Why Y2K was a non-event

http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_00/dfisher011500.html

-- A (A@AisA.com), March 19, 2000

Answers

But this is just more of the same: Instead of Doomsday, the guy offers Dooooooomsday -- a slow, gradual buildup of problems. (What he's REALLY trying to do is recreate at a little of the highly-profitable FUD that helped him sell stuff last year[g]. He figures, aw, what the heck; can't hurt to try ...)

The problem with his argument is that it ignores several facts. First of all, the embedded side of the thing is OVER. Period. Those that were going to fail due to Y2K bugs would have done so the first few days of January.

Look at the imagined oil crisis. To quote CPR from another thread here, not only are futures for petroleum inverted (a strong indication that prices will be dropping in the future), how come there's no "chemical crisis?" The chemical industry uses essentially the same equipment as the petroleum guys! What, did their stuff experience no Y2K bugs, while the petroleum industry got hammered (and which hammering they successfully manage to hide from everyone but RC)?

People like Poole, CPR, Hoffmeister, Cherri, Paul Davis, Jon Latimer, and Brad Sherman have been saying all along that yes, there would be some Y2K-related failures; but we would be able to handle them.

Even at the enterprise level (ie, big data systems), thus far, according to the best information I've seen (from MIT and others), Y2K-related bugs remain lost in the background noise of all computer problems in general.

(In fact, Hoffmeister made this point a few months BEFORE January; he noted that, in the mainframe discussion groups, Y2K-related help questions were only a small fraction of the total. He saw it then.)

(It is also a FACT that most Y2K bugs have ALREADY occurred. We're in the downhill slide now.)

Take, for example, one just posted here: Y2K is being blamed for a lack of statistics in a government department. Big deal. At the same time, literally thousands of other systems have failed (some spectacularly) due to natural causes, bugs UNrelated to Y2K, you name it.

Computers and software fail all the time, because computers and software are man-made. Anything made by man will fail.

Poole wrote some very good essays about this: see Why Y2K Won't Be TEOLAWKI and Score: Cowboys 37, Anal-Retentives, 0.

-- Me (me@thisplace.net), March 19, 2000.

Just another Tinfoil stooge regurgitating the same message to the hapless suckers still listening: "It's still gonna be bad - buy Gold!"

-- Y2K Pro (y2kpro1@hotmail.com), March 19, 2000.

Thanks me for posting such a "right on" reply. I wish Poole, Cherri, CPR, Paul Davis, John Latimer, Hoffmeister, Sherman and the rest, had turned me upside down and shook me until my brains fell out of my ass and back into my head, where they belonged. Then, just maybe, I wouldn't have been the foolish FUD crazed idiot that I became.

I console myself by thinking of all the idiotic things I didn't buy.

-- gilda (jes@listbot.com), March 19, 2000.

Gilda Dear,

It was not your fault. Don't beat yourself up. You were not alone. People ranging from Ph.D. to high school kids from Doctors and CPAs to truck drivers got overwhelmed by the scope of the Y2k problem and the seeming "inability" to handle it. The facts are there *was* a Y2k problem, it involved work by *millions* of people and *billions* of dollars. Out of those *facts*, others "concocted" a believable set of "scenarios" that lead to what you experienced.

You were **mislead** by others and fell into a trap by those who willfully mislead you and since 1/1/2000 have seen fit to walk away from the consequences of doing so. There is a special place in Hell reserved for such types. They surface in assorted shapes and sizes over and around every serious public issue.

You did just fine and you will be better off in the future because you will be a lot more careful in selecting out those you will listen to. Feel sorry for those who haven't learned that lesson. So did many others who came to realize they had gotten excited beyond what was called for.

I doubt any of the debunkers and non-Doomers blame those who were mislead. Most of us just tried to stop those who were doing the misleading (and those who continue to do so now).

As far as I know, none of us plan to make a career out of Y2k debunking. After all, it doesn't seem to be a valid career path.

SO........don't make a career out of "beating yourself up". Do what I always do....go make NEW MISTAKES. Its more fun.

cpr

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), March 19, 2000.

gilda,

CPR beat me to it!

The old saying goes: "fool me once, shame on YOU; fool me twice, shame on ME." :)

OK, so you got fooled once. Shame on North, Yourdon, Hyatt, Weiss, Kappelman, Martin and all the other purveyors of doom ... but *NO* shame on you. :)

-- Me (me@thisplace.net), March 19, 2000.

Mr. Fisher's load of bull was first published on January 6. I'm not sure why it's being posted now. Mr. Fisher is a "prophetic" stock forcaster who believes that the stock market is somehow linked to biblical predictions.

His essay is an excellent example of how to backpedal. No, it's not the rollover but failures that will show up in "strange and wonderful ways". Just what these are he doesn't explain but rest assured, they're there and they will show up. Now, most people won't notice them but he will.

Geez!

-- Jim Cooke (JJCooke@yahoo.com), March 19, 2000.

If that wasn't weird enough "strange and wonderful ways" was the buzz words of the Leftists Fringe of Y2k who used that in conjunction with "which will give us the chance to restructure society in the way that will be fair to all as we should have done so long ago".

And the mouth pieces for that were the techno-illiterate/phobic Tom Atlee and THE Dr. DooDoo Carmichael, Ph.D., the Georgetown, DC "Consultant" who by Summer of 1999 was still sending out 50K weekly spam with more "weasel words" per K than the "establishment" he and the Cluster of Airheads around the "Center for Y2k and Society's Wasted Nathan Cummings Foundation Grant Money".

(I actually have the orig. quote of The Dr. DooDoo using those "strange and wonderful ways.)

They were the dirtiest players of all because unlike the Right which was rather upfront, the Leftists cloaked themselves as "just trying to help the Community" while they were recruiting for the Future.

(Said future is behind their Golden Dream Boy of the Environmentalist movement and hitch-hiker on every agenda they have from Spotted Owls to Tuna Saviours: one algore, the inventor of the internet (after dropping out of grad school and law school, of course) ).

If you thought the Leftists in Y2k were panting for Grant Money, you have know idea of how they drool at the thought of internet algore dispensing all the Spoils after current occupant of 1600 Pa. goes back to whatever he ever did to begin with.

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), March 19, 2000.

Thanks guys, It's just that I've always been such a skeptic about doctors, politicians, religion, the lottery, etc., I can't believe I was so gullible when it came to this.

And, I've had nothing but trouble with computers all my life, at home and at work, so naturally I just knew the IT professionals were right.. But now I'm moving on to new and better mistakes. heehee

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), March 19, 2000.

Laughing my bum off at gilda....shake so hard the ol brains fell out the ass? Goooooodddd oneee..... I share those same feelings.

As I am negative for the most part, and to say the least paranoid at times, I followed the TB site and I admitt, when I read Gary, I often times would go out and buy more STUFF....

I dont blame them, I blame me also gilda, I can relate.

The scariest part was the 'fear' I had. I spent well over $1,000 bringing my sister and her 2 children from San Diego so they can be near for when TSHTF...

Stayed up ALL nite, had numerous family members here in my small modest lil house....

Gave foood away as I mentioned before, was GLAD to help.

(only gave the stuff i wouldnt want anyway, lots of Spam...)

Wonder if we will ever know if this was just a ploy to end the year by having us, as Flint said boost the economy a little? (think he put it a little differently though)

Still, I'm done kicking my own tush....I was DUMB, but cautious.

Heres to wishing I hadnt spent so much money, I damn well sure could have taken the Cancun Vacation next month...instead I gotta wait now till October.

Consumer who is STILL having a rough day.

-- consumer (shh@aol.com), March 19, 2000.

Y2K was a non-event because Unc D was ready for it, Murphy's law in reverse.

We now resume our regular programming....

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeed@yahoo.com), March 19, 2000.

Unc,

Heres to ya.....me too murphy law in reverse, i like that....

missed you....glad you back

-- consumer (shh@aol.com), March 19, 2000.

Because nothing happened ;)

-- capnfun (capnfun1@excite.com), March 19, 2000.

Is It Or Is It Not! Y2K maybe on us now, how will we know if everyone lies!

-- ET (bneville@zebra.net), March 19, 2000.

ET,

If you don't notice the effects of it, who cares? You can still buy bread, milk, meat, gasoline, water and other necessities.

If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound? Likewise: if a bug happens and no one ever noticed, does it matter?

If several dozen computers a day blow up due to Y2K bugs, that's a completely insignificant number. Hundreds of PCs are hammered by viruses, hard drive failures and other problems on any given business day, knocking the machines out for several hours (or even days or weeks, in some cases).

THAT's the deal. That has alway been the deal. Y2K-related problems are just a small subset of the overall Problem Picture, and were blown way out of proportion by people with agendas (or no sense -- or both!).

-- Me (me@thisplace.net), March 20, 2000.

consumer, thanks, you've made me feel even better.

Eureeka Uncle, that has to be it; I prepared so nothing happened. Now we're resuming our regular programming. That phrase "regular programming" does have a rather sinister ring to it, don't you think. What if we are really programmed to react in certain ways.

Once I heard my son and a friend talking about God, the Universe, life on other planets, artificial intelligence etc., and the friend said, "What if we are a model that some higher intelligence, on another planet has set up here on earth to observe how we react in different situations." I've never forgotten that, and occasionally I wonder about that myself.

ET if Y2K is upon us now, then frankly my dear, I don't give a damn. Not buyin' that crap anymore!!!

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), March 20, 2000.

Jim, you ask why information like this is still being posted. The same folks that spread FUD for profit are still at it my friend.

-- Ra (tion@l.1), March 20, 2000.