I've gone to Yourdon's site for about a month now...and I've been generally impressed by the amount of thoughtful letters on Y2K. This is my first glance at the message board section and I am impressed by the people here as well.

I'm wondering if any of you got direct responces from Mr. Yourdon himself... Or what kind of information has helped you in your decision about Y2K...

Thanks and God bless.

-- Tribe (tribeshawn@netscape.net), August 05, 1999

Answers

Newby;

Welcome, yes Ed does stop in from time to time, not as much as he use to when he moderated the forum, but he does stop by to chat from time to time.

I GI last summer. Saw lots of sites and info on the Web, and read Ed's book. It was real clear, that there is a problem. As you have probably guessed there is no clear consenses on just how big the Bump In The Road (BITR) is but there is lots of discussion here as to this debate!

Read and Learn, make up your own mind as to how to prepare. This is not a "one size fits all" problem. Things will vary depending on what your resources are and how much $ you want to spend. There are lots of good people here and a fair number of Trolls. Each of them has there place. This forum appears to have become a bit of a debate (towards the BE PREPARED side of the equation) on just what will happen.

IMHO: It will get worse before it gets better.

helium

-- helium (heliumavid@yahoo.com), August 05, 1999.

<Or what kind of information has helped you in your decision about Y2K>

Take a look at my response at this thread. (It's near the top.) A newbie from Houston asked for some help and wanted to get some insight: http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=001AmK

In '97 & '98 I was a speaker at various business conferences. Media used to call me up frequently. I directed them elsewhere for "quotes" from experts. I've always prefered to remain in the background.

Thread above relates to some of my personal experiences. In the past I lead a somewhat glamorous lifestyle. Now I'm gardening up in Oregon:-))

-- Cheryl (Transplant@Oregon.com), August 05, 1999.

More information specifically for newcomers:

Y2K for Newcomers

Y2K for Newcomers  Part II

-- Rob Michaels (sonofdust@com.net), August 05, 1999.

The second link (Part II)is to the wrong thread - seems as though WORD changed a letter in the url from upper to lower case! So here goes a second try:

Y2K for Newcomers  Part II

-- (sonofdust@com.net), August 05, 1999.

Try my website for some hard-core Y2K preparatory information. In particular, look at the "Suggested Readings" article for IMO the best Y2K books, and "Other Links" for some of the best Y2K websites. Regulars, my new site administrator is most of the way thru with updating my website. You may want to take a look at it also.

www.y2ksafeminnesota.com

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), August 05, 1999.

I've been visiting the site since I read Ed's book and Michael Hyatt's THE MILLEMNIUM BUG. I initially went looking for the books because, even though I wasn't sure what might happen around Y2K, I wanted to find some discussion about what I might do to help my family cope just in case there were problems. I find this to be a place where I can "brainstorm" from the sidelines by just reading other postings, or ask specific questions, one of the only places I know of, I might add. My husband and I don't discuss it, and MOST of the people I know seem to have pushed it off their radar screens for whatever reasons. I don't know why I feel compelled to have contingency preps. There are smart, responsible people who have come to totally opposite ends of the spectrum, in their reactions to the same information from govt. and business. I don't consider myself distrustful or cynical about people in general, but on this subject, I just can't believe all of these assurances that this is just going to be a bump in the road for a day or so. With the factor of embedded chips alone, how can anyone know for sure where every one of them is, what they do, and whether they are compliant? I have children and I am very careful about who I entrust their welfare to, whether it is a teacher, a doctor, or another parent while they are in their home for a sleepover. I know there some people throughout govt. and business whom I would trust to do the right thing, if I knew them, as well. But I realize that there are also people in those places whom I would not choose to trust, and those are the ones I worry about when it comes to whom to believe about Y2K. So I am hedging my bet, so to speak, by taking the course of praying for the best, but preparing for difficulties in whatever ways I have available to me. I will live with being overprepared just fine, if that turns out to be the case, but I would not be able to forgive myself if I could have and should have prepared backup supplies, and didn't. The consequences of that kind of bad bet could be very bad in winter, where I live. You know that old saw, "If everybody else jumped off the bridge, would you, too?" It feels like I would be doing just that if I took a leap of faith that Y2K will just be a BITR. That's some of the thinking that informs my place in the Y2K "debate" at this point in time. Hang in there, and just do what feels right and makes sense to you.

-- Kristi (KsaintA@aol.com), August 05, 1999.

Thanks again to everyone who sent me some information...

I tried to write back to the people who responded, but was unable to write Cheryl. Thanks for the info. about the petroleum situation in Houston.

To everyone who posted...let me know what things the Y2K bug has you concerned about and what you have done to prepare...I'm sure that lots of people would be interested. (Unless this has already been covered, if so, send me an email.)

God bless.

-- Tribe(Shawn) (tribeshawn@netscape.net), August 06, 1999.