/tailpane engines are no longer a good idea. That is one of the reasons it was abandoned.
As to the other part of your post. Yes. Unfortunately it is a sad aspect of the entire GA industry. All mannufacturers are, at best, marginally profitable. Few have survived as independent companies. Many have been in BK several times.
It is really sad, but true. That is why I keep on poiting out that what Eclipse has accomplished is not trivial. Even established companies like Lear, Beech, etc have trouble launching a new product without aid from parent companies, etc. A start up has not done a new jet in 40+ years.
I sincerily hope that Eclipse gets their act together so we can have another stubmling success story.
Eclipse needs to do a better job communicating with the "public" and this blog needs to [and has in the past few weeks] mature and focus on valid substantiated criticism with no blind insults.
Vern said he'd respond to his non-anonymous critics. Since his statement, a number of bloggers have gone from being anonymous to being known, yet Vern did not keep up his end of the bargain. Vern is acting like he has something to hide due to his lack of transparency.
lastly, I would refer the judge to the statements Vern made and the promises he made to be completely transparent.
"he committed to a policy of transparent development"
I think eclispe, at the very least should have to show there was no way for anyone who did not sign an NDA to know the details/facts/rumors being claimed as inside information.
Eclipse has named a number of posts that can easily be traced to their source - most frequently its Vern talking to the press. It would be great if Vern's own filing got him fired because he was such a moron.
I think it might be extremely helpful to go through all the named posts and find public citations for them that pre-date their posting. This would put Eclipse in a very difficult situation both with the lawsuit in general as well as with the employees cited in the source in particular (VPs and above). Right off the bat I see Eclipse on the hot seat with their VP of Customer Support...if his disclosure wasn't authorized why is Eclipse still seeking blogger IDs while keeping him on the payroll and if it was authorized why did Vern perjure himself and Eclipse by claiming the disclosures were unauthorized to obtain blogger's IDs?
airsafety ...
yes , definitely , this is the difference between true professional and paperplane maker who "invented" the eclipsing dollars ...!
one has a big log of real orders , all the cash of the world to do whatever research they want to , all the respect from past , present , future clients ...
the other one has an orders-book looking like an ice-cream left outside in the sun on an august afternoon in Arizona ...
and the respect (fear?) from mostly guys more inclined to make fast$ than really committing themselves to be pilots ...
the story on "Inside Knowledge" and NDA doesn't go very far ...
i never mentioned any INSIDE knowledge ...
i gave my estimation of situation with European Orders ...
i reported part of discussion with a friend of mine , working as a civil servant thou NOT allowed to commit himself to NDA with both private AND foreign firm ...
and talked about Russia !
nothing covered by any valid NDA that i would have ,even unconscientiously , signed with EAC !
but i am/was on the list
so the NDA's violation does not stand !
poorly executed job ...
i am thinking that Vern can get a free-to-go ( it would be an other avatar of "la fontaine's fables" : it is called "the toad wishing to become a bull" ) if he can trick the system into believing the magnificence of the small toy ...
that is the reason of one previous post ...
on the sworn documents it is stated :
FACTS that can be witnessed ... and under the perjury of law !!
"they are the only ones still doing a tri-jet and the only ones still burying an engine in the fuselage, high off the ground."
They are the only one making a business jet with more than two engines. The engine is no higher off the ground than the other two, WHICH IS THE WHOLE POINT OF THE "S" DUCT.
"Are you aware that modern turbofan engines are designed so even a HSI can be done without removing the engine from the plane?"
Well, yes, since I once worked for Rolls Royce as a service rep on the RB-211 and then for AVCO on the 502 I am somewhat familiar with hot-section inspections. I gave CLASSES on doing it to EAL and Pan Am mechanics at JFK years ago.
"That is why I keep on poiting out that what Eclipse has accomplished is not trivial."
I doubt if Dasault, going back 40 years has EVER delivered a business jet without weather radar or anti-ice or de-ice, OR one that had to be rescheduled back in to be completed.
Vern and his VPs take leaks...
Looking at Flightcenter's #2 post named, the only item they could possibly be talking about is the planned production volume. This is 100% Vern leakage with numerous cites all over the net...and sweetest of All, Vern himself saying Eclipse not hitting their planned targets is no secret! The source of said leak is a combination of Eclipse CEO Vern Raburn and Eclipse VP of Manufacturing Todd Fierro, who goes into explicit detail on shifts, current production rates, etc.
When a reporter observed that it seemed like a big jump to move from 20-plus aircraft a month to 650 a year, Raburn's resilient optimism resurfaced. With sufficient inventory in place, Eclipse has already demonstrated a "surge" production capacity of 1.4 aircraft per day, he said. To reach desired annual production levels Eclipse simply has to go from averaging one aircraft per day to two a day on a 30-days-per-month basis, a level he maintained is eminently possible.
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=busav&id=news/ETIR01228.xml&headline=Eclipse+Chief+Betting+New+Equity+Infusion+Will+Carry+Company+to+Profitability
This news article seems to precisely nail the exact statement of 1 per day by April (Q2) that Eclipse claims was a secret:
Eclipse has changed its production processes, modeling the new procedures on those in the automotive industry, with the goal of producing one airplane per day by the second quarter....
Eclipse technicians are close to manufacturing one jet per day, Fierro said, and should achieve that milestone by the second quarter. The processes that he has helped develop, however, have been validated up to a 2.5-airplane-per-day rate. The assembly technicians are working a four-crew shift, keeping the Albuquerque factory open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
One crew works a 3-4-4-3 day shift and the other a night shift, which means a technician works three days on, four off, four on, then three off. The result is 180 days off per year, a schedule similar to that used in the nursing industry, and it allows full use of the factory floor without having people work more than 40 hours per week.
http://www.ainonline.com/news/single-news-page/article/new-investor-secured-eclipse-adds-manufacturing-facility/?no_cache=1&cHash=4383092e68
Here's Vern saying its no secret:
Even though it delivered 103 airplanes in its 12 months of production, Eclipse is coming off a difficult year in which Raburn said it was no secret that the company didn’t reach its production goals. Though Raburn blames suppliers for much of the struggle over the past few years, he said, “Our lack of production is our fault.” The company’s eventual goal is to produce four aircraft per day, but it is currently pushing less than one per day out the door.
http://www.aopa.org/aircraft/articles/2008/080115eclipse.html
Eclipse says these are company secrets that were revealed and extreme measures must be taken, so is Eclipse going to fire Raburn and Fierro or drop their litigation?
airsafety ...
"I doubt if Dasault, going back 40 years has EVER delivered a business jet without weather radar or anti-ice or de-ice, OR one that had to be rescheduled back in to be completed."
well , let me tell you something :
Marcel Dassault was a survivor from Nazi's camp ...
he was deported for mainly 2 reasons
born jewish (real name : Bloch)
after the french collapse (in 1940) he was ordered to collaborate with occupation forces ...
he refused because "too many of his staff was either dead or prisoner to do a good job to his own standards "
so as to deliver a half finished plane , i suppose he would have preferred to kill himself on spot !!
passion is at this price !
Untimeliness
Last week, over at Eclipse-vs-Does.blogspot.com, I wrote:
"My understanding ... is that on Friday, May 23, Eclipse filed an opposition memorandum to John Doe's motion to quash the subpoena. Eclipse also filed supporting documentation and evidence, in the form of two declarations (CCP 2015.5) and a request for judicial notice (EC 453). ... John Doe's reply papers are due Friday, May 30 (per CCP 1005(b))."
According to the proof of service of the Raburn declaration, it was faxed to both of the Does' attorneys (Norman Malinski in Florida and Warren Jacobson in California) on May 23, and backup copies were sent to them by mail. I assume the rest of the opposition papers were also faxed and mailed that day.
It appears that Malinski and Jacobson then waited until 12 days later (i.e., until 5 days after the reply was due) before even starting to canvass their clients for responsive information. WTF?
Unless Malinski was unexpectedly hospitalized last week, or there are some other extraordinary circumstances of which I am not aware, I don't think Judge Manoukian will be willing to consider any late papers filed today or tomorrow, and I'm guessing he will deny the Does' motion in its entirety.
(Some clarity will probably be provided about 6.5 hours from now, when Judge Manoukian's tentative orders for tomorrow's calendar should become available. I will then post an update at eclipse-vs-does.blogspot.com.)
I've parsed the "Controller" listings for serial number cohort. Craft where only an approximate delivery date was presented were coded by bracketed values.
The table reinforces some speculation about the actual order book.
Note the cohort above S/N 500 drops off. This indicates that craft sales become critical only when the 60% payment is called. The new policy of calling all progress payments should induce more sales in the higher cohort. Alternatively, the >500 cohort has opted to refund the position deposit, and the lack of sales may represent S/N now skipped for lack of firm order.
Significantly there are no offered positions above S/N 1210, and its estimated delivery (q1 2010) is in line with current delivery offering for newly placed orders. I don't believe I have ever observed a S/N above 1210 offered on Controller.
The smaller number of sales in the 300 cohort may reflect the now suspended 60 craft DayJet block that must be present in that approximate group.
The sales number per cohort in the 0-500 group is reasonably constant at a bit over 11%. The total offered craft above 500 is 17, extrapolating out using the inverse of the 10% sales ratio we get an estimate of a total of 170 private orders still active in the cohort above 500.
S/N .. Craft
0 .. 15
100 .. 11
200 .. 12
300 .. 8
400 .. 11
500 .. 3
600 .. 2
700 .. 3
800 .. 6
900 .. 1
1000 .. 0
1100 .. 1
1200 .. 1
>1200 .. 0
Total .. 74
How is this possible - Garmins/FIKI/NG/International??
From Controller:
2008 ECLIPSE 500 $2,095,000 NM
S/N: EA 500.000290, NG/Garmin/Internat, Delivery August 08. Complete! Garmins/FIKI/NG/INTERNATIONAL Equipped. 50% BONUS DEPRECIATION QUALIFIED!
Re: previous post
August 2008. Looks like everything will be fine in 2 months. Everyone just needs to "hurry up and wait".
Al said:
"It appears that Malinski and Jacobson then waited until 12 days later (i.e., until 5 days after the reply was due) before even starting to canvass their clients for responsive information. WTF?"
Actually, Al, that's not quite true. Norman Malinsky was not hired by some Association of Bloggers. He was hired by ME. He sees ME as his client and reports to ME. I made it clear fro jump that I could not share all behind the scenes discussions with this Blog, because it's P-U-B-L-I-C.
As some on this Blog are aware, I've not been home except for 2-3 days at a time since March due to an ongoing medical issue with a member of my family that takes a great deal more precedence than progress reports to you.
The documents caught up with me in Tucson last Friday and I couldn't get hold of Norman 'till Monday, at which time I reached out to Shane.
Finally, tomorrow's hearing is unlikely to even get to the issue of Vern's declaration. I won't bother to telegraph the reasons why and, quite honestly, I don't believe I owe you any explanation as to strategy.
Now, if you'd like to send me the sum of $25,000, I'll be happy to fire Norman and step aside to allow you or your designee to argue this case before the Court.
Short of that willingness to put your money where your keyboard is, don't ever run up in my face again with this Monday Morning Quarterback pap.
OK?
OK?
OK?
Rich Lucibella
How is this possible - Garmins/FIKI/NG/International??
From Controller:
2008 ECLIPSE 500 $2,095,000 NM
S/N: EA 500.000290, NG/Garmin/Internat, Delivery August 08. Complete! Garmins/FIKI/NG/INTERNATIONAL Equipped. 50% BONUS DEPRECIATION QUALIFIED!
That's being sold by Don Morris of Morris Research Inc. A superconductor instrument company associated with the Berkeley Lab.
gunner ; MONSIEUR Rich Lucibella
25.000$ ??
oucchh !!
you must be kidding us ...
how are we going to repay you , if it is what it cost you ?
(i know some who would prefer to loose a leg than to depart this kind of money ...)
once again , i think we ALL need to entrust you !!!
In my opinion "Darth Campbell" gives the man too much credit.
'Jar Jar Campbell' seems to me to be a much better fit.
Fred-
I've not stated that to be what I've invested in this. Nor does anyone owe me anything...I chose to finance this theater of the campaign. And I'm more than willing to match Eclipse, $ for $, well in excess of $25K. That's the price that Vern pays for attempting his behavior toward us.
Gunner
Short of that willingness to put your money where your keyboard is, don't ever run up in my face again with this Monday Morning Quarterback pap
A little testie are we, Rich?
Fred, Gunner will just hide the legal expense in his magazine, or other such company, as a write off expense. Not quite a legal write-off, but he'll do it anyway. I smell audit this year.
dave:
"I think it might be extremely helpful to go through all the named posts and find public citations for them that pre-date their posting."
I did this in my reply - its easy... takes a few minutes, search "Vern Raburn" and "key word(s)" from the statement at issue...
Its pretty hillarious.
Rich,
Never mind these guys. Some folks just don't get it.
Big thanks,
ATMAN
The S/N 290 now on controller at 2.095 MM was originally listed on 5/19 at 1.670. The S/N 229 went up from 1.799 to 1.899 in the same period.
There is an effort to capture the new pricing in the resale market, but a number of the listings have not actively repriced. This inventory will moderate any price increase on resale. S/N 148 repriced down from 1.825 in April to 1.695 on 5/29, and has not reset back up. It is being flown this week in the midwest.
S/N 83 converted from a fractional sale to an outright disposal this week. It flies a typical Florida>Bahama route.
There's one flying in the Midwest between KPWK and KOSH - listed on FlightAware as SFH717. Flightaware shows 'Unknown Owner'. Any idea who that is?
Increased used prices as a result of increased new price:
Certainly anyone selling a used EA500 would try to get as high a price as possible and might argue that since the new price (with options) is $2.3m, the used item should sell at $2.0, even though last week it was offered at $1.6.
Does this make economic sense? There are some for sale, some demand and the price at which they have been trading has been around $1.5 to $1.6m. Eclipse raising the price to $2.3 or $5.3 does not change current supply or demand, does it? So why should the price change?
If Mozart's signature goes for $100,000 in the signature market then if he were to come back to earth for a day and offer some at $500,000 would he sell any or affect the current market? I would say that he could lower the market by charging less than $100,000 (why should I buy yours if I can get one from Wolfgang for less?) but I am not sure he can raise the market by charging more (Wolfgang, why are you charging so much when I can get one at Christie's for less?)
I wrote: "It appears that Malinski and Jacobson then waited until 12 days later (i.e., until 5 days after the reply was due) before even starting to canvass their clients for responsive information. WTF?"
Rich Lucibella (Gunner) responded: "Actually, Al, that's not quite true. Norman Malinsky was not hired by some Association of Bloggers. He was hired by ME. He sees ME as his client and reports to ME."
I was talking about his clients in this case. I'm sure he has lots of other clients, and that you are one of them. However, I meant the clients that he has stated to the court that he represents, and on whose behalf he filed the motion to quash. The written motion stated that it was filed by "Attorneys For Defendants", and that the motion was being made by "Defendant, John Doe". I understand that a declaration was filed on May 28 (which I have not yet seen) in which Norman clarified that the motion is actually being made by about two dozen anonymous clients he represents. My understanding is that Rich Lucibella a/k/a Gunner is not among these clients.
Thanks for providing some information about the timeline, and thanks for posting the Raburn declaration. (BTW, if anyone is having difficulty opening the PDF of the declaration, try this slightly tweaked version that I created from the version that Rich posted. It should work with PDF viewers back to Acrobat 5 and compatibles.)
"Now, if you'd like to send me the sum of $25,000, I'll be happy to fire Norman and step aside to allow you or your designee to argue this case before the Court. Short of that willingness to put your money where your keyboard is, don't ever run up in my face again with this Monday Morning Quarterback pap. OK? OK? OK?"
Of course, I'm not interested in sending you money, nor am I licensed to represent anyone in a California court, nor do I have any desire to hire an attorney to argue this case for either side.
I didn't even mention you in my "pap", so I don't really know why you saw it as "run[ning] up in [your] face", and I'm not sure what exactly you're asking me. If you're asking if I'm willing to agree to never again suggest that Norman Malinski or you may have made a poor decision, then of course my answer is "No".
If you're just asking that I cease posting to this site, well, my answer is also "No", but if you can get Shane Price to ask me, I'll say "Yes" (it's his blog).
Al-
I'm not going to do this dance with you. Post as you see fit; but when you embarrass yourself on this suit thru sheer ignorance (such as by suggesting that Malinski "canvas" Bloggers who are anonymous, even to he and I), you can expect me to correct the record.
Further, when you choose to grandstand your superior expertise in jurisprudence (here or anywhere else) and blatantly attempt to do so at the expense of my associates, you can pretty much expect the reaction from me that you received.
Those who can, Do.
Those who can't, Teach.
Don't be a teacher, Al.
Rich
Responding to Orville question regards the SFH on FlightAware.
The SFH designation are the North American Jet Charter craft. I know of 5 serial numbers, but they have recently announced they are adding a sixth craft
S/N 18 ... SFH875
S/N 64 ...SFH717
S/N 86 ... SFH990
S/N 114 ...SFH197
S/N 123 ...SFH696
gunner ...
don't take me wrong ...
i think you , Monsieur (believe me i do not call everybody this way !) deserve to be thanked profusely for your time , your effort , etc ...
we can start (all) by respecting your choices , entrust you and bear you in high esteem !
merçi beaucoup !
Viele danke !
Yes Fred, I agree we do owe a big thanks to Gunner. "Open source" activities such as this blog can sometimes lead to confusion and disagreements because the blog cant be open source on all matters...particularly on legal matters. I believe that open source is the way to go with as many eyes as possible on the problem. There will inevitably be personality clashes when you've got many different eyes from many different backgrounds, but the strengths of this approach outweight the weaknesses. Vern's deposition confirms the combined wisdom of this blog tackling things together.
A bit early for me, but has anyone heard the latest updte in NM on Brian?
[Off Topic], but Re Dassault - once again, great planes, god company, but how quick do we forget.
Dassault was at one point being tried for bribery in Belgiun and worked out a sweet heart French-government sponsored merger with Aerospatiale (eventually to form EADS), with substantial and direct government ownership and preferential tax treatment not to mention the direct subsidies.
To claim that Dassault is some sort of model company/model CEO or did not, does not receive subsidies is just ludicrous.
You can read about it here to refresh your memories if you are interested
Here's Vern on the EA400:
http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm?ContentBlockID=4468689a-5dc0-467f-8a89-e0e5b800c226
Al,
Read my blog profile.
It's not 'my' blog, it is our blog. Gunner, to use a military term, has earned his 'stripes'.
With respect, you have not.
When you are prepared to do as he has done, then you are welcome to provide legal advice. Contact me at the usual address for the appropriate bank details.
Shane
Dave,
Thanks for the link. Interesting article. Another article on the same website states that EAC reported that they will move the 500 production to Russia. The government has given permission to EAC to ship E500s and components to Russia. They also gave the same permission to PW.
So it looks like Vern will get rid of the sheet metal techs and hire composite techs. From where I wonder. Or the more likely scenario will be to close ABQ except for the Type Certificate and outsource the E400. Smart idea, too bad for ABQ but smart none the less.
Are you assuming the E400 will use composite cabin on top of the E500 metal wings?
Or do you have any other info that points to a composite fuselage?
Remember, Eclipse's stated goal is 60%+ commonality between the two types.
Baron95,
For example, Shane would have to produce the tons of emails he claims Eclipse employees are "bravely" sending to him every day. BTW Shane, if Eclipse were to spend enough $$$ you could, by by-laterla treaty be deposed under a UK court procedeing.
What part of me being Irish did you not fully understand? And 'procedeing' is actually spelt 'proceeding', unless you meant 'procedure'.
Finally I never said 'tons'. Just lots. And lots, and lots... I would be very happy, should any court so decide, to reveal all of the mess I have seen.
BUT....
Vern has carefully avoided any such legal action in Ireland. Why? I think it's because he can't afford it. Either in cash terms or because he's worried that the full story will come out.
Shane
Baron,
No insider info on the E400. There was speculation here at one time that the 400 would be composite. I don't know if you can put a comp body on metal wings because of the spar bridge needed in a comp body. Or were you being facetious and I am too slow?
Baron,
I am married to an Irish lass (34 years), you can't force an Irish(wo)man to do anything. I am living proof though that you can marry an Irish person and live a somewhat productive life.
From the inbox. Make of it what you will....
From: Customer Care
Sent: Thursday, June 5
To: Mickey Mouse
Subject: Airworthiness Directive Expected From the FAA
Hello Mouse,
Eclipse Aviation anticipates that in the coming weeks the Federal Aviaton Administration will release an Airworthiness Directive (AD) for the pitot/AOA probe on the Eclipse 500® due to a quality escape at the manufacturer. The AD will address thermal issues that can cause erroneous flight instrument disagreements. While we are diligently working with the FAA, we do not yet know when the AD will be released or how the final ruling will impact the Eclipse 500 fleet. We simply want you to know that the AD is pending.
In the meantime, we have released Service Bulletin 500-34-019 Rev Z and will contact you to schedule an aircraft inspection. Today, we believe that the AD will require a simple thermal test of the probes. No further action is required if the probes pass the test.
As soon as the FAA publishes the AD, Eclipse Aviation will release a Customer Technical Communication (CTC) outlining the AD's impact for all Eclipse 500 owners, operators, and service providers. The CTC will be Eclipse Aviation's official communication on this issue.
Thank you,
Vern Raburn
For anyone keeping score, if accurate that will be, I believe, the 3rd AD on the pitot/static system for the preemie jet - in about a year or maybe 18 months.
How many AD's for the Mustang - still NONE.
Eclipse remains in the 'lead' on this important subject.
Perhaps we should call the E-500 the 'not ready for prime time' jet.
Gunner, my reply is in for Norman's use if necessary - man did I have fun putting that together.
Vern, you really are a tool, see my responses and weep for the embarassment you have brought down onto yourself.
Do you suppose an NDA precludes a dissatisfied customer who has received his incomplete, partially functional preemie-jet from discussing said dissatisfaction with others?
I don't think so, and boy should you hear what I heard - sailors and marines were crying and washing their ears out with soap - I have never heard of so many expletives being strung together to form a cohesive and complete if not compound sentence.
Chicksaw said... I don't know if you can put a comp body on metal wings because of the spar bridge needed in a comp body. Or were you being facetious and I am too slow?
Not being facetious at all. That is actually a popular configuration. E.g. Beech Premier bizjet. Composites could offer advantages in the complex shapes of the E400 fuselage, but would offer few, if any, advantages on the relatively simple wing planform.
I was just wondering if you knew somehting that had been announced about the construction methods.
Baron95 said,
"Not being facetious at all. That is actually a popular configuration. E.g. Beech Premier bizjet."
The Premier - now there's a winner.
Gad,
I don't think most will able to read it...requires a paid subscription
Eclipse 500® due to a quality escape at the manufacturer
I'm glad to see Eclipse as a manufacturer admitting to their quality problems.
Spend a little time and study the following news article, most carefully . . . and please, “do the math”:
http://www.abqjournal.com/news/metro/309305metro05-31-08.htm
Then decide if you would spend your own hard-earned money on anything that this company has to offer.
gadfly
(There’s really nothing that I could add . . . this is the word from the “horse’s mouth”.
And we all read the word, "composite", when it was publicly announced about a week ago.)
(eclipso: Good point! But basically, the article confirms virtually everything we already know . . . and Vern is quoted as saying they never intended to sell the "E400" . . . and the ABQ Journal reporter, Andrew Webb, sounds far more cynical than most of the "critics".)
"Eclipse Aviation on Friday raised the price of its much-ballyhooed Eclipse 500 to $2.15 million, more than double what it was when unveiled eight years ago."
and
"The Eclipse 400— set for customer delivery in late 2011— was originally unveiled as the Eclipse Concept Jet last summer. It shares many components, including landing gear and wings, with its larger sister.
At the time, Eclipse founder and CEO Vern Raburn said the company had no plans to produce it.
"This is just a way for us to test out some of our technology ideas, and a good way to get some really solid feedback from the marketplace before we spend a bunch of money," he told the Journal at the time."
(My brief quotes do not do the article "justice".)
I don't think most will able to read it...requires a paid subscription
Just select the temporary premium pass (the option on the left) and all you have to do is watch on ad.
What is a 'quality escape'? This event sounds like it could happen at a zoo or prison, but not in a factory that builds aircraft.
The V-tail Eclipse 400 will fly at an estimated 330 knots at 41,000 feet, compared with the 500's 370-knot cruising speed. It will be powered by a single Pratt & Whitney Canada engine similar to those used on the 500.
In Vern's declaration, he's says the 500 will go 430kts....what gives?
What is a 'quality escape'?
When many of your good employees quit or are fired.
This event sounds like it could happen at a zoo or prison, but not in a factory that builds aircraft.
I believe Eclipse is combination of the two. I think the correct word for this is an asylum, with Vern the head inmate running the asylum.
In Vern's declaration, he's says the 500 will go 430kts....what gives?
wasn't it 430MPH?
CONfused
that's the point.
"Composites could offer advantages in the complex shapes of the E400 fuselage"
you want your answer?
1- imagine a racecar body made of aluminum.
2- imagine having a few years experience with FSW...
simple, really. It took 10 months of "voice of the customer" NOT!
"There was speculation here at one time that the 400 would be composite."
whose JOKING here, the g'darn prototype WS pastic.
Sheesh... give it up.
Now, had someone revealed the plane was going to be aluminum and FSW, THAT would have been a revelation.
This is exactly the stupid BS we are dealing with...NDA? Joking right?
"Remember, Eclipse's stated goal is 60%+ commonality between the two types."
what else have they said? HOw much did they lie? This is complete BS... designed to assuage investors that all is lost from the $1.x billions invested. Its an insiders joke.... I am sure.
Commonality part part? Weight? Volume? System? Its a joke man, wake up.
Joke on suppliers, and investors. NO one else cares, they just want something for their deposit money.
Way off base. I imagine there will be almost nothing in common with the e500 ... then again, which
e-500? There's almost nothing really common to the e500 rev1, rev2, rev3...rev to be seen.
Its a BS stement, with no relevance. Who cares? no one. Lets get a fully functioning plane out the door, and see how it flies.
UNless you wasted your money on the DOA e-500.. then there's some 'splaining to do... like commonality.
"Dassault was at one point being tried for bribery in Belgiun and worked out a sweet heart French-government sponsored merger with Aerospatiale (eventually to form EADS), with substantial and direct government ownership and preferential tax treatment not to mention the direct subsidies."
We just can't get away from our little smears can we? First off EADS was formed when DASA, Aerospatiale, and CASA joined forces. The French government sold Aerospatiale the Dassault shares it owned which were a minority position in the company. Aerospatiale is part of EADS, Dassault is not. The majority of Dassault shares is owned by the Dassault group. 46% of the shares are owned by Aerospatiale. Dassault and EADS compete among themselves for several programs. As for Serge Dassault, I don't believe he was ever convicted of anything. He remains the honorary chairman of Dassault.
Its a BS stement, with no relevance. Who cares? no one. Lets get a fully functioning plane out the door, and see how it flies.
The problem is that Vern is exactly the wrong type of person to be CEO of an aircraft manufacturer. Vern is great at the concept and cash-raising stage, but for the execution stage you need someone else. If Vern had left years ago after the initial fundraising was done, Eclipse could have already been profitable with fully functional aircraft flying. Now instead Eclipse hasn't cleaned up its first project and is already taking off focus to work on another new project. Vern simply cant execute proper completion of a project.
ATM,
I stand corrected..
Dave,
forgive me, BUT...
the e500 is a BS design. The entire industry knows this. It was based on a NASA demo engine that never even did its proving flight. Its a BS kluge job.
The market for 700-1000 plane per year was a crack-enduced pipe dream in my opinion. The insanity associated with dreaming there are this many qualified buyers of a $1.x million jet is stupid.
Also, basing your plan on selling this many, when you know full well fromyear and million of marketing that you only sold 700 planes or so, is criminal, in my opinion.
The making statements regarding selling 2600 planes to the world, as if its true, only to find that your buddy "bought" with no money really, 1430 of them, is criminal, in my opinion. Then your buddy backs out, no repercussions, and you claim you do not care? HUH? PAss the pipe, pls.
Finally, as part of the cover up, you rasie the price by another 40% or so, and you offer a product for $1.4M... to "REPLACE" the failed $1.x or $2.x billion sillborn misguided product you claimed was going to revolutionize air travel.
C'mon.
The single most important competency required by an OEM in aerospace S TO KNOW WHAT TO MAKE.
These guys screwed the pooch so bad, they are abandning the product all together... within weeks of Dayjet saying "we're not going to take it any more".
Kidding, right?
Nope just a total lack of competence, in my humble opinion gathered from publicly available statements and events.
ATM,
Thanks for the positive comments.
I've been away from the blog for a couple days. It seems like I almost missed all the fun.
There wasn't any information in any of my posts identified by Vern that wasn't public information published on the web prior to the post.
The source of most of the data in the posts referenced by Vern comes directly from the Eclipse website or the FAA website.
The comment on the projections regarding Eclipse production plans was based on the newsletter from Mike Press.
Gunner,
Thank you for your efforts!
Interesting how the shotgun fishing net narrowed from the original 29 to only 15 or 16 when Eclipse had to actually try and be specific isn't it. But this is not a SLAPP attempt or fishing expedition.
More interesting is that the 'Leadership Team', 'Hot Jobs' and 'What's New' pages on eclipseaviation.com are apparently a common source for the alleged violations of the Eclipse NDA. Vern better shut down the eclipseaviation.com website to be on the safe side - it has more leaks than the State Department.
And I mean really, what am I supposed to do when interviewing a former Eclipse employee? Resumes and cover letters identify job titles held and basic responsibilities - if you see one that shows Manager, QA, or Manager, Configuration Management what should I assume - all things are fine for those positions? What if the tenures were short?
I doubt the Eclipse NDA can be used to prevent someone from attempting to earn a legitimate livelihood by accurately reflecting the position(s) they held throughout their career even if, God forbid, they spent part of it at the Wellington J Wimpy Aircraft facility in Albuquerque where they will gladly deliver someday the plane you pay for today.
Similarly, I doubt if any former Eclipse employee would be limited by any NDA with Eclipse insofar as developing or sharing an opinion or speculation they come to after they have left. I am pretty sure an NDA only covers the time the employee is there - anything developed after they employee leaves/gets fired that does not involve information gained while at Eclipse should be fair game.
Oh, and since there are no specific claims of damages, the real question before the judge ought to be why Eclipse is entitled to any of this information in the first place, violating the first amendment rights of dozens of active blog participants, if they cannot effectively control/manage their own employees.
Guess we will know more tomorrow. Regardless, it has been, remains, and will continue to be an honor to consort with such an august group of intellects. commentators and provocateurs.
Gunner, you da' man for taking on the burden of organizing our defense, thanks again!
Once again I want to thank Vern and Eclipse for confirming my speculations (based on, in large part, public data and almost 20 years experience in industry), that Eclipse has tried to steal the IP of their suppliers, that suppliers are demanding higher prices due to lower than projected sales/delivery volume, that there is (or at least in February there was) chaos in the Quality and Configuration Management departments, that the service engineering issues are considerable, that there were significant vacancies on the Executive team, that Eclipse is over $1.3B into this thing, that they have precious few 'real' assets, that the orderbook is mostly vaporware, that they have significant warranty liabilities, and that the valuations seen for Columbia and Adam indicate a post BK Eclipse will not be worth very much at all.
I am sure the CIO/VP IT at Eclipse simply did not have enough time to go back and research them all but I will consider this vindication of pretty much everything else I ever posted.
Thanks Vern! Tool.
Gadfly said ... and Vern is quoted as saying they never intended to sell the "E400"
Not true at all. The article, talking about the ECJ unveiling an year earlier says that the CEO said they had no plans to produce the ECJ and would use it for technology showcasing and to seek market feedback. That is exactly what Eclipse has done.
No where in the article does is say that Eclipse never had plans to produce the E400.
There is so much to legitimately criticize about Eclipse, why is it that some in this blog feel the need to "invent" more reasons is beyond me.
baron95 :
first about Dassault corp . , don't you know HOW to read what Airsafetyman has written ?
as a French Citizen and being interested in what tax-payers money is spent , i can assure you that Dassault Corporation has NO TIES with EADS , nor it HAD with former Aerospatial ...
(it fact , they were fighting quite bitterly )
may be , you should try to wake-up (just a bit) and consider that a written article even from a Good newspaper can sometimes be wrong or exaggerated or misleading ...
i would give many example if i wouldn't fear to bore to death anyone reading , including myself !
the difference is: peoples or firms quoted in the article didn't find it right to be acknowledge as "WorldClassAss" (sorry shane) in embarrassing themselves , their entire industry and their country in doing a court-case to blow a lie to cover a publicly known fact in the name of "proprietary" topic !
as for peoples not being example or Godlike C.E.O. , well ...
i would suggest you to show me someone who has NEVER done anything wrong , i will hence show you a liar or a fool ...
there is nothing you can say to justify what has been so poorly done in NM ...
and to put in the same sentence , V. , quality , cleverness , ethics , results and achievements is just a deep insult to any form of living creature !
if not something that will remain as a good joke ...!
As someone who has participated in many B-727 #2 engine changes I would hardly consider the #2 engine "buried in the fuselage".
My only experience with a pod mounted engine was on a Lake Amphibian and I considered that a much bigger pain in the arse.
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