Ok, it seems as if there have been few or no major problems reported yet, and I'm feeling very opptimistic now. I'd say that I'm now expecting a 3 - 8.5 on the scale. My major worries now are banking/finance, oil, and unremidiated critical and non-critical systems that had been shut down for roll-over. As it seems like most infrastructure survived 100%(well ok 99.9%) intact, with the Iron Triange having few if any problems at all, eliminating the worries of TEOTWAWKI that we've had. I think that everything has gone very well, and I hope it continues. I'll ask again durring the week to find your oppinions. Happy New Year!

-- Crono (Crono@timesend.com), January 01, 2000

Answers

In the poor house paying off those 'preps'. That's where we will end up. Give it a rest or go look for comets.

-- Gary (nada@rollover.com), January 01, 2000.

Remember the phrase that everyone is sick of hearing, well here it again: "No one really knows." And that's a fact Jack.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), January 01, 2000.

I'm still holding my breath a little. The banking sectors, business, tthe stock markets and several organizations that shut down for the weekend, have yet to report that all is well.

While the power stayed on nearly everywhere, these have not felt the effects of the bug yet.

When everything is back up and running smoothly in a week or so, I'll exhale.

I still expect many thousands of small to medium businesses to fail due to computer problems. This equals loss of jobs. If enough people lose their jobs, and can no longer feed their families, riots could still occur. Thats why (IMO) the military will stay on alert for several days.

-- Ger (Ger@a.com), January 01, 2000.

Until we see Medicare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, I.R.S., to name a few, operating with precision and dependability, we are very vulnerable to an economic nightmare. Government accounts for a huge segment of employment in this country. Add to this the incredible amounts of money that is issued into circulation in the form of benefits and such, and the truly amazing unanswered questions as to where the U.S. is at this point remain unanswered. I have viewed my preps as not only "meal insurance" against interruptions in the supply chain, but as an economic hedge against rising prices in the months ahead. I cannot believe I am alone in thinking this way. Interest rates are going to march upward; housing may well take a hit. Mortgage brokers will be doodling on pads of paper as they realize there is less and less business(to name but one example of an industry vulnerable to rising interest rates).

Most of the really important problems, e.g. Def. Dept., pipelines that were shut down (and may be pesky to restart), will be kept from public view as a matter of national security.

And what about the many computer viruses that may be running around, looking for infrastructure to disrupt? Seems there are MANY more things yet unknown to hoist a victory flag over this country and y2k. (The only victory so far is preventing massive public panic;well, there is the additional victory of propaganda over a national audience--YECH!)

2 very alarming things to me are: 1)The overall complacency of our nation(not going totally unnoticed by folks like China and Sadam) and, 2) HOW EASY IT IS TO STILL MAKE PRUDENCE TO APPEAR LIKE FOOLISHNESS! An extra comment on this 2nd point is the incredible amount of folks reporting they feel foolish and embarrassed. If you really want to feel/experience both of these emotions, then chuck your preps. and begin running around trying to get folks who prepared for NOTHING, to accept you back into their "fold of foolishness". Then, when fallout begins to become apparent, you will realize the true meaning of foolish, embarrassed, and UNPREPARED!

Just as the coverage of y2k was so incredibly shallow and simplistic in the press for the past few YEARS, so too is the thinking that we are over the worst of y2k. Just cuz my T.V. works, doesn't mean it is "all-clear!". And one night of CNN pics. of lights on all over the world hardly gets me feeling even remotely confident that things will not be "so bad". (This line of reasoning wouldn't work on a 6 year old child.)

The most unfortunate side-effect of y2k roll-over so far (IMHO) is the "innoculation effect" that is occurring among some who prepped. How willing will they prepare or stay prepared for the unforeseen yet not on this nation's radar screen?

In closing, I will add that this nation is in and will remain in a window of vulnerability for some time. Just as a cancer patient never knew the day, time and hour that a tumor began to form within themselves, so too this nation appears to be generally clueless as to our vulnerabilities to attack and outright breakdowns in necessary infrastructure that are now present. When rollover occurred, every unremediated line of code became a cancer cell in this country's economy. Whether the Nation's "immune system" of bug busters can heal all of these conditions, before they grow into a sizeable tumor remains a HUGE question, at least to me.

I therefore will remain ready to "roll with the punches". Old habits are hard to break: Why let CNN and the "crowd of fools" do your thinking for you?

-- (He Who) Rolls with Punches (JoeZi@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), January 01, 2000.

Who knows? Businesses will not fail due to y2k that would not have failed on their own anyway (for using old cruddy software and not fixing it in the many years they had the chance).

Major financial companies WILL NOT FAIL. They've been working on y2k the most, having the most to lose. Trust me on this & don't take "WILL NOT FAIL" to mean "won't have any problems".

y2k will be glitch city for all sorts of systems that haven't been fixed, and because of the fixes. This is god news because it will continue to CREATE jobs well into the new year.

We will learn about the farce of the embedded systems scare in the next few weeks (as things besides water, power, phones all seem to work in spite of using computer chips).

As it was all along, a forseen problem that shows up as a date glitch on many systems. no big deal. (this is what we all thought it was at first and then went crazy because we had too much time to think about and get creative).

And losing a spy satellite for a number of hours aint no big deal.

-- Mike (mike@noemail.net), January 01, 2000.