So that's one thing we'll lose when the 747 goes away.

One advantage of the alternating forward/backward configuration on that plane is that there are no seats (as far as I can tell from the seatmap) where one person's feet are near another's head. It's all feet to feet or head to head alignments in Business.

I suppose in Global First the seats are aligned head to toe, but you'd have to be pretty tall to be kicking the seat shell in front of you in GF.