http://www.year2000.com/y2kitaly.html

-- Yan (no@no.no), January 09, 2000

Answers

The link.

On the other hand, he seems to be working under the assumption that the code *is* functioning properly.

He seems to believe the words of HAL: "I'm completely operational, and all my circuits are functioning perfectly."

There is one other scenario that fits the evidence, and IMO is less of a strain of credulity than the picture he paints.

That scenario is known as "going manual".

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), January 09, 2000.

Anybody know who this masked man, Ron is? He cracks me up (sometimes) (the rest of the time he's probably following me around stealing my jokes).

Hehe, let's hope he continues to use his old billing system so that he doesn't get whacked with the data integrity problems of migrating to a Paradox engine. Whoaaaaaaa, boy, are we having fun yet?

-- paul leblanc (bronyaur@gis.net), January 09, 2000.

If de Jager mentioned WHEN the defective code would be executed, I have missed it. Has all of Italy's code that will execute at any time during this year been executed since the rollover?

Mikey2k

-- Mikey2k (mikey2k@he.wont.eat.it), January 09, 2000.

Exactly, Mikey. We haven't yet seen the delayed or accumulating results of this as-yet-unseen defective code. deJager, like many others who sounded the alarm early, appears to be under the gun to come up with a reasonable explanation NOW, a mere 9 days after the initiation of this insidious process. He simply has not yet allowed enough time to pass for the individual, cumulative and interlinked effects to show themselves.

Plus, he's ignoring the fact that it's in everyone's - software companies, companies, and governments - interest now to immediately declare that "This is NOT a Y2K failure!" when one surfaces publicly, and to neglect to tell us if it doesn't.

But we'll soon seen the output, and then practical, results, one way or another. They can't ultimately be hidden - only desperately and glibly 'explained away'.

-- John Whitley (jwhitley@inforamp.net), January 09, 2000.

John, how soon do you think it will be before enough Y2k problems appear that noticeable effects occur, ones that can't be swept under the rug? I'm not talking about humourous stories about $70000 video late fees or even an occasional small business failure, but rather an impact on an economic report or the jobless rate?

My opinion is that if we don't see an effect on the first quarter that any effects that surface later will be of even lower impact. Yes, I imagine Y2k errors will crop up occasionally for years, but their effects will not be serious, at least not to very many people.

As a side note, I would urge all not to be too quick to assign Y2k as the cause to any failure -- it will discredit any later attempt to assign blame in an actual Y2k effect.

Mikey2k

-- Mikey2k (mikey2k@he.wont.eat.it), January 09, 2000.

Everybody has this curious burning paradox about Italy, Germany, Japan, other first world countries and most of the the third world.

Firstly the fact that these countries did little and are relativly ok (both with embeds and business systems *so far*) it appears that clearly that remediation has had very little to do with why y2k is ok in the US (I say "appears" simply because as I explained below to me the real test for business systems is 1.1.2000 and 1.31.2000 and so far 1.1.2000 was a non-event). Actually it really is very easy to explain. All paradoxes (paradoxi?) are based on assumptions, change the assumptions and the paradox resolves itself. You are assuming that your assessments about y2k are correct. So either you live with your paradox or change the assumptions.

The choice is yours.

As Flint said in response, when I posted the above elsewhere:

IS has a point. One assumption here is that because the government was only *tracking* mission critical systems, therefore they were only *addressing* mission critical systems. I recall 3 or 4 reports from agencies who reported remediating *all* their systems. I don't recall any reports of any agency not working on any non mission critical systems.

Another assumption is that all systems, critical or not, made roughly equal use of dates in the code. I certainly don't know if this is true of all the non mission critical systems. Some of them might have been pretty easy to fix.

Yet another assumption is that fix on failure is not feasible. For many systems, it's good enough. Most date bugs can be tracked down and repaired quickly (within 1-3 days), enough to make a system perfectly functional for practical purposes. And this is good enough for non mission critical systems.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), January 08, 2000.

WRT to embeds I believe that the assumptions that led to the dire warnings were based on completely bogus data to begin with.

For my complete "diseratation" on why this is the case for embeds see:

Why nothing was ever going to happen with the embeds

Serious Question on Embeddeds

WRT to small business I believe the data about who did what may be correct, but the interpretation as to what these facts mean was incorrect.

For my complete "diseratation" on why this is the case for small business see:

Hyatt: Y2K will not be a one time event...

WRT other business systems, I believe that their first real test was was the overnights of 1.1.2000 and 1.3/4/2000 (i.e. after the first business day) and during the overnight to come on 1.31.2000.

So far they have passed very well the begining of the month overnights. If they pass the 1.31.2000 then I don't think any serious problems are out there.

As to why they passed the first set of dates so well it would seem that the dates are not used as much as expected or not in code that can bring systems to a halt as much as expected. If the business systems pass 1.31.2000 with similar effects (i.e. antoher non-event) then we can state the same for business systems in general.

If Italy, Germany, et al bomb out on 1.31.2000 and the US, Canada, et al don't then we can say for sure remediation had an effect for those systems. But as long as results continue to be essentially the same in well prepared and remediated countries as those that did nothing, as has largly been the case to date, there is *no* other conclusion except pre y2k remediation was relatively unesseary as dates were not used to the extent expected or do not cause the failures that were expected.

So I think on 1.31.2000 we will begin to see if pre y2k remediation was necessary or not. That does not mean that remedation was not necessary, it just means as Flint pointed out FOF would have been an adequate response to Y2K.

I am not saying that it should not have been done, as those that did not do it were gambling, but as a postmortem assessment this is what the facts teach us if we really desire to understand and learn from the paradox.

-- Interested Spectator (is@the_ring.side), January 09, 2000.

So you're saying that time slips like an arrow, Paul?

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), January 09, 2000.

Good to see de Jaeger drop the "we fixed everything" line and admit that no one really knows why there weren't more problems.

"We don't know," is an intellectually honest answer, while claiming we fixed everything defies common sense.

-- Xng Ng (Xngng@go.com), January 10, 2000.

This one is gonna be 'no fun' at all. To wit:In a message dated 1/6/2000 5:04:24 PM Central Standard Time, Chris.Rohrs@sf.frb.org writes:

<< Subj: Re: [uk-bcp] FYI - Millennium Bug prophet receives death threats. (reply) Date: 1/6/2000 5:04:24 PM Central Standard Time From: Chris.Rohrs@sf.frb.org (Chris Rohrs) To: SMeyers33@aol.com

Reference: Posted 05/01/2000 4:00pm by Thomas C. Greene http://www.theregister.co.uk/991231-000005.html

Thanks, Steve I finally found it. "Defrocked Prophet of Y2K Doom" really bothered me because de Jager has never been a doom prophet. Guess they wanted to ring a few people's bells.

>>

You are welcome Chris......

Yes, very disturbing that some individuals can find nothing better to do, other than to tear down someone who is so intelligent, and more so, obviously a very caring person. He seemed to miss that about De Jager.....*and all the other* precise, brilliant, caring people who gave Y2K the serious attention it deserved. They did their very best, they were honest; they did real work, hundreds if not thousands of hours...because they cared.....and *that* is what counts.

So few are able to admit that the central problem with Y2K were the *unknowns*....NOT what we 'knew' about it. We were all quite lucky....at least so far (no major chemical or nuclear accidents)...that was my prime concern, above all others. Like I said, "Who needs to try to dodge *those* icebergs...when there are already so many other potential Y2K problems to navigate? It would only complicate matters that much worse."

Obviously, the idiot that made that statement about De Jager had no comprehension of what a Y2K breakdown would mean....in terms of human suffering, here or elsewhere. Or its implications for social instability...a very ugly, hurtful thing...(care to visit Russia or Calcutta today?)...and/or greatly accelerating existing ecological problems. What folly.

At best, 'sophisticated egos reduced to intellectual sword fighting'...devoid of human compassion and completely missing the negative potentials involved in Y2K. Very upsetting that someone could 'shoot from the hip' and (attempt to) discredit someone of the caliber of De Jager, and by implication, all the others working at his 'level' as well. Then threaten him? How encouraging, no? To anyone who still has a brain, or a shred of Heart left in them, this individual only draws attention to themself and how much is lacking within...they are saying very little about de Jager, and a great deal about themselves.

Sorry I'm a bit upset here, but I am. For so many to have worked so hard to insure the safety of Humanity...only to have other *very* small people take pot shots at them...is disgusting. That all the years of focused effort...could be reduced to "eat crow in public" because we *didn't* have a disaster?? Are these people insane? Unbelievable.

It makes me think of Rudyard Kipling's "IF"

'If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken, twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools....'

That about sums up my view of the individual who saw *nothing* of value or benefit in what De Jager and many others did. They missed what is most important about 'the Man' as a human being...and all he did, his contributions. We are quite lucky to have the De Jager's, Gordon's, Kappleman's, Yordon's, Barnett's, Jim Lord's, Koskinen's, David Spinks/UK, Dale Way, etc. and *so* many others who helped get us this far. Yes, even Gary North deserves much credit, even if only as "Devils Advocate" to make people stop and think twice. He did. Gary North is a brilliant individual and a straight shooter; much insight, much excellent analysis; very hard working, dedicated, caring individual. He certainly is nobody's fool. Gary played 'the part' very few have the guts or tje brains to pull off. He didn't cause the problems...he tried to solve them. That takes a lot of caring...that is what I see about the man.

Everyone did their part and made a difference. North got many people to prepare...and had the situation turned out differently, his work would been seen in a very different light today. They seem to miss the connection between those who kept the pressure on...and how much *did* get accomplished; (more than what most expected it seems). Yes, any informed person knows very well we are not out of the woods yet...still more hills and valleys to traverse before we 'Know' we are in the clear. We are not at that point yet...only 1 week into Y2K. There is still more to come it seems; let's hope it's manageable.

I would much prefer that people were "over concerned" and erred on the side of safety, spent extra money, etc....than some half-ass approach which could have resulted in incomprehensible levels of suffering for millions...had the pressure not been on continuously. How people can miss that..is beyond my understanding.

In my view, hats-off and kudos to all those who cared enough to do everything they could, individually and collectively, to insure the safety of so many. We are all very fortunate (so far) and *that* ought to be the understanding that comes out of this "Y2K thing".

What about the he individual efforts AND the cooperation which took place...world wide. When is the last time Russia & the US sat down together to make sure their nuclear weapons didn't go off at each other? How did all that get lost...what...because 'we *didn't* have a massive breakdown' on Jan 1? Y2K helped us realize we are all in this together...and that we depend on each other, and that we need each other....how could that recognition not have significant, lasting value in our fractured world? To ignore all that and more.....and then tear down the very people who worked tirelessly to cover all bases? My, aren't we an enlightened species...

Actually, Y2K was a good 'practice run' for the ecological problems we are now facing, which arguably make Y2K look quite 'trivial' in true context..(see below)...if only they would open their eyes. The information is there, but who knows if they have the emotional guts to look at it for what it is, and not go back to sleep.

Sorry for all my opinions, but that's they way I see it, based on thirty years of comprehensive, global-environmental research. The data on the environment speaks for itself...doesn't need me or any 'authority' to 'validate' it. It's there, and we better face up to it like we just did with Y2K. This is not the 'end' of our problems which need solving...only the beginning.

Anyone who cares to argue that one.....would be a certified fool.

For a short briefing, see:

http://www.bashar.com/GSP/rachel.htm http://www.bashar.com/GSP/sciwarn1.htm. http://www.bashar.com/GSP/articwarm.htm http://www.bashar.com/GSP/water.htm http://www.bashar.com/GSP/oceans.htm http://www.arkinstitute.com/htmls/update.html http://www.bashar.com/GSP/treedying.htm http://www.bashar.com/GSP/butterfly5.htm http://www.chem-tox.com/chlordane/default.htm http://www.trufax.org/fluoride/isfrextracts.html http://www.foe.co.uk/camps/indpoll/0198ape.htm http://www.bashar.com/GSP/erthstat.htm http://www.sierraclub.org/cafos/map/index.asp http://www.mg.co.za/mg/news/97jul2/29jul-radioactive2.html http://www.bashar.com/GSP/chernobyl3.htm

I invite anyone to read *all* the articles, take them *as a whole*...and put forth their 'assessment' of "what it all means" as far as "infrastructure problems". Good luck..(smile)...because we are going to need it even more than what we have just seen with Y2K. It will be quite interesting to see how many "experts" will still be standing after Y2K, or...if they truly learned anything about 'infrastructure threats', or... if it was just well- intentioned "academic posturing"...specialists lacking true context, depth and comprehensive analysis. How convenient. Denial is just such a wonderful thing.

The only problem with 'seemingly making it through' Y2K....is that we probably will not really learn anything lasting from Y2K, and continue unabated, pedal-to-the-floor, racing towards ecological disaster as we have been...under the false impression that we are so smart...."Now, we can lick anything." What a dangerous illusion...and lost opportunity to really "focus up" about the truth of our present global environmental situation: Our planet is dying....and we are pretending (or are being told) that nothing is happening. Uh huh. (My, what a brilliant species...so smart.) Think we can fix those problems as easily as a four digit date field? Keep dreaming.

I like Robert Dean's assessment: "If you are not concerned about these issues, then you are simply uninformed."

and "Why are these issues so important?"......Make no mistake: it's because one of the things at stake...is the future of Planet Earth...."

(Contrary to popular myth, there are real solutions IF we got down to it with the same focus as Y2K, we might even surprise ourselves...and 'make it.' see http://www.bashar.com/GSP/door- solution.htm

In very short order...we'll see how much we really learned from all this, or if 'sailing through Y2K' (as so many now think)...actually turns out to be 'a curse in disguise'. Maybe if things had broken down a bit more...we might have directed our attention to the other threats to our True Infrastructure...our bio-sphere...and Man's destructive impact on it, pursuing short-term profits for the few, at the painful expense of the many.

Those are the real issues, now that we are past the Y2K '10 yard line'. 90 yards to go before we reach the finish line.

Let's hope we care enough about ourselves, each other, and future generations...to get the job done. We are way behind schedule as it is. Any doubts? Read the above articles and, please, show me where I'm wrong.

Best always,

Steve Meyers Global Strategies Project http://www.bashar.com/GSP SMeyers33@aol.com

-- Steve Meyers (SMeyers33@aol.com), January 11, 2000.