TV Movie To Focus On Y2K Problem

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FOR EDUCATIONAL/DISCUSSION PURPOSES ONLY

By DAVID HAYES and FINN BULLERS - Columnist
Date: 10/22/99 22:15

On Jan. 1, 2000, computers malfunction in unexpected ways, causing global chaos, catapulting the Washington, D.C., Y2K crash team into a nonstop race to keep the most frightening consequences from happening...

Promos like that one began running this week for "Y2K," a Year 2000 suspense thriller on NBC. Unable to resist the temptation to exploit Y2K anxiety, NBC will air the made-for-TV movie on Sunday, Nov. 21, during ratings sweeps.

It has already alarmed some Y2K experts, whose greatest remaining fear is the potential for public panic in the weeks building up to Jan. 1, 2000.

"It's akin to yelling fire in a crowded theater," said John Castagna, spokesman for the Edison Electric Institute in Washington, a trade association of electric utilities that has spent billions fixing year 2000 problems. "It's absolutely the wrong thing to do."

Edison Electric has launched an aggressive letter-writing campaign to NBC affiliates -- including KSHB-TV Channel 41 in Kansas City -- urging them to either rethink airing the movie or provide free rebuttal time.

Relax, says NBC.

"If there is a concern, it's only because people haven't seen the movie yet," said Rosalyn Weinman, the network's executive vice president for broadcasting, who has seen rough cuts.

"I can assure you, it's a classic thriller. And if people in Y2K worry about this movie, it's like the transportation authority worried about the movie `Speed' and what it says about buses."

KSHB-TV's programming director, Dana Boyd, said she wasn't aware of any controversy and would take the issue up with her boss. And Y2K planners with the Mid-America Regional Council also plan to discuss what they can do to ease the potential for panic.

The Warner Bros. studio had earlier rejected a similar Y2K project.

In the NBC movie, actor Ken Olin ("L.A. Doctors") is crackerjack computer expert Nick Cromwell, who is recruited to work on the government's "Z2" (think zero-zero) project. And as the minutes tick down, he persuades his boss to ground all airplanes, just before the Eastern seaboard suffers a serious power outage.

By using old-fashioned ingenuity, Cromwell saves the day. A happy ending. "Remember," one NBC spokeswoman says. "We work for General Electric, and they care very much about how this is perceived."

But the fear, the electric institute's Castagna said, is that "some audiences will not be able to separate fact and fiction." And without disclaimers running before the show airs, he envisions a "War of the Worlds" reaction in which some viewers will make bad decisions based on "bad television."

The North American Electric Reliability Council has added its own words of caution.

"We hope NBC will be a good corporate citizen and recognize the dangers involved in hyping a negative situation that could feed people's concerns," spokesman Eugene Gorzelnick said.

Don Meyer, spokesman for the Senate's Y2K committee, doesn't make too much of the movie, saying viewers are smart enough to separate fiction from fact. "The movie," he said, "is not likely to blur the lines anymore than the ripped-from-today's-headlines genre we see on `Law & Order.' "

John Hall of the American Bankers Association, a group that in the past has been thin-skinned about Y2K, agreed.

"Of course, we would prefer the movie not be shown, but we're confident that people will see this as strictly entertainment," he said, "just as they did with `Terminator II.' "

Y2K on PBS

If the disaster genre is too rich for your blood, public television has a Y2K offering worth viewing this week.

Robert X. Cringely, former high-tech gossip columnist for InfoWorld and one of the first dozen employees hired by Apple Computer in 1977, presents "Y2K: The Winter of our Disconnect" at 7 p.m. and midnight Tuesday on KCPT.

In the one-hour show, Cringely's car breaks down near St. Helens, Ore., his rural backdrop for "dissecting, decoding and debugging" the Y2K quandary.

-- flb (fben4077@yahoo.com), October 24, 1999

Oops. Sorry...

Underline off. I hope!

Havn't posted in a while. It's early - need more coffee....

And for the Spell Check Police, elctric, is really electric. Now I will go away quietly, thank you.

;-(

-- flb (fben4077@yahoo.com), October 24, 1999.

Oooh!! I want to see the "War of the worlds"-style disclaimers:

"The following depicts a series of worldwide computer failures due to incorrect handling of years by computer programmers. In reality, no one would ever be stupid enough or short-sighted enough to make such a mistake. Governments and businesses have not spent billions of dollars on this problem. The U.S. Senate has not issued hundreds of pages of reports and testimony on this subject. Now back to our enjoyable little fantasy thriller...."

Actually, I think turning Y2K into a movie of the week would be the best way to keep the public from taking it seriously. They can play it back to back with one of those asteroid movies.

-- You Know... (notme@nothere.junk), October 24, 1999.

"It has already alarmed some Y2K experts" How come the 'experts' quoted are just PR flacks?

In any event, in the interest of avoiding panic, I wish the network will not see fit to broadcast this movie, since it seems to have panicked the 'experts.'

-- Scarecrow (Somewhere@over.rainbow), October 24, 1999.

My Favorite Quote "Don Meyer, spokesman for the Senate's Y2K committee, doesn't make too much of the movie, saying viewers are smart enough to separate fiction from fact. "The movie," he said, "is not likely to blur the lines anymore than the ripped-from-today's-headlines genre we see on `Law & Order.' ""

Maybe Don Meyer should visit this forum before he makes any judgement of people being smart enough to separate fiction from fact.

-- Don't Get It (fear@tbomb.2000), October 24, 1999.

children.

-- fix (it@up.now), October 24, 1999.

-- the apprentice (cleaners@re.us), October 24, 1999.