Yes, software industry as we know would not exists if companies where held liable for all damages. But in the current state of affairs they have little incentive to improve software quality - when incident like this happens they can suffer an insignificant short term valuation loss but unless it happens too often they can continue businesses as usual.
Many companies paying lip service to quality/reliability but internal incentives almost always go against maintenance and quality of service work (and instead reward new projects, features e. t. c.).
> Yes, software industry as we know would not exists if companies where held liable for all damages.
Of course it would. Restaurants are held liable for food poisoning, but they still operate just fine. They just - y’know - take care that they don’t poison their customers.
If computer systems were held liable, software would be a lot more expensive. There would be less of it. And it would also be better.
I like that future too, but to play devil's advocate:
Write me software that coordinates all flights to and from airports, capturing all edge-cases, that's bug free. Then tell me the number you estimate and the number of years to roll this out.
Sure, but ... thats not a spec. Specs have clear goals and limited scope. "All flights from all airports forever" is impossible to program, full stop.
The right way to write code like that is to start simple and small - we're going to service airports X, Y and Z. Those airports handle Q planes per day. The software will be used by (this user group) and have (some set of responsibilities). The software engineers will work with the teams on the ground during and after deployment to make sure the software is fit for purpose. Someone will sign off on using it and trusting its decisions. And lets also do a risk assessment where we lay out all the ways defects in the software could cost money and lives, so we can figure out how risk averse we need to be.
Give me scope like that, and sure - I'll put a team together to write that code. It'll be expensive, but not impossible. And once its working well, I'd happily roll it out to more airports in a controlled and predictable manner.
Many companies paying lip service to quality/reliability but internal incentives almost always go against maintenance and quality of service work (and instead reward new projects, features e. t. c.).