The good news is: Now all the "debunkers" can go away! America is "cured." :-) This really is an unbelievable article!

America's obsession with Y2K fading away

By Jonathan Sidener

The Arizona Republic

Aug. 2, 1999

Americans seem to have taken a collective deep breath and have stopped obsessing over Y2K. Y2K refers to digital land mines inserted by programmers into every computer code ever written. The programmers then all resigned on the same day and became consultants, charging $5,000 an hour to fix the problem they had created.

At first, there was widespread panic over Y2K.

Such stalwart journalistic publications as Vanity Fair and Wired magazine declared that the end of the world was at hand. Our television remote controls and garage door openers might stop working, Vanity Fair warned. Pizza Hut might be rendered unable to deliver pizzas for hours or even days, Wired cautioned.

Time and information have apparently calmed some of the panic over Y2K, which actually refers to the Year 2000. For years, programmers used two-digit shorthand to store dates because computer storage space was scarce. The year 1997 became 97 and 1999 became 99. When 2000 rolls around, the two-digit shorthand, 00, will no longer make sense. For the past couple of years, programmers and system administrators have been working to convert to four-digit systems and otherwise fix the problem.

In December, a USA Today/Gallup poll found that 34 percent of Americans expected major Y2K problems and 55 percent expected minor troubles.

Last week, an Associated Press poll reported that those numbers had changed drastically. The AP found that only 11 percent now expect major Y2K hassles. And 66 percent said they expect only minor problems.

Those numbers seem to parallel media coverage of Y2K. A year or two ago, it was easy for reporters to toss out worst-case scenarios about how bad things could be. But as we entered the countdown to 2000, the facts often didn't support the earlier, hypothetical doomsday stories.

These days, it's hard to report that ATMs will fail and banks will falter when the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. reports that most banks are on schedule and the regulatory agency is cracking the whip on the stragglers.

It's hard to report that planes will fall out of the sky, when the Federal Aviation Administration reports that the air-traffic control system checks out.

One of the worst Y2K stories involved a spill of 4 million gallons of sewage during a Y2K test. In a simulation of a Y2K power outage, a backup system mistakenly closed a large pipeline, sending sewage into a park and nearby streets. The flaw was traced back to a programmer's error made in 1985, not Y2K.

Just as there is a minority in the population predicting meltdown, so is there a minority of journalists expecting the same.

In addition to Vanity Fair and Wired, another glossy magazine is joining the dire prognostications. FamilyPC will become the third horse of the Apocalypse with an upcoming issue on Y2K.

"Experts say it could be the biggest global catastrophe since World War II," a FamilyPC press release gushes. "Kentucky and other states plan to call up the National Guard in case it provokes looting and widespread civil unrest."

To back up their grim predictions, the magazine enlists an unimpeachable expert:

"It's a classic science fiction theme. Man creates science and science destroys man," Leonard Nimoy says.

Wow. Mr. Spock. How can you argue with such a brilliant mind?

To survive in this grim scenario, the magazine offers this advice:

Stockpile water and canned goods.

Be prepared to have a home birth if you're expecting a baby at the end of the year.

If your kids are younger than 6 or 7, spend a weekend without electricity this fall to prepare for a possible power outage.

And if none of that works, we add this suggestion: Maybe you can ride out the Y2K Armageddon along with Spock aboard the starship Enterprise. Stand in your back yard and repeat three times: "Beam me up, Scotty. Beam me up, Scotty. Beam me up, Scotty."

Jonathan Sidener can be reached at (602) 444-8169 or at jon.sidener@pni.com.

-- Gayla (privacy@please.com), August 02, 1999

Answers

"Those numbers seem to parallel media coverage of Y2K"

Bingo-- a prime example of how the media coverage, or lack thereof, can drastically(will drastically) affect the way y2k goes down.

what an idiot.

"at first there was widespread panic over y2k"

WHAT?? yeah RIGHT!!!!!! even polly's have to agree there has NEVER been widespread panic over y2k.... NEVER.

and hopefully there never will be...unless people stay in the dark about the possibilities, until the last minute

-- SuperLurker (Slfsl@yahoo.com), August 02, 1999.

Another idiot article. Save those newspapers! Fodder for the Tribunals.

-- gonna go right (to@the.wire), August 02, 1999.

I like it! Very PC!!!

Lets take a poll and decide if the computers will not talk to us after January 1, 2000. All in favor, all against...

Motion fails due to lack of interest, next problem please....

If it were only a question of public opinion.....

-- helium (heliumavid@yahoo.com), August 02, 1999.

I'm beginning to think that only a few chosen few were meant to "get it" to start with. Seems like everyone who does "get it" has a similar mindset at the moment. "I understand this so clearly, why doesn't anyone else?" Similar dreams, premonitions, feelings. (Please let's not mention "The Stand" here)

Sure starting to seem like "we" are being driven by a force unlike anyone else. Hehe, I'm scareing myself, I'll stop now.

-- kritter (kritter@adelphia.net), August 02, 1999.

Chubby Hubby works at the county landfill. He has talked y2k to everyone at one time or another. But never made a big deal out of it. In the last week, 3 co workers have come up and asked him what they should be doing as they are getting worried. All have figured out that they are taking their money out of the bank...now! Which I thought interesting. All 3 are headed out for Lowes this weekend to buy advertised generators and all have told their wives to start making lists and buying stuff. One guy told his wife to get matches. She said she had 3 boxes...he told her to buy more that he wasn't going to be out in the woods rubbing two rocks together. I am sure that the wives probably don't have a clue as to where to start, so I spent the evening printing up some of the lists of preps on the web. These guys are all red necks out here in the woods. Don't need to tell them to buy a gun. There are arsenals out here and everyone knows how to use them... including this old lady. I wonder if there are a whole lot out there that are doing the same thing. We don't know it as they aren't on any forums. Anyway, I found it encouraging.

Taz...who will help anyone that helps themselves. The rest of those that we have tried to help, and who have laffed, can sit in the dark!!

-- Taz (Tassie@aol.com), August 02, 1999.

Why do you sound like you made this all up, or at least thats how it sounds to me. Wondering bout this whole board now.

-- Funny (Afunnyfeelin@tas.now), August 02, 1999.

For the last year + I have been waiitng for reporters to toss out worst case scenairos. With a group of other posters from this forum we have scoured the newspapers, magazines, senate reports, and television doing research on Y2k. What little we found was presented as positive, no problems, bump in the road.

I would like for this reporter to give us his reseach notes. Evidently we are not living on the same planet. And if I hear that planes are not going to fall from the sky one more time, I am going to PUKE.

This guy has the credability of a goat.

-- Linda A. (adahi@muhlon.com), August 02, 1999.

I apologize for that article in our local paper. It will not help our city make the proper preparations. This type of coverage for y2k is a disservice to the public.

At least it was deep within the paper in the fifth section (Business/Computing). Previous reporting has been fair but this is bad, bad, bad!

-- rb (phxbanks@webtv.net), August 02, 1999.

Watching the spin control on Y2K makes me sick to my stomach...like watching some people going out to the end of a breakwater to watch a tsunami (tidal wave). They are clueless...and won't listen to what anyone tells them. (Either that, or we aren't telling very well).

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), August 02, 1999.

People don't want to hear bad news, especially news that would cause them to think (heaven forbid) and get off there butts and take some kind of action. Preparation requires thought and work. Y2K not only involves preparing, it also involves questioning things that were previously just taken for granted. Some are not in any position to prepare, even if they wanted to. When they do wake up they are not going to be smiling. All of this crap that we see is just like a lullaby that keeps them alseep. Besides, folks resist change. Human Nature. Folks always have, and always will. It must be forced upon them in order to become real. By then, it will be too late, and we shall see what actually does fade out.

-- Rob Michaels (sonofdust@net.com), August 02, 1999.

Save that newpaper and others like it.. When you run out of toilet paper you have a back up reserve. Makes great reading too. You can laugh at the dim wits and tell them to kiss your --- literally. lol

-- Cassandra (american_storm@usa.net), August 02, 1999.

Gayla,

That was the first article I read this morning during my news cruise, and I really did laugh out loud. There were other articles today, and over the weekend, that expressed the same sentiment.

I think it's a symptom of the accelerated news cycle, or rather the accelerated life cycle in the information age. Also, it's summer and this is the kind of stuff that people want to read. When the press "picks up the story" again in September, it'll seem like ages since all the hype. 150 days left!

"...Wired magazine declared that the end of the world was at hand..." HA!

-- pshannon (pshannon@inch.com), August 02, 1999.

Look, this guy is a reporter. He gets paid to investigate the facts, find the truth and report that to his readers. Why shouldn't Arizonians believe him? Eighteen anyone?

-- BB (peace2u@bellatlantic.net), August 02, 1999.

"charging $5,000 an hour to fix the problem they had created"

What's this guy smoking?

And I'm sick of hearing how "we" created the problem. The DOD refused the 4 digit year standard, and IBM, wanting the .gov business, designed their OS to be "compliant" with the DOD.

Yea, save this article. We may need TP next year... <:)=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), August 03, 1999.

Sysman:

Calm down! [grin] I'm ALWAYS entertained by these high rates that reporters spew. Even when Y2k work was at its height, I never saw a programmer billed out for more than $200/hour, and this was by the larger consulting firms for folks with special hard-to-find skillsets. Who knows how much of this actually went to the programmer? I remember talking with a junior SAP programmer who was billed out at $130 and only got $30/hour from the consulting firm for his work. That's an extreme example, but representative of how much these firms take off the top for our work. No offense to (I think) Jon, but I'd like to see the IRS 20-questions eliminated, thereby eliminating the need for these middlemen.

While on this subject, had I known that companies would institute freezes once Y2k work was complete, I wouldn't have worked so fast to get things done. This brings me to another question...mind wandering this morning. I've seen quite a bit of discussion on this forum regarding missed predictions by the experts on 1999 dates. The answer always seems to be "It's called the Year 2000 problem...NOT the 1999 problem." Then again, I hear lots of folks screaming because systems aren't quite ready NOW. If it isn't Y2k yet and if companies are freezing systems once Y2k-ready or (pick your favorite term here), why are folks upset? It seems prudent to me to take the time to test completely for as long as possible rather than have an IT staff sitting on their hands drawing a paycheck while a system is frozen to changes.

-- Anita (spoonera@msn.com), August 03, 1999.

As I see this article talks about how silly predictions are being ignored, as they should be. He mentions that progress is being made with the ATMs. Then he pokes fun at quotes from star trek actors.

But don't you "get it". This is how the rest of the world sees doomer mentality. It's not our fault you look so stupid; it's your fault. You need a PR campaign for your cause. Ed tried but didn't succeed. You need to talk about realistic scenarios (not the Milne type) if you want to be taken seriously. Instead of flaming pollys, you should use them to sharpen your own arguments. That's not being done and as Hardliner put it: the doomers are losing.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), August 03, 1999.

Maria,

The doomers may be "losing" the PR campaign, but unfortunately this has NO bearing whatsoever on what will actually happen come 1/1/00. PR will not fix a single problem, keep a single person warm, or feed a single person when the century date change arrives.

We all have opinions about Y2K, and they are probably all wrong to some extent. But if my opinion and outlook is way off, I'll look silly next year (just as I have for the past 2 years while trying to get my family and friends to prepare) while I'm eating beans and rice.

If your opinions are way off, it's likely you'll have a more serious situation to deal with. It's all about choices, Maria. You've made yours, and I've made mine. To borrow a phrase from Andrae Crouch, "soon and very soon" we'll live (or die) because of the choices we've made.

-- Nabi Davidson (nabi7@yahoo.com), August 03, 1999.

Nabi, that's certainly true of everyday life activities not just Y2K. Kennedy made his choice and died as a result. The women in the plane with him made their choices and also died as a result. But you missed the point (or maybe got it but choose to sidetrack it). I'm talking specifically how the rest of the world sees you. Don't get upset that they poke fun at Y2K when it's doomers' fault.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), August 03, 1999.

Maria, you truly puzzle me. You come to this forum, and I get the strong feeling that you are searching for answers for yourself. Yet you say it is the "doomer's" (a term I hate...I prefer preparers" or "wise ones" as a more true portrayal of us)...fault that the pollys fail to accept the facts being contributed to this forum and others like it because some contributors see more than a bump in the road ahead. That is faulty reasoning, because, with few exceptions, the press is not covering Y2K in the depth necessary to give the facts to the general public. The government is giving out spin, while preparing for "doom" itself, i.e., bunkers, troops, contingency plans, etc. If you were fairly evaluating what you see here, you would read many highly intelligent people's diligent research and reasoned presentations. I know I share with others who came in the past half year to this and other forums our heartfelt appreciation for the alertness, caring and sharing which has enabled us to begin our preparations for survival in the future. Please shift the blame to where it rightly belongs...and start listening to these knowledgeable posters. Maybe you, too, will begin your preparations.

-- Elaine Seavey (Gods1sheep@aol.com), August 03, 1999.

Elaine, Maria is (bless her heart) already completely prepared.

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), August 03, 1999.