Sorry, I do get wordy at times!! anyway to the question...Where are all the heavy hitters now?? With all the events that are posted here it would appear to me that just maybe the frequency, type and level of severity of outages, sewage spills, Telcom problems, etc., are beyond the NORM. Are we just more astute or attentive to these events. How would they compare with the past couple of years. Are they on par with previous years or is there a trend here?? Imagination, paranoia or reality?? I wonder! Sure wish one of these heavy hitters would put together a study to show a side by side comparison for us. I wonder if creditability is stopping them??

-- Ron Withers (rgwithers@hotmail.com), June 23, 2000

Answers

A forum question, Ron -- and an excellent one -- but not within the raison d'etre of the GICC.

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-- (nuts@upina.cellrelaytower), June 23, 2000.

As an "occasional" poster I have not seen any evidence of a "heavy hitter" interest in this forum. This could be anything from loss of creditability or maybe lack of profitability. The one exception is Paula Gordon who does check in now and then.

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), June 23, 2000.

Ron Withers:

Quite a few comparative analyses of the kind you mention have been undertaken. The ones that I know of are pretty basic, but they do represent a beginning. References to many of these analyses can be found on the old TB2000 website. A whole host of references to websites that have tracked problems (including government websites) can be found on my website in several places: the January 17 comments piece, the John Koskinen Q&A piece, and the summary of the April 12 presentation (see the link on the Recent Programs page). See http://www.gwu.edu/~y2k/keypeople/gordon.

To do a proper job on a comparative analysis for any given sector might well take weeks of effort. At the present time, very, very few people seem to have the interest, time, and resources to devote to such an undertaking. I know of no one who has been tasked to undertake such studies as a part of their job responsibilities.

Perhaps, if more people knew where the raw data could be found, they would undertake the task. Of course, this is what the ICC was to have done. The sector benchmark fact sheet that the President's Council released on December 13, 1999 was to have provided the baseline data. (For a copy of this see Appendix 2 in the Q&A piece at http://www.gwu.edu/~y2k/keypeople/gordon/Q&A.html) So far as I know, there was no effort to follow through on this and to use it for its intended purpose. (I discuss that a bit in a summary of an April 12 slide presentation at http://hv.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a.tcl?topic=Grassroots %20Information%20Coordination%20Center%20%28GICC%29 A URL to a video is also available at that site.) It seems most likely that the kind of comparative studies you are looking for will need to be done by individuals on their own time without benefit of funding. I think this will be accomplished, but it may take some time.

nuts:

Perhaps, the raison d'etre of GICC is in the eye of the beholder. I find GICC to be the best/last source of leads, clues, and information on actual and likely Y2K and embedded systems-related problems around. As far as I am concerned, GICC is fulfilling its purpose very, very well indeed.

Martin:

Thanks for the compliment. Time and energy can also be factors. I hope to post something soon on psychosocial aspects of addressing Y2K, including whistleblowing-type challenges that are serving as major impediments to sharing information. Such information is needed in order to do the most useful analyses and assessments. Such analyses and assessments might well be the best means of helping many in roles of responsibility understand that there are concerns that still need to be addressed, that Y2K and embedded systems-related problems are continuing to occur.

I can assure you that I know that the postings on GICC are reaching people who are finding them of great interest. I have good reason to believe that many of the postings here will serve as a basis for analyses that will be undertaken during the next six to twelve months. "Stay tuned," as they say.

In my view, your efforts and those of other posters to GICC have helped provide an invaluable resource. Your postings help further understanding and serve as a basis for further study. Your postings have done more to advance efforts aimed at tracking and assessing national and global Y2K and embedded systems problems than the government's Information Coordination Center or the International Y2K Coordination Center. Thank you and all the others who post at GICC for all you are doing. Rest assured that the postings are making a difference. The information and the clues are reaching people in roles of responsibility who would not otherwise learn about what is going on and what avenues deserve further exploration and attention.

Thanks again.

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), June 24, 2000.

Thanks all, for this thoughtful discussion.

The GICC was naught but a twinkle in my eye until right before the rollover. I had two purposes in mind at the time it was established:

1. Record as many Y2K glitches as possible. At the time, I was deeply involved in the Utah Y2K effort from the Governor's Coaliton and had the inside track to the fact that although many "command centers" such as Koskinen's ICC and Utah's JIC were poised to record these things, it was from the Government's perspective only. That didn't sit well with me - I felt that the story was too big to leave to just those entities and their one-sided agendas. We put the call out to several networks of grassroots folks to help us record the "people" side of Y2K.

We didn't know what would happen - would Y2K be major? Small? Non- existant?

2. The second goal of the GICC was more long-term. We wanted to track and analyze the glitch instances and cross reference them across categories. This would be more likely to reveal the true, interconnected story, if it indeed existed. We lined up experts in several fields who stood poised and ready to "go get 'em". Unfortunately, we quickly found the information to be overwhelming. Via series of teleconference calls with our group of analysts, we soon realized that unless we could quickly find funding, we would lose our talented folks. As you can see, we ultimately have had to leave the analysis up to the readers.

We receive a lot of mail that affirms the work of the GICC. The GICC is performing well towards the first goal - recording the infrastructure story. We provide the data, and you use it as needed.

We have often searched for baseline information. That, too, is not without a price.

Therefore, the GICC will continue as is, indefinitely. We hope that it serves as a valuable resource for what it is you do, and that ultimately history will be better served with a more well-rounded view of this interesting period of our culture and world.

~Regards

-- Jen Bunker (jen@bunkergroup.com), June 24, 2000.

Many thanks for the work being done here. A few changes/additions would, I think, help in getting the word out. 1. Create a short webaddress for this site, ideally one that can be remembered, or at least one that will fit on one line. 2. Use at least one summary graph, for example postings per day. It seems the glitch central site has gone down. It had an easy address to remember and useful graphs.

I suspect that there will be more studies of y2k in the future when we are more removed in terms of time. The topc still makes people very nervous. So, please continue the excellent work of keeping good records. This work will expedite research in the future.

-- Stuart Umpleby (umpleby@gwu.edu), June 25, 2000.