A Y2K Disclosure Page That Pulls No Punches
Comment: Here is what a disclosure page ought to do. Here is what y2k disclosure is all about.
This is the model.
Tell Citibank. Tell Bank of America. Tell the American Bankers Association. Somebody is doing it right.
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Unofficial Y2K Page
This is our Y2K absolutely unofficial page. It's not a statement. It's not a disclosure. However, it is about Y2K. If you want our official Y2K statement and disclosure, you'll have to call us (or click here) to get your copy.
Welcome to our unofficial Y2K page. It's filled with totally unofficial stuff which can't be relied upon by anyone for any reason, but it's okay to enjoy it. In fact, we hope you like it so much you'll stop sending us those twenty page long, complex questionnaires, which of course we never send back.
The first thing you need to do to prepare for the Y2K crisis is to finish reading this web page before January 1, 2000. After Jan 1, this page will still be posted in cyberspace, but because the world will be coming to an end as a result of power grid failures and inadvertent launching of nuclear weapons, you probably won't be able to hook up to the web, even if you stop foraging for food and your portable power generator has enough spare amps for surfing.
However, we do have some good news for you! If the world does come to a halt on January 1, 2000, or within a few days thereafter, it won't be because of Hart Scientific instruments. Nope, if you're having a bad Y2K day, it won't be because of us.
None of our instruments use dates--well, almost none. Only the 1560 Black Stack, 1575 Super Thermometer and 1590 Super Thermometer II use dates, but the dates are input by the user. Therefore, if you're the user and you're Y2K compliant, your Hart thermometer will be too. So, whenever the power grid is up and running again, all you'll have to do is input the correct date and time and you're good for another millennium. For the other 100 or so Hart instruments, you don't have to do anything except turn them on.
In addition to our instruments, we've tested all of the software we sell. Because we wrote all of the packages, we know how they work. We can't find any problems with any of them. We're not saying we're Y2K experts because we're not. We've tried every test we can think of and so far there are no problems. However, if for some unfortunate reason your computer fails to turn on, or if it melts down right after it boots up, there's a significant chance our software won't work either. Oh, if your computer feeds our software the wrong date and time from your computer's internal clock, our software is going to put the wrong date on your data. You better check your computer clock for its Y2K compliance.
Let's summarize all of this. WE CAN'T FIND ANY Y2K PROBLEMS WITH ANY OF OUR INSTRUMENTS OR OUR SOFTWARE---PRIMARILY BECAUSE 98% OF OUR STUFF DOESN'T USE DATES, AND THE STUFF THAT DOES HAS PASSED EVERY TEST WE CAN THINK OF!!
Okay, anybody got any questions?
Need more? We've got it for you.
What about our own internal software programs and computer systems-things like our accounting packages? Of course, we tested our own systems in every way we could think of also, and everything passed.
Even if our accounting software stops working on January 3, 2000, you can count on us finding a way to bill you for whatever you bought from us prior to Armageddon. Even if we have to write your invoice on the back of bubble gum wrappers, we're going to bill you. This is the promise our lawyers made to us and it's the same promise we're going to make to you. It's the only thing we're going to guarantee you-- but at least we're guaranteeing something.
We've checked our 401K and payroll programs too. They work! Imagine how glad our employees are. You can stop asking us if we're going to continue to check these programs because the answer is simple. We all want our payroll program to cut those checks on time. If any banks are still operating after January 3, 2000, we want to be able to deposit our checks in them. Of course, once world peace is restored, and we're all living under one world wide government and monetary system, our dollars won't be worth much anymore. However, we will still need toilet paper so everybody will probably be asking to be paid in ones.
Unfortunately, we can't answer many questions about our external suppliers. We aren't expecting many problems, but who knows! We're contacting 20 of our largest suppliers and maybe they'll tell us something and maybe they won't. We've got a lot of suppliers. We already know some of them are pretty good and some of them are idiots. We don't expect the Y2K problem to change this.
Well, that's pretty much all we've got to sayalmost. Our lawyers tell us we can't promise you anything regarding Y2K (except maybe the part about collecting our money). If you're using our equipment with someone else's gear, who the hell knows what's going to happen. We sure don't, so how can we promise you something specific, or even vague for that matter? We can't, so we won't. However, we love our customers and like always we'll do whatever is reasonable to solve whatever problems come up, if there are any.
If life as we know it comes to an end when everyone wakes up to flashing lights on their alarm clocks the morning of January 1st, please remember to keep all of the memories of the good times you had with your Hart temperature calibration equipment. Don't ever let the memories die!
Right after Armageddon, using your temperature calibration instruments may come in a little low on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Food, shelter and ISO 9000 compliance may come first, but don't worry, as soon as there is a millikelvin to be measured, we'll be there helping you get your job done faster and better than ever before.
Nothing on this web page supercedes our official policy, and it is very official, so get your copy today if you feel you need to read it. You can get a copy of it by writing on a plain 3 X 5 card 'SEND ME A COPY OF YOUR OFFICIAL Y2K POLICY EVEN THOUGH I'M NOT ORDERING AT THIS TIME.' Put your complete name and address on the card and send it to us. We'll send you an official copy of our official policy, or you could just call us and we'll mail it to you, or just click here to get to our official Y2K page. There are so many ways to get it, how much easier can we make it?
Now what happens if YOUR accounting software doesn't work next January? Don't bother calling us with that feeble excuse. Just pick up a pen, open the old checkbook, and HAND WRITE US A CHECK! If you have any employees old enough to remember life before computers have them help you with this. The world actually existed before spreadsheets. It was a narrow, somewhat boring existence, but in a pinch it will still do.
So what scares us about Y2K? The only thing we really worry about is the over reaction of some obsessive people, and we're not talking about the nut cases burying Y2K compliant ammo in mountain caves, we're talking about what people say to us when we tell them we're not sending their questionnaire back. Wow! Mass panic could cause a mess. We recommend you keep your cool, buy some Dinty Moore's beef stew in cans, and lay in a good supply of toilet paper.
Before you start thinking that we just don't get it, yes we do. Many of our employees were actually there the day COBOL was invented. Some of them started their computing careers on an IBM 1620 mainframe that was slower than a Casio calculator. The nights were long back then.
We do have one suggestion. Turn off all the equipment in your lab before you go home for New Year's eve. If Armageddon does happen, you won't care about the lab, and if everything continues along as usual, you'll have fun turning everything back on January 3rd to see if it all works.
Yes, we know it's also a leap year. Since the beginning of time we've had about five of them. There has never been a Hart product fail because of a leap year, at least not during a leap year when we were keeping records. Don't call, and don't ask. Of course our instruments are all going to work just fine on February 31st just like every other day of the year.
-- flb (fben4077@yahoo.com), August 12, 1999