energie:
777's FBW force feedback is entirely artificial and computer-controlled, i.e. no less susceptible to computer failure than any part of the Airbus system. Some see it as an innovative way to retain comfort and familiarity for the pilot, others see it as a crutch. It's a shame everyone's so polarised about it.
GMDS:
Sounds like you decided to dislike the Airbus system before you even tried it to me. Non-active controls neither enhance nor detract from safety as long as a viable form of feedback is supplied, be it visual, aural, tactile or otherwise.
What gets me is that we're getting the tired old 'ain't Boeing, ain't going' canards coming up again, fortified by the same old misinformation that's been around for the last 20 years. The primary anti-Airbus rant was that they were taking the third cockpit crewmember away, even though Boeing had done this in the old 737 25 years previously. Another was that 'the computer was doing away with direct control by the pilot', something that had been around since the 757 in the early 80s - as far as the FMS was concerned anyway. As for sidestick-oriented FBW, you didn't hear F-16 pilots complaining that the old column was done away with in the late '70s. It not only made the aircraft more agile than it otherwise may have been, but made it a more comfortable work environment than other similar aircraft (the original F/A-18 for example).
Of course, a lot of this was thinly disguised 'NIH'-phobia from the US (even though the initial FBW production aircraft was indeed theirs), plus a desire to counter a percieved 'downgrading' of the pilot's responsibility with the new computer-assisted control architecture. Airbus didn't help the latter initially, their training could be on the patronising side and they did put too much faith in the computer's ability to out-think a pilot making a mistake. The loss of Nick Warner did show them the error of their ways, and now the operative word is that the Airbus is a 'different' piloting experience rather than 'easier'.
I did laugh at the '103 years' of doing it the Boeing way though - I didn't realise that wing warping was controlled by a heavy column with a wheel in the middle of the Wright Flyer... The truth of the matter is that controls have evolved throughout the brief history of aviation, it's just that they remained static for the longest period between WWII and the late 1980s, with innovation coming within other areas (propulsion, cabin comfort, pressurisation) during that period. What gets me is that the same people on this thread dissing the Airbus controls are leaving out that the 777 FBW feedback is entirely artificial, and like I said above - if you don't trust computers to the extent that you refuse to fly Airbus, you probably shouldn't trust what the 777 column tells you either!
It boils down to what you want from your job I suppose - if you're more into your stick-and-rudder flying and like the older office layout then you're probably going to prefer to fly the Boeing line. If you like a more neatly laid-out office that helps you get the other aspects of piloting done more easily, then you're more likely to enjoy the Airbus experience.