Monday, October 4, 1999

Y2K fears fall off

Experts say media lulls Canucks into 'right conclusion for wrong reason'

By CP TORONTO -- Are you suffering from Y2K fatigue?

Well, you're not alone.

Earlier this month, a national poll found a majority of Canadians surveyed -- 57% of the 2,054 adults surveyed -- said they were confident they wouldn't be bothered by the Y2K bug, a glitch that affects older electronic devices that use two digits instead of four to record the year.

The poll, prepared for the federal government by Environics Research, also suggested Canadians who did feel threatened weren't in any hurry to make emergency plans.

Guy McKenzie, head of the federal Year 2000 Project Office, says anxiety about Y2K is decreasing because of all the reassuring information Canadians have been getting from governments and big business.

But Canadian Y2K guru Peter de Jager says the media has ignored the positive aspects of the story.

That means most Canadians have "made the assumption that since the media isn't reporting about this, things must be okay ... They're coming to the right conclusion for the wrong reasons."

De Jager says he's worried about how the public will react when media coverage starts to pick up towards the end of the year.

"All of a sudden, the press is going to come back with hob nail boots, and people will overreact to the fact that the media are talking about it again."

But Toronto-based writers Stephen Gadsden and Jonathan Chevreau, co-authors of Krash: How Y2K Could Sink the Stock Market, believe the media will remain largely silent on the issue -- until it's too late.

"... The final pin prick to the over-inflated U.S. stock balloon is mostly likely to be Y2K," the book concludes. "That may be an understatement -- Y2K could be more like a detonator."

For now, the fuse is still burning.

Last February, top U.S. Y2K troubleshooter John Koskinen stressed the impact of the millennium bug will likely be more psychological than physical.

"As it becomes clear our national infrastructure will hold, overreaction becomes one of the biggest remaining problems."

- Back up important computer files.

- Run a year 2000 test on your computer.

- Get paper copies of important documents including bank statements, credit card bills and investment portfolios.

- Check insurance policies on what is covered.

- Ensure you have a flashlight, radio and extra batteries.

- Have enough groceries and non-perishable food for a long weekend.

- Have enough cash for a long weekend.

The Year 2000 problem tends to be most common in computer applications created before 1995, and arises from the way the date is stored. To save memory, older programs and microprocessors were designed to store the year's last two digits rather than all four numbers. When 2000 arrives, systems with the bug are expected to mistake 00 for the year 1900.

You might wonder, what does it matter if the computer thinks it's 1900.

Problems arise because much of our everyday lives are now reliant on computer technology. When 2000 rolls around, if some programs think it is 1900, that could result in calculation mistakes or outright system failures.

If you want more information on who is doing what to get ready for the Y2K bug, here are some Web sites you can visit:

- For federal government info: www.info2000.gc.ca

- For The Canadian Bankers Association: www.cba.ca

- For Statistics Canada: www.statcan.ca/english/y2000

- For travel information from the Department of Foreign Affairs: www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/y2k

- For the United Kingdon's Action 2000 site: http://international.bug2000.co.uk

- The International Trade Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce: http://y2k.ita.doc.gov

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http://www.canoe.ca/OttawaNews/OS.OS-10-04-0048.html

-- Homer Beanfang (Bats@inbellfry.com), October 04, 1999

Answers

Garbage in, garbage out.

Same crap being spewed by the spinmeisters.

Gary North already has posted the FDIC charter portion that clearly states that any/all personal statements/printouts of your financial accounts at any FDIC institution have NO LEGAL WEIGHT.

Maybe the REAL reason Jaeger is worried is that if Y2K turns out to be more than a BITR, his EX-allies will be coming after his cajones.

Or is that his allies? Hell, I can't keep track, he keeps changing sides.

-- profit_of_doom (doom@helltopay.ca), October 04, 1999.

profit:

de Jager has been doing his best to keep his sights on a rapidly moving and hazy target. There are no "sides" except as imposed by your imagination. Reality tends to gravitate towards middle grounds, where things aren't as great as we'd like nor as bad as we fear. And de Jager is trying to grasp that reality, while being sniped at by extremists at both ends. We'll have the usual bell curve of events, plotted against any number of different scales. And this curve neither has, nor takes, "sides".

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

But Canadian Y2K guru Peter de Jager says the media has ignored the positive aspects of the story.

Whoa. Look at that. He's doing stand up comedy now.

-- Lane Core Jr. (elcore@sgi.net), October 04, 1999.

Profit

When did GN post that FDIC charter? I cannot seem to find it on his site, do you have a link?

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeed@yahoo.com), October 04, 1999.

Could be he's just trying to sell his new book on Y2K humor.

Hey, maybe he's got a tour booked, as well. Can't you just see him now? Adjusting his tie, eyes all a-goggle:

"No respect, I tell ya. I get no respect...

Y2K's been gettin' to me. I called Suicide Prevention. They tried to talk me into it.

So I told my psychiatrist I got suicidal tendencies. He said from now on I have to pay in advance.

I tell everyone the airlines are gonna be fine for Y2K. No respect. Why, American Airlines, they thanked me for flying United.

No respect at all..."

-- Mac (sneak@lurk.hid), October 04, 1999.

Mac,

I was going to say something about de Jager, but heck, you said it all. That was perfect! He *is* a bit like Rodney Dangerfield, isn't he?

-- Gordon (gpconnolly@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

The spinmeisters are like a bad back seat driver. They are always yelling for the sriver to "slow down" or "speed up." The worst part is that they never tell the driver to "look out for the truck."

-- smfdoc (smfdoc@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

I heard that De Jager was abducted by aliens. They inserted a tube in his head, sucked his brain out, and filled his head up with green eggs and ham.

-- @ (@@@.@), October 04, 1999.

Flint

There are no hazy targets in some sectors of society. While there is alot of confidence in power, communications, and banking in Canada we have NO infomation about cities, water - waste water systems, transportation (just look at the DOD air transport report), chemical industries, and health, S&MEs, international problems are looking to be a real problem.

de Jager is just a twit to be saying we broke the back. All these spin doctors are trying to play down TEOTWAWKI when that isn't the problem. It is the local systems that will be the problem, de Jager makes a big deal about being in a airplane during the rollover. BIG DEAL!!!! How many folk are going to be in a plane at that time???? He should be just a little more informed about water - waste water systems. May just be a suprise to him that they are going to be shutting down the systems in Ontario during the rollover.

I wonder if he knows little details like that.

Y2K has provided a good reason for folks to get up to speed about living in a society prowen to breakdowns. Unfortunately January 1st is not one of the best times of the year to learn about such things. Society is cronicly ignorant on how to deal with managing cold weather disruptions. Just a head in the sand way of looking at things.

All these big thinkers (including yourself) don't understand that they have killed community motivation inregards to emergency relief, and that is where it starts, the individual, family and community.

I would relish having a little chat with de Jager, I just hate it when soft looking individuals have no clue on how to deal with disruptions, specially when nature holds the final cards as it does during the winter months up here.

With Y2K it isn't fear that will kill but ignorance.

-- Brian (imager@home.com), October 04, 1999.

Brian:

When you say "we" have no information about many critical things, are you referring to yourself, or do you mean to say that *nobody* has this information? I know I've seen quite a bit about chemical industries, health care, water/wastewater treatment plants, transportation systems, etc.

No, I haven't seen full details on all of these, nor would I be likely to understand full details in all these various specialties. But the attention paid to all of them has been far from a secret. I doubt intensive investigation/testing has been happening at all plants, all cities, all companies. But a great deal of what we've learned where this *has* been done is highly transferable. Nobody invents a water treatment or chemical plant from scratch -- these are composed largely of "off the shelf" components.

I have absolutely no idea how extensive de Jager's knowledge is of all these essential components of our infrastructure and economy. But I won't make the claim that he lacks all this information just because *I* don't know. And he seemed so knowledgeable and convincing when he was sounding the alarm. Amazing how much he's forgotten and how stupid he's become when you disagree with him, isn't it? As Mark Twain wrote, his (Twain's) father was stone ignorant when Twain was 17. When Twain was 21, he was amazed how much his father had learned in four years! Just like you're amazed how dumb de Jager has become in one year.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

Flint,

I know de Jager fits your own model of the Y2k scenario. But the rejection of de Jager is for a more basic reason than you infer. He has done a 180 degree flip-flop, that's the problem. In psychology, they call this sort of thing manic/depressive or depressive/manic in the de Jager case. Also schizophrenic. Can you imagine that?

-- Gordon (gpconnolly@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

Flint I have the only Canadian Web site with all the Industry Canada info on it.

 Industry Canada Testimony

I am quite aware of what is happening in Canada. Not much at the moment. The NCPG has minimal information on the status of the above industies IMHO and are not conserned with the preventing the Y2K problems but the swift contingency management in the event of failures.

 The National Contingency Planning Group (NCPG/GPNC) Who we are

The local - community awareness is still minimal at best, this is where the rubber will meet the road for peoples reactions to the effects of Y2K and failures. If there are significant failures then there are going to be alot of really pissed off people because they weren't properly informed as to the risks. Even today there was a local comp show and he was discussing the failure of drive trains in cars. Well that was a non issue for a long time. Now where folks get their paychecks would be a more interesting story. Or investments in risky ventures because there is only going to a minimal problems in society.

Canadian are relying on the US data for an indication of where we stand. Power, Banking, and Communications up here are totally differant issues as each is more consolodated in just a few institutions. But I highly doubt that the hospitals and health industries, wastewater plants, chemical plants, shipping (I live on a island and the ferries are going to be a problem) and S&Ms are any differant, also the international risks are large. For example the Asia crisis hit my province in a terrible way for the forest and mining industries. LOTS of personal TEOTWATKI, towns shutting down because there is only one company. And that was just a currency fluctuation.

Y2K will be worse. And the press doesn't have a clue.

Personally personal debt will get the biggest attention after the rollover. That is where people will feel the effects big time, in their pocket books.

-- Brian (imager@home.com), October 04, 1999.

Gordon:

I strongly suspect that this "180 degree flip flop" is an artifact of your own projection. de Jager warned for a long time. Finally people started doing something about it (whether de Jager had anything to do with that I wouldn't know how to determine).

So de Jager watched what was being done, talked to a lot of people, and became encouraged by the progress. Eventually, he came to the conclusion that y2k might be bad, but would no longer be a civilization-killer. And he *still* says that 3 days worth of preparations is useless and urges at least a month. And he *still* says there will be many problems, inconveniences, shortages, delays, screwups, etc. De Jager continues to predict a genuinely notable event, just not a global dieback-type calamity.

NOW, where is this flip flop? It only exists in the mind of someone with a binary mindset. de Jager is considered to have been a doomer because that was the closest pigeonhole. When he softened his stance in the face of genuine (albeit VERY expensive) progress, these binary- minded people were forced to cram him into the no-problem polly pigeonhole. In fact, he *never fit either one*! He was somewhat right of center to start, and has been gradually moving left. When he passed the midpoint, you plucked him from one FAR extreme and plunked him down at the other FAR extreme, and THEN you said that DE JAGER did the flip flop. Sorry, ain't so.

You're only saying that if he's not on OUR side, then he must be on THEIR side. And there are many bell curves, as I wrote elsewhere, none of which have sides. You created those sides in your imagination.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 04, 1999.

Flint mentioned

"Amazing how much he's forgotten and how stupid he's become when you disagree with him, isn't it? As Mark Twain wrote, his (Twain's) father was stone ignorant when Twain was 17. When Twain was 21, he was amazed how much his father had learned in four years! Just like you're amazed how dumb de Jager has become in one year."

Flint

de Jagar might know something about Y2K but he is an obvious idiot when dealing will potential social failure. That is what REALLY bugs me. If we are going to in a vulnerable period during the middle of a Canadian winter then one had better be able to look after their comfort level in the event of possible failure. My experiance with such conditions is very extencive, yet there is no conformation that information on the failure of systems during the winter is taken seriously. There is no real information on the net that discribes how to deal with situations like that on a personal level. If we have a disaster like the Quebec Ice Storm again in Canada this winter we will not have the support of the continent. We have learned little from that disaster and if Y2K is going to be smack dab during a natural disaster then I am NOT GOING TO BE IMPESSED. But that is what we should be preparing for.

And just so you are clear about what I am talking about read the site below, it was written after the Quebec Ice Storm and when folks were talking about "heading for the hills". This is not a good idea :o)

Been there done that. Peter hasn't

 Chop wood haul water

-- Brian (imager@home.com), October 04, 1999.

and this is from the country that experienced a three week ice storm last winter. Oh, wait--It was "only" Quebec. Sheesh, don't they get it that there are other occasions needing food, water, cash and alternative heating? As Old Git and some others said on another post earlier today, this is not just about Y2K. It is about taking responsibility for yourself and your family. I don't diminish the potential impact of Y2K and deJager seems to have become an opportunistic head case, but really...

-- Nancy (wellsnl@hotmail.com), October 04, 1999.

Flint,

Like I suggested, de Jager fits your own scenario. Now, what's all this personal crap directed against me and my imagination? Do I accuse you of imagining *your* own scenario and creating something out of whole cloth? Please Flint, stick to de Jager. And I wasn't suggesting that you are schizophrenic either, but if you really want me to start analyzing you from that perspective, well hell, it wouldn't be too hard, sport. Flint if you had any really good stable imagination working for you then you would be on the gold train and making a bundle right now. But no, you had to stick to some naive attempt to profit from a software project, and get wiped out. Flint, you are at point now where you should be listening and learning more and talking less. Advice from those who failed is not good advice at all. Face it Flint, you lack courage, always have and probably always will.

-- Gordon (gpconnolly@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

As far as de Jager being stupid. Well this one proves it. Telling the leader of the excited states how to conduct his country how to conduct its awareness and remediation must be hard enough for US citizens but to have a Canadian do it must be gauling. I am sure that de Jager got raked through the coals for this one.

 Open Letter to President Clinton

Interestingly enough Senetor Horn's last reportcard was not widely covered. Actually it got to share Y2K awareness with the international situation and the State Department. Alot more sexy.

In Doomsday Avoided de Jager writes about the efforts of the "iron triangle" to solve their problems. Well that is just the tip of the Y2K iceburg. But there is an obvious change in his manner. Do we think that he got the message that Canadians weren't going to be welcomed in the US if they continue to play up the Y2K risks?? I think so.

  Doomsday Avoided

-- Brian (imager@home.com), October 05, 1999.

"Reality tends to gravitate towards middle grounds, where things aren't as great as we'd like nor as bad as we fear. And de Jager is trying to grasp that reality, while being sniped at by extremists at both ends."

FLint, pal... while I agree with your general statement in general (not to be redundant or repetitive), de Jager's position cannot lucidly be interpreted as anything but a flip-flop. In 1993, de Jager said that we were "accelerating toward disaster." Now, he asserts that we have "broken the back of Y2K," almost exclusively (outside of a couple of highly regulated industries) on the basis of self-reported data.

You make good arguments in general that Y2K won't be a doomsday issue (and likely never would have been), although I'm not in agreement with you on each part of your argument. But I think you're reaching here to defend de Jager as a guy who's always been looking squarely down the middle of the highway.

-Scott

-- Scott Johnson (scojo@yahoo.com), October 05, 1999.

Scott, you said:

"In 1993, de Jager said that we were "accelerating toward disaster." Now, he asserts that we have "broken the back of Y2K," almost exclusively (outside of a couple of highly regulated industries) on the basis of self-reported data."

Are you seriously putting forth the notion that no progress could possibly have been made in six years? That's not pessimism, that's defeatism.

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), October 05, 1999.

Paul:

No, that's dogma. Blind faith is not subject to "progress", while remediation is. Those who notice progress are heretics, not observant. de Jager cannot be understood, explained, or defended within this frame of reference.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 05, 1999.

Flint,

Just as dogma can be used as an excuse for "unfounded optimism" so can it be used as a rationale for defeatism.

I wonder, have none of the people who rip de Jager for altering his viewpoint ever changed their minds about anything, especially after six years?

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), October 05, 1999.

Paul:

We are still not communicating. You do not "change your mind" within this frame of reference. You either get converted, or you do not. de Jager hasn't been accused of changing his mind, but rather his master. He "converted" to the enemy religion. There is no other explanation.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 05, 1999.

Flint,

I understand your point that "one camp or the other" is the prevailing viewpoint here. After all, how else could anyone label de Jager as a "traitor" unless clearly demarcated "sides" had been established. I simply choose not to allow myself to fall into that trap, even when discussing those that have.

My choice of wording was intentional. I really would be interested to hear if, in fact, those who deride Peter de Jager for "flip-flopping" have never once in the last six years changed their minds about any issue of significance based on new information. Can they really believe that thoughtful people cannot change their points of view as facts change? After all, Ed Yourdon has done so on other issues as can be witnessed via his books "Decline And Fall Of the American Programmer" and "Rise And Resurection Of The American Programmer." I've corresponded professionally with Ed for about seven years now and he's always struck me as a pretty thoughtful guy. He seems generally well regarded here, so why is Ed's thinking allowed to evolve and not de Jager's?

Yes, I know that there is a mindset among many here that won't allow such a switch. What I'm really fishing for is an explaination of why it is not allowed from one of those who holds the position that, despite 6 years of change regarding the issue, nothing could have reasonbly changed about de Jager's view point. Moreover, I'm really hoping for an explainiation that doesn't use trivial terms or concepts such as "butthead," "idiot," "traitor" and "shill." What do you suppose my chances are?

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), October 06, 1999.

Lastly, while I know he won't be espousing this position, I wonder what the reaction would be to Ed's coming out and saying "Ol' Petey D. is right! We really have broken this Y2K thing and we are going to be alright." Imagine the wailing and nashing of teeth from that one. Would all these folks who damn de Jager and beatify Yourdon stick with their dogma ("Y2K cannot be fixed") or their icon (Ed)?

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), October 06, 1999.

PAul, you've been downing a few too many at the Straw Man Saloon. All I said was that de Jager has most assuredly flip-flopped, from suggesting we were heading to a disaster to a place where we have "broken the back" of Y2K... and that he makes this switch primarily on the basis of self-reported data. Nowhere do I suggest, nor do I believe, that significant progress hasn't happened. I believe that it has. The question is, have we gone from a 20 megaton H-bomb to a "low-yield" Hiroshima-style event? Or have we "broken the back" of the Y2K problem, whatever that may mean?

It's bad manners to put words in someone else's mouth, whether doomer or polly. Unfortunately, that is the favorite pastime of some on this forum.

Scott

-- Scott Johnson (scojo@yahoo.com), October 06, 1999.

Scott, actually he made the switch about two weeks after the prez read his letter and was able to dispatch some goons with duct tape.

Really. Doomer -> Polly in < 1 month.

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), October 06, 1999.

Don't waste your time arguing about what De Jager says. How can you give any credibility to someone who says one thing, a few months later does a complete 180, then a few months later does a 180 again? That's even worse than some of the Pollyticians. At this point I don't care which side he is on, his opinions are worthless.

Maybe he is a corporate puppett having his strings pulled in ten different directions.

Maybe his doctor keeps switching his medications.

Maybe he is cracking under pressure.

Maybe there is nothing between his ears but a 10 lb. slab of feta cheese.

No matter how you cut it, he's a flake. Don't waste your time!

-- @ (@@@.@), October 06, 1999.

Paul:

OK, more seriously then. Six years ago, de Jager's position on y2k was "Dangerous monster. Must be slain, or abandon all hope." Today that position has moderated to "Not slain, but seriously crippled. Still capable of doing significant, but no longer irrecoverable, damage." As such, de Jager's position seems to track remediation progress more or less accurately.

It's interesting to contrast de Jager and Yourdon, since Yourdon's position really isn't necessarily so different. Yes, Yourdon has predicted serious repercussions, but also not irrecoverable. Yourdon instead expects a very slow recovery, following an extended period of near-universal hardship. I don't think de Jager expects either such initial difficulties, or such an extended recovery period.

I'll presume that both men base their expectations on their interpretations of ALL available evidence (that is, that neither has taken an inflexible position). What do you suppose would lead them to such varying opinions? Perhaps a clue lies in some of the reports we've been reading, wherein business and IT leaders admit current y2k problems, expect them to worsen, and remain optimistic about business prospects. There is an apparent paradox here (called a "disconnect" in some threads) that needs to be understood.

My guess is that de Jager has chosen to focus on macroeconomic impacts, on the likely changes to quality of life generally, on the magnitude of the incremental changes y2k might bring (reduced availability of some things, higher prices, higher unemployment rates, more time spent straightening out mixups, and so on and on). From this perspective, he feels we'll get by with perhaps some small struggle (and perhaps not). This is a top-down perspective.

Yourdon seems much more narrowly focused on the technical aspects of the date handling bugs themselves. This is a natural outgrowth of his profession, contacts, and experiences. Yourdon sees that it's unavoidable that we will experience a very large number of such bugs, many of them critical to the operations of those who suffer them. IT departments everywhere will be very toxic places for a while, and some of this poison is sure to leak out and affect the health of the business. This is a bottom-up perspective.

It's probably noteworthy that the failed predictions so far (all those spike dates that didn't end up causing problems) originated from geeks buried in IT departments. Those are the people who wrote those bugs, they knew they were there, they knew they hadn't been fixed yet. And indeed those bugs did bite as predicted, but it didn't hurt. Their importance from a business perspective was tiny compared to their importance to those working long hours in glass rooms to fix them.

Now we read that organizations are admitting to substantial numbers of y2k problems (direct date mishandling) in droves, still without significant impact to the businesses themselves, much less the economy. And these are occurring simultaneously with the much more significant problems associated with major upgrades and totally new implementations.

For de Jager-level impacts (the macroeconomic picture) the latent (still to strike) date bugs must truly dwarf anything we've experienced so far from a combination of date bugs and remediation disruptions. But this is exactly what remediation has forestalled. No, we didn't get them all. de Jager feels we we got enough of them, while Yourdon does not.

To return to my automobile metaphor, Yourdon and his camp will emphasize the 40,000+ deaths, the resource consumption, the environmental impacts, etc. de Jager and his camp will point out that we still buy and drive cars without a second thought. Y2K will exact a high price, but we can afford it.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 06, 1999.

Scott,

I did not mean to put words in to your mouth, and I apologize if it seemed that that is what I was doing. It just seems ludicrous to think of a position changing over a six year time frame as "flip- flopping," a term which (at least to me) implies a rather sudden change in direction.

And no, folks, I don't believe in the "he was a doomer one week and a polly the next" schtick. Read his stuff over all that time. He evolves. The general progression has been:

"Houston, we have a problem!"

"Really, this could be bad if left unattended."

"Okay, now that I have your attention, how are we going to do this?"

"I'm going to harrangue you until this gets done..."

"Okay, that's a little better, but now we have the big stuff left."

"Getting better, but still a lot of work."

"There's light at the end of the tunnel. Let's hope it's not another train."

"We might have a chance."

"Okay, We've solved the root problem. If we don't blow it by getting cocky at the last minute, we will be okay."

If that's "flip-flop" and a sudden turn to you, you see things a whole lot more black-and-white than I do.

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), October 06, 1999.

"Y2K will exact a high price, but we can afford it."

"Y2K will be insignificant."

Flint, are you sure you're not a Libra? What IS your birthday? I'll pop you a chart to help us all reconcile the root cause of this amazing schizophrenia/duplicity. Please. This is an honest request.

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), October 07, 1999.

We Libras are far too balanced to believe in astrology. 8-}]

-- Mac (sneak@lurk.hid), October 07, 1999.

lisa:

I'm just trying to keep up and think about what I read, rather than take a dogmatic position and ignore what I don't like. So I freely admit I swing wildly from day to day, depending on what I run across. Today, my feeling is that problems will be manageable -- a high price compared to what's happening right now, and insignificant compared to my level of preparations and what they imply.

When I think about y2k, "bad" is kind of like "big". I always have to ask, "Compared to what?"

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), October 07, 1999.