CNNFN Y2K Poll at www.cnnfn.com: Fact or fiction?

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Here's the address. In order to look at the poll, you have to take it first... http://cgi.cnnfn.com/cgi-bin/poll_new/gen_poll.cgi/gen_me?pollname=Y2KFears128 Verbage:

"A global economic collapse? A worldwide technological blackout? Or will the biggest problem caused by the Millennium Bug be the inability to tape the Rose Bowl? Of all the predictions of Y2K-related mayhem, which of the following do you think are likely to occur?" Questions: 1. Air traffic control systems will fail and planes will fall from the sky.Y/N

2. Prison cell doors will swing open.Y/N

3. ATMs will not accept deposits, or dispense cash.Y/N

4. The Internet will crash, along with telephone systems. Y/N

5. Computerized shipments of goods, such as food to grocery stores or medicines to hospitals and pharmacies, will be delayed.Y/N

6. Government checks such as Social Security or military pensions will be delayed. Y/N

7. Millions of older PCs, at schools, in small business and in homes will cease to function. Y/N

8. VCR programming will not work. Y/N

9. Finally, the so-called "Y2K crisis" or "The Millennium Bug" will be:

- the biggest event of the year
- the biggest non-event of the year Link to results...if that doesn't work, you'll have to take the test:

http://cgi.cnnfn.com/cgi-bin/poll_new/gen_poll.cgi/analyze_me?hiddenPollName=Y2KFears128&1=1.0&2=2.1&4=4.0&5=5.0&6=6.0&7=7.0&8=8.0&9=9.1&10=10.0&userEmail=noneofyourbusiness@spook.net&submitButton=Finished+-+Submit+survey

-- Tim (pixmo@pixelquest.com), January 30, 1999

Answers

wow.

-- Faze the Nation (dazed@confused.com), January 30, 1999.

If you answer any one of these idiotic questions, you will be the idiot.

-- dave (wootendave@hotmail.com), January 30, 1999.

These questions lack depth and research, it is true. Example: prison doors Prisons were designed to "fail" with lock-DOWN as the fail-safe mode. Not swing open. True and documented.

-- Mr. Kennedy (y2kPCfixes@MotivatedSeller.com), January 30, 1999.

(sigh) Why am I not surprized?

-- spirit (spirit@vaporware.com), January 30, 1999.

>In order to look at the poll, you have to take it first...

Apparently not. I simply clicked on the "Finished - Submit survey" button at the bottom without entering any answer or my e-mail address, and was immediately presented with the poll results.

-- No Spam Please (anon@ymous.com), January 30, 1999.



Oops...I stand corrected. Sorry not testing this thoroughly...think it's time to get some shuteye!

-- Tim (pixmo@pixelquest.com), January 30, 1999.

Whoever designs polls for CNN is extremely overpaid.

-- Nathan (nospam@all.com), January 30, 1999.

I'd say whoever designs polls for CNN is highly competent.

The extreme polarization of each question allows only the ignorant to answer. This preselection is not only "not scientific," it is a deliberate effort to keep CNN's audience from recognizing the actual situation.

"Put not your trust in princes"-- or in mass media either. But you knew that.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), January 30, 1999.


This is NOT the work of a rank ammateur!! Consider #1. thius is a question which in its totality is FALSE, but in half is true (atc systems). Continue down th erest of teh way and you see what they want to see, which is, how many people believe the worst case, even teh untrue negatives?

they also want to get some rattling numbers for whatever they will do next.

this is designed VERY WELL, in a VERY SOPHISTICATED effort at setting up the thinking public for dis- and mis-information efforts.

OY! I sound like a conspiracy nut!!

chuck

-- Chuck, night driver (rienzoo@en.com), January 30, 1999.


Possibly a very smart poll. Most of those questions are directed at things that may or may not go wrong or could be fixed and most of them are minor.I don't see any questions directed to do you think your electricity will work, hospitals will be safe, banks will be open,,the stock market will crash, food shortages resulting from lack of deliveries and on and on.When they do address a serious question I notice they only use the word "delayed".

Seems like a statement of our society,that the biggest worries are whether the VCR and the microwave will work!

-- sue (deco100@aol.com), January 30, 1999.



Addendum to my last:

Look up who owns CNN, anymore.

Him as pays the piper, calls the chune.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), January 30, 1999.


As above, either very stupid, or very clever. Nevertheless, its rigged.

Answers even so show much more alarm than I expected + 40-60% predicting at least serious levels of "gloom".

The correct answer - in every case above, is "sometimes", "maybe", or "it depends" == for example, on whether power, telephones (nationwide and local) are available, and whether the individual agency or bank has prepared itself.

Also, even if the "ATM" for example works, will your account be credited (debited) correctly?

The results, even when so skewed by the poor questions, indicate a credible level of awareness - but about trivial stuff: why does the media give a d**m about VCR's? About old PC's in schools? About trivial hacked-over garbage "airplanes will fall from sky?"

Don't they understand that people will likely be completely without POWER, LIGHTS, JOBS, WATER, 911 service, SEWAGE, GAS and GASOLINE, and readily avaialble FOOD? Even "for short periods of time" (as promised by the federal government) doesn't this concern the media at all?

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), January 30, 1999.


The White House must be devastated that so few trust in the Social Security remediation after its intense PR effort to take credit for fixing SSA!

-- Brooks (brooksbie@hotmail.com), January 30, 1999.

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