MISLEADER BIG TIME: The one and only JO-ANNE

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Cory Hamasaki's DC Y2K Weather Report V2, # 43 "October 27, 1998 - 430 days to go." WRP99 Draft $2.50 Cover Price. (c) 1997, 1998 Cory Hamasaki - I grant permission to distribute and reproduce this newsletter as long as this entire document is reproduced in its entirety. You may optionally quote an individual article but you should include this header down to the tearline or provide a link to the header. I do not grant permission to a commercial publisher to reprint this in print media.

As seen in USENET:comp.software.year-2000 http://www.elmbronze.demon.co.uk/year2000/ http://www.sonnet.co.uk/muse/dcwrp.html http://GONOW.TO/Y2KFACTS http://www.ocweb.com/y2k/weather.htm http://www.kiyoinc.com/HHResCo.html

Don't forget, the Y2K chat-line: http://www.ntplx.net/~rgearity any evening, 8-10PM EST. --------------------tearline ----------------------------- Please fax or email copies of this to your geek pals, especially those idiots who keep sending you lightbulb, blonde, or Bill Gates jokes, and urban legends like the Arizona rocket car story.

If you have a Y2K webpage, please host the Weather Reports.

Did you miss Geek Out? Project Dumbass needs you.

In this issue:

1. Jo Anne's Scenario 2. How did we get into this mess? 3. This week's food score. 4. Y2K Awareness Week 5. WDC Y2K Meeting 6. Jace Couch on Time Dilation 7. DragonRanch 8. CCCC

Scenario ----------- Jo Anne's --------

Thinking About a Possible Future by Jo Anne Slaven

I think that the people in this group use the hurricane/earthquake examples because those "disasters" are ones that the ordinary person can easily imagine and relate to in some way. While this may be a good starting point in explaining the possible outcome of this whole mess, I have to agree that it's not going to be at all like that.

I picture more of a "creeping catastrophe". Putting aside the possibility of violence and looting for the moment, here's one way I can see it playing out.

November and December 1999 is panic time. The general public scrambling desperately for non-perishable foods, candles, and generators. I don't think that the people participating in the "1999 supply riots" will necessarily be thinking long-term. But they *will* want their 2-weeks worth of food and cash "just in case".

January 1 - 10 is blackout time for a lot of people. Obviously, that means no banks, no phones, etc. But somehow, the brave men in the hydro companies manage to bring power back up (sort of) in most places.

January 11 - 31 is *major* annoyance time. The ATMs are off-and-on. Power and phones are off-and-on. Your bank may be out of business. Fuel supplies are sporadic. Your water bill is screwed up, and you have to spend 4 hours in line to talk to someone about adjusting it. All you can find at the grocery store is mustard and plastic forks. The company that you work for had declared a brief lay-off until things settle down.

February 1 to May 31 is depression time. Nobody is buying all of those useless products on the market today (like beanie babies and leather sofas), so a lot of manufacturers and retailers have shut down. Not to mention hotels, restaurants and service companies. And the banks - they won't be doing too well either. Lots and lots of people out of work.

Feb February 1 to May 31 is also Time Dilation time, when the clocks in some older PCs start jumping forward unexpectedly. Some of these older computers are used in process control. Could get interesting. See http://www.nethawk.com/~jcrouch/

June 1 to September 30 is "cautiously hopeful" time. Lots of fresh fruits and vegetables are available, and everyone is looking forward to the abundance of foods that will be in the stores come the fall. There won't be enough to go around, but people are ignoring that for the moment.

October 1 to Lord-knows-when is Serious Shortage time (and a continuation of depression time). Shoes, clothing, fresh fruits and vegetables - anything that is normally imported from developing countries is in *very* short supply. And expensive. Not that the unemployed masses could afford to buy anything anyway. Perhaps more important, raw manufacturing materials from other countries are non-existant. As are the foreign markets for finished goods.

And so it goes on. Bad times building on bad times. And remember that I left looting and violence out of the equation. Also omitted were martial law, nuclear "accidents" and disease.

I could be wrong though. It could be worse. (with acknowledgements to infomagic)

Jo Anne, who needs to buy more candles

History ----- How did we get into this mess ------

You're pretty smart... But how did we get into this mess? It's not just denial and procrastination. There's something more fundamental at work. At GregS90210's last Y2K lunch, Dec threw out a couple ideas, he was working on a report on the Microsoft trial, said that he raised the issue of Y2K in a room full of techno-reporters and was boo'ed down.

OK, they're just reporters and couldn't make round two of MVS Jeopardy, "Security for $400" "CA7 and the INTRDR" -bzzzzzt- "What are two computer viruses?" but they are smarter than the average bear, so why the razzing?

We have side impact airbags and grants to molecular biologists to find a cure for AIDS. How did we get these things? These are subtle and not directly connected to need and positive results.

We have these because each base problem has been an issue long enough for advocates to rise up and for industry to recognize that they can make a buck. It's two things, make a difference, make a buck.

The problem with Y2K is that there aren't a noisy bunch of survivors and relatives of victims who have organized themselves into a cause. Y2K doesn't have a sad-eyed emaciated poster child... the closest we have are a couple big dollar consulting companies that didn't make their revenue projections.

Things like heart disease, cancer, on the job safety, and defending the U.S. against Moamar Gadaffi, uh, Quadaffy.... ah shit, I can't spell it... anyway, what's his face over there in Libya, they've been around long enough that we have a groups of people who have strong feelings about the issues.

This isn't about the merits of funding space research v. your local volunteer fire department. These causes have afficionado's to champion the cause as well as those who stand to make a buck off it.

Y2K doesn't really have either a victims advocate or a well funded industry lobby group.

In time, in 10 or 15 years, there might be someone who speaks for the people on Y2K. There isn't now. There are several candidates but no one is in the position of big dog of Y2K.

Y2K is a leaderless, come as you are, crisis. ...and for this reason, it will be far worse than it should have been. I'm trying my best, as are dozens of others. But it is not enough, flat not enough.

Y2K doesn't have the support, the leadership, or the time to develop either. We have 430 days left; I started writing the WRPs almost two years ago. We don't have the time now. Times up, rules changed.

A big problem now is management hysteria... They're bailing out. We've already seen Emmet Paige and his "real brave" staff, squeal in terror and run for it, frothing at the mouth, not on my watch, I'm scared, maaaaa...

The good news is that hard times will forge new leaders, that which does not kill you, makes you stronger. I look forward to a new management that is not contaminated by pop-biz-psych-jive. A world without TQM, PPBS, matrix management, and the biz-fad of the month.

The bad news is that people will go hungry, kill, and die.

Another fundamental problem with Y2K is that it is technical and there are layers of technical issues. Although the basic problem is simple, the ambiguity of two digit years, understanding the technical and technical management issues requires significant expertise.

Until you can post one word jokes in comp.lang.asm370 or bit.listserv.ibm-main, and have someone reply, "good one", you're not up to the technical challenge of Y2K... on the mainframe, enterprise systems side.

C.s.y2k had a full discussion on SVC-11 over a year ago. It's a nasty problem, it will kill people... although I don't know who or when. C.s.y2k explored it from all angles, put the problem to bed. So last month, comp.lang.asm370 started in on SVC-11 again and last week Big Arnie, reported on a live, subtle SVC-11 problem.

I won't go into SVC-11, TIME DEC, and R0/R1. 90 percent of the c.s.y2k'ers and WRP readers aren't sure exactly why I was raising a ruckus about these and tm_year... why it was an issue.

The problem is, 90 percent of the Y2K leadership does not understand these issues... which is OK but unless it's within your experience, it's hard to know how afraid to be... ...and that's the problem with Koskinen and the others. and that's why when SHMUEL says, a 5% probablity that it's worse than milne is prepping for, I get chills.

You denial-heads, check out SHMUEL in comp.lang.asm370 and bit.listserv.ibm-main. ...or even better, subscribe to both groups and argue with him there, show both groups how tuff *you* are.

Preparedness ------- This week's score --------



-- Friday (Friday@gilligansIsle.org), July 08, 2000

Answers

Tiresome.

-- KoFE (your@town.USA), July 08, 2000.

B-O-O-O-O-R-I-N-G

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W-R-R-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-N-N-N-N-G

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-- - (-@-.-), July 08, 2000.


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