Another Academic Study on how the Y2k FUD was spread.greenspun.com : LUSENET : TB2K spinoff uncensored : One Thread |
Take this "in", King of Spittle and other "recovering" DOOM-A-HOLICS. How TB I and the FUD really workedhttp://www.aleae.com/rollover/internet.html
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000
I liked the header, "He Who Shouts Loudest Has The Floor"... Let's see, there's probably a corrolary there somewhere...
-- I'm Here, I'm There (I'm Everywhere@so.beware), September 25, 2000.
That's really some "academic study", CPR. It's written by someone with no contact information and no footnotes. How did you ever get through graduate school without learning what an "academic study" looks like? Assuming that you really do have a master's degree, that is. Did you get it by mail?However, that doesn't mean he's all wrong, of course. For example, he seems to have you pegged pretty well with respect to your absurd belief that you SAVED THE WORLD FROM Y2K FUD:
Begin with this rule of thumb: if somebody subscribes to an outri view of any form (like this essay), he will argue it extensively and passionately, he will ignore all evidence which contradicts him, he will not react well if you disagree. It doesn't take much effort to believe gravity works, but when you're receiving messages from Jesus in your daily flapjacks, you need publish just to convince yourself you're not crazy. Most unbelievers will mock you briefly, then, having better things to do, leave you alone while they continue their lives.
-- ABC (a@b.c), September 25, 2000.
Mike did a good job on that piece. It's too bad many of the links no longer work.
-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), September 25, 2000.
ABC, as usual you shoot from your Fat Lip without knowing anything.Author of the site is a Paid Researcher at one of the most important Technology Universities in the world.
And for TWO.......yes TWO....years....he watched as the Y2k FUD-Ass- Holes made FOOLS of themselves from Duct Tape North to Your-toast-Ed to the "Embedded Myth Pushers".
In short, he was also one of the de-bunkers the Y2k-Sheeple and Kult- Fuhrers refused to listen to.
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
Oh, he's a "paid researcher". That's very different, then. I thought he was just an anonymous poster, you know, like the ones you always attack... if they're doomers, that is. So why doesn't this "paid researcher" give a valid email address or other contact information at the end of his "academic study"? I think the reason is obvious: he doesn't want to stand behind it.
-- ABC (a@b.c), September 25, 2000.
Gawd!!! This pile of crap is being passed off as an ACADEMIC STUDY???? And you make snide remarks regarding Paula Gordon's academic credentials???!!!!!!Too funny!
-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), September 25, 2000.
MAR1999@ozemail.com.au "Found your site today and am hugely relieved to find an island of sanity on the North American continent!! ... Is it because you're Canadian?? From my view point in Australia it seems as if the US is just full of Chicken Littles darting terrified glances at the sky.... The only difference today is that the shysters have access to much bigger audiences."MAR1999@fx.andara.com "I would like to know how to make some cash off these fools and get rich. Maybe if I stock up on those meal supplement drinks, bulk and canned foods and bottled water I can start making a killing in October and November when these idiots really start to panic."
MAR1999@@pac.com.au "I have attached a copy of a nomination I made to the Australian Skeptics for the annual Bent Spoon award, where I collectively nominated the same people your site is about."
MAR1999@ix.netcom.com "I truly hope Y2K is a hoax. BUT ... It got me off my fat butt and into action to provide some reasonable disaster preparedness for my loved ones!! Thanks for your site. It adds real balance to this issue!"
MAR1999@aol.com "what makes you and all the rest of the world think they know whats going to happen in the future, things unimaginable can happen, disastorious things, what if you are wrong? what if they are wrong?"
MAR1999@@pacbell.net "You might want to get your facts straight. I have been following this problem for over 2.5 years and have read thousands of articles from numerous sources. July 1997 front cover of newsweek was just the begining.... You like many other critics will be very silent in January."
MAR1999@netasia.net> "I will keep your forecast on file and will email you, one week after Jan. 1, 2000 and if you are correct I can still communicate with you because our ISP will still be working. I also suggest that you become serious on this matter and avoid jokes. There are some people who believe you and they will take your every word you say. This is also true for the doomsayers. -- Yours in Christ,"
MAR1999@cnmnetwork.com "Everyone drawing all their money out of the banks because they do not want to loose it and what they are doing is DESTROYING the economy!! This COULD be a distaster, it would be riotous everywhere."
MAR1999@aol.com "Your site has helped alot in not only my understanding of this whole shin-dig, but it's also helping my grade. Without this site my paper would've been alot harder...glad you see this whole thing my way..."
MAR1999@ "If we talk about something long enough it may just come true. To quote the great philosopher in disguise, George Burns: 'Fairytales can come true ... it can happen to you...'"
MAR1999@ix.netcom.com "I'm not a programmer, but I've read hundreds of articles on y2k and I know what's coming.... You should be scared shitless. Don't be so narrow minded. Start reading stuff on the net."
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
Hmmmmm. Looks like an interesting collection of e-mails from MAR 1999. Oh, I see, you are trying to use this to ESTABLISH THE CREDIBILITY of the "academic study".Well ... nope.
-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), September 25, 2000.
KOSpit/hit now is going to "evaluate" what an "academic paper" is??TIME OUT WHILE I TRY TO STOP..........LAUGHING.
MOVING RIGHT ALONG.......HOW WOULD HE/SHE/IT KNOW????
And just look at this "nice" post above from King of SPITtle-shit, a clear return to pre-1/1/2000 vile form. NOTHING CHANGES. NOTHING LEARNED.
ONLY THE ENDLESS EFFORT TO "RE-POSITION" and "RE-WRITE HISTORY". HOPING MINUTE BY MINUTE THAT "TIME WILL HEAL ALL WOUNDS" another EMPTY CLICHE' vs. the more accurate: THOSE WHO DON"T LEARN FROM HISTORY ARE DOOMED TO REPEAT IT (whether OIL, Greenie BS or "baaad things coming".)
He /she/it SLITHERED back PRETENDING to be in need of "intellectually satisfying his /her/ its curiousity" about HOW he/she/it had been "so wrong" AND LO AND BEHOLD THE SAME DISMISSAL OF ANYTHING he/she/it can't bear to read.
YOU WANT FUCKING FOOTNOTES? ............WHY??
YOU DON"T READ ANYTHING THAT CAUSES YOU THE SLIGHTEST BIT OF **DISCOMFORT** ABOUT YOUR PRE-CONCEIVED A PRIORI BELIEFS.
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
CPR:Oh, yeah, THAT explains it -- now I see clearly how those random MAR1999 e-mail snippets COMPLETELY SUPPORT and JUSTIFY the "academic research" paper. I just needed you to tie it all together with your eloquent summation.
Yes, thanks so very much!! Moron.
-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), September 25, 2000.
cpr, speaking ofFor some one that yells, rants, raves and comes across like their home lobotomy didn't take, you sure come up with some interesting statements. DO you EVER go back and read your own stuff?
Open minded and pragmatic you are not? Interesting to observe - though!
Perhaps you need to up the dosage or take your medication with more of an over lap between doses? Regardless, you do provide a different perspective.
-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 25, 2000.
ABC wrote:>> That's really some "academic study", CPR. It's written by someone with no contact information and no footnotes. How did you ever get through graduate school without learning what an "academic study" looks like? <<
cpr replied:
>> ABC, as usual you shoot from your Fat Lip without knowing anything. Author of the site is a Paid Researcher at one of the most important Technology Universities in the world. <<
May I respectfully point out that, using cpr's logic, anything done by a Paid Researcher at a University becomes academic research. So, by extension, when lawyers go to the crapper they are just practising law. Sounds about right to me.
-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), September 25, 2000.
Academic standards have fallen, but I hope not to this point.What Reuben has provided is an editorial, not a journal article. It is easy to have an opinion (like Collins). It is much harder to prove (or disprove) a hypothesis. The Collins article is simply a long train of subjective thoughts.
Collins does raise a few interesting points, but nothing we haven't covered here. And "academic study?" Where might one find his data? his analysis? his conclusions? Does anyone really think this op-ed piece made it through peer review? (chuckle)
I find it ironic that Collins provides an extension of the same 'net- based rhetoric he decries.
-- Ken Decker (kcdecker@att.net), September 25, 2000.
1. Anyone got the slightest question about the so-called "rhetoric" being correct? 2. As for the lack of footnotes.......WHAT IS A URL if not a reference? M.C. has about a gig of data to support his views. What does Decker have? Thrice cut and pasted snips from the public media and that Fountain of "information" TB I? 3. TRY THIS ON FOR SIZE .........DOOM ZOIDS: LINKSee the flow chart and learn where your DELUSIONS were started.
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
http://anon.free.anonymizer.com/http://www.aleae.com/rollover/gary.htm lIT
C'mon, where did you think it would start? Of course Y2K starts in IT; more precisely, it starts with Peter De Jager's Doomsday 2000article. De Jager has the laurel of point man for the Year 2000 apocalypse - for IT. Spiky-haired mutant warriors don't show up until much later.
-- (how@it.started), September 25, 2000.
M.C. uses a piece that I uncovered in 1997 about His Duct-TapeNess. Anyone reading this and the Duct Tape's intro (OR Yourdon's intro) to Y2k would have to be struck by the similarity. But in 1995, it was dispatched to the trash can of academia for removal by a Harvard Prof. In 1998, aided by the Net, such GARBAGE REMOVAL was a problem. The title could have been written by any hack at the National Inquirer and was a prelude for his next fiasco: the "mountains of bodies in the city dead from Aids by 1992.....get out of the cities now."
ELECTRONIC AIDS (Part I) Scenario: Paul Volcker is handed a telegram as he enters the monthly meeting of the Federal Open Market Committe. Every other member of the FOMC, which sets monetary policy for the U.S., is also handed an identical telegram. The telegram reads as follows: THIS MORNING (a rural bank is named) SUFFERED A MAJOR FAILURE IN ITS COMPUTER SYSTEM STOP ALL DATA IN THAT COMPUTER HAS BEEN SCRAMBLED BEYOND RECOGNITION STOP WHEN BANK OFFICIALS ATTEMPT TO CALL UP THE RECORDS FROM ITS BACK UP COMPUTER TAPES THEY WILL FIND THAT THESE BACK UP TAPES ARE ALSO SCRAMBLED STOP ON MONDAY AFTERNOON THREE OTHER SMALL BANKS WILL SUFFER THE SAME FATE STOP ONE WILL BE IN NEW YORK CITY STOP ONE WILL BE IN LOS ANGELES STOP ONE WILL BE IN CHICAGO STOP PLEASE MEET AGAIN ON TUESDAY AFTERNOON STOP WE WILL GIVE YOU INSTRUCTIONS AT THAT TIME Volcker calls the appropriate bureaucrat at the Federal Reserve Systems's headquarters, and he asks if there are any reports from the named bank. A few minutes later, the official calls back. The bank's management confirms the breakdown. The bank is attempting to install the back-up tapes. Volcker orders him to call back and stop the tapes from being installed. The bank complies. The tapes are then shipped to the Federal Reserve Bank under armed guard. When the FED's computer specialists acquire the same operating system and try to bring up the data, the system crashes. No usable data. Tuesday morning, one by one three banks call the FED, the FDIC, and the Comptroller of the Currency's office, each with the same frantic tale. They have been working all night, but their computer records are scrambled. They cannot open at 10 a.m. They have only an hour to make a decision. What should they do? The FED instructs them to remain closed. They are also instructed to keep their mouths equally closed. The T.V. networks are tipped off, but no one at any bank says anything. Lines appear in front of each bank. Governers in all three states call frantically to Washington. They all remember Ohio and Maryland. What is the FED going to do? The FOMC, the Board of Governors of the FED, each regional president, and a team of computer experts meet at the New York FED's offices. At three in the afternoon, a telegram is delivered to Volcker. It is brief. It says: WORMS "What the @%* is this?" he yells to no one in particular. The computer men turn white. They do their best to tell him what it means. They are finished answering his questions in about 45 minutes. Another telegram arrives. It says: ON FRIDAY AFTERNOON THE CHASE MANHATTAN BANK WILL EXPERIENCE A SIMILAR COMPUTER FAILURE STOP ITS BACK UP TAPES WILL BE EQUALLY USELESS STOP IT WILL NOT BE ABLE TO REOPEN ON MONDAY MORNING STOP ON TUESDAY MORNING CITICORP WILL SUFFER A SIMILAR FAILURE STOP ON WEDNESDAY MORNING BANK OF AMERICA AND THREE OTHER MAJOR BANKS WILL ALSO SUFFER A BREAKDOWN STOP WE CAN PROVIDE YOU WITH THE CORRECTION FOR EACH COMPUTER STOP THE PRICE WILL BE THE REMOVAL OF DIPLOMATIC RECOGNITION OF THE ILLEGITIMATE STATE OF ISRAEL BY THE UNITED STATES AND AN END TO ALL ECONOMIC AID TO ISRAEL STOP TO PROVE THAT WE CAN DO THIS WE WILL SCRAMBLE ALL THE RECORDS OF CHASE MANHATTAN BRANCH BANK XYZ TOMORROW MORNING STOP The next morning, all of the records of Chase Manhattan's branch bank are turned into random numbers. That afternoon, the President of the United States breaks off diplomatic relations with the state of Israel. The banks stay open. No crash of the data occurs. This time........................... For those who *still* don't get the message, this link takes you to a past "de-bunking" of the hogwash North ONCE BEFORE tried to propagate about "Computers, Banking and a collapse". NOTE THE FREAKING DATE: 1985. And so practiced by 1998 was North that all he needed to do was plug Y2k in for "computer worms in Banking Programs" and get to the same nonsense the DOMINO DOOMZIES and INTELLECTUAL SLUGS....... took from him.
http://www.aleae.com/rollover/sources/north/risks2.html
Macrakis' analysis is, mercifully, shorter:
Gary North's Remnant Review' (Worms, etc.) Stavros Macrakis < macrakis@harvard.HARVARD.EDU > Tue, 10 Dec 85 18:04:07 EST This overly-long message appears to say nothing new. We are treated to some sort of breathless and misinformed paranoia about `anti-Zionists', Soviets, and foreigners in general, not to mention hackers. We get thriller- novel political scenarios with countless pointless (and hardly verisimilitudinous) details. (See below for a textual analysis of North's tract.) We all know that computer security is hard. We know that banks and other important institutions have often failed to apply even the most elementary security precautions. We even know about `trapdoors', `worms', and `viruses' (which were discussed during the design of Multics, if not earlier). We also know that both technical people and users of computers must become more aware of security issues. What does North contribute?: a vision of a horrible secret hidden from the public by frightened bankers whose livelihood depends on hoodwinking the public into believing that paper money and bank deposits have value -- a secret which will be taken advantage of by Godless Communists, dark- skinned terrorists, and evil foreigners in general. Does North's article tell us something about public attitudes towards computers? No, I don't think so. It's just the standard apocalyptic, conspiratorial vision applied to computers. -s Paranoia about the news media: I am going public with this story because it is unlikely that any conventional news source will touch it, unless pressure is brought to bear. The reason is this: the problems are too horrendous even to be discussed by appropriate officials, unless they have specific answers. But they don't. What I present here cannot be smoothed over by a press release abount having set up a blue-ribbon study panel. Stumbling into a terrible secret: I literally stumbled into this information. I had read about one tiny aspect of it. I made a few extrapolations. Then I got worried. The problem looked as though it would have major implications. Little did I know! Blatant racism and xenophobia: Everyone knows [computer genius types] are either orientals, dark-skinned people with accents, or teenagers. The firms don't hire teenagers, but they hire a lot foreigners. Fortune-telling by `authorities': "The great fortunes of the 21st century," [Adam] Osborne predicts, "will be the legacies of the great computer thieves of the 20th." A major source whose qualifications are: ... a former businessman, quite young, and a true "space cadet." ... a nice fellow, a Christian, and a moral philosopher of sorts. Phobia of paper money: the various banking regulatory agencies would be swamped with crises and outside rumors. Then, all at once, bank computers begin breaking down.... The lines appear in front of banks. The only answer at this point is to print up paper money. It would be printed by the hundreds of billions in order to offset the deflationary effects of bank runs.... Gold-bug-ism: All of a sudden, market-created alternative currencies would be revived. It would the be METALLIC CASH that talks loudest. Silver dimes are not electronic. They can't be infected electronically. They still circulate when banks are "temporarily closed, due to circumstance beyond our control." Misunderstanding of the nature of banks: (ALL banks are `fractional reserve') ... the bankers are desperatesly fearful of this sort of vandalism. It could topple people's confidence in the fractional reserve banking system, and confidence is the only thing which keeps it going. He concludes with an apocalyptic vision: Maybe later; not now. Keep precious metal coins. Don't assume that it an't happen here. It can. The only thing holding it back is the restraining hand of God, through the temporary self-restraint of a technological priesthood.
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
Charlie, why squander your good energy antagonizing the people here and having them indulge in all this petty baiting? All this point-scoring about what's academic and what's not. As if it matters a hill of beans what the forumites here think. Get thee to a website and start putting this stuff up now.
-- Debbie (dbspence@usa.net), September 25, 2000.
*yawn*
-- consumer (shh@aol.com), September 25, 2000.
Deb, Why bother? M.C. has done a good enough job for now. When some over moneyed Professor decides to pay me to do a Ph.D. instead of the other way around, I might write the definitive history of Y2k FUD Hysterics and get a Doctorate for it. I could borrow a term for another Academic : The Y2k Branch Nitwittians. Fits nicely because it describes a KULT which took as holy scripture media reports **when it suited them** but ignored any sort of **heresy** when it did not. To this day, they are SOOO predictable, I could almost list after I post, the names of the Nitwittians who will attack from their perches in Fantasy Land. Watching Decker pick and choose which threads he will post to is also great fun (much more so than watching him strut about like a poppinjay when he starts a thread with some lighter then air "thought"CHUCKLE (to borrow his overused leftover that went out of style pre-1980 after the Death of Chuckles the Clown on the "Mary Tyler Moore Show".)
For now, just watching KOSpittle return to his pre-1/1/2000 format and seeing the others twist on the petards they themselves hoist is amusement enough. BTW: I didn't post this :Friends of the Library Genealogical Research GroupBooks as of 6/5/97.As an effort to make a statement, I vote: "waste of bandwidth".
-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 25, 2000.
[CPR is so pathetically sad. Yet so hysterically funny.]CPR:
Yes, YES, that is an excellent idea!! Truly, you have so much to contribute to the world of academia!! Your two years of exhaustive research into the contributing factors of the Millinenium Contagion, those who MIS-LEAD and those who BLINDLY FOLLOWED, cries out to be heard among learned scholars everywhere!!!
Perhaps Paula Gordon would consider sponsoring your endeavor. You know, just to provide a sense of historical balance. [Gawd! Wouldn't that be a hoot!! Talk about the "odd couple".]
Rest assured, you can count on the forum members here for support. We know you can do it!!! Please keep us updated as your soon-to-be busy schedule permits, as to your progress on this most worthy of efforts as you set out for the halls of higher learning!! [And stay out, you pathetic piece of looney-tooney crap CUBED.]
Wishing you the best,
-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), September 25, 2000.
King of Spain = Abe Vigoda (the crusty old geezer who played Fish on Barney Miller).
-- I KNOW (WHO@YOU.ARE), September 25, 2000.
Now I've seen it all. CPR complaining about wasting bandwidth? CPR, who had to be chastised by the forum moderator for spamming the same long, incomprehensible, message on every thread? CPR, whose hallmark is interminable rambling messages that often can't even be decoded if you happen to have your Captain Midnight secret decoder ring handy? CPR, who can be counted on to have an incompetently constructed cut and paste job handy for every subject (often the same one, the matter what the subject)? You almost have to admire such unmitigated gall. Almost.
-- ABC (a@b.c), September 25, 2000.
Then the question will be asked over and over (as we asked *BEFORE* 1/1/2000) :HOW COULD ANYONE BELIEVE THAT SHIT?If I didn't know better, I'd think cpr was saying y2k was never a big deal. Cpr, you estimated in the summer of 1998 y2k was going be to an '8' on the 1-10 scale. Why is it you believed "that shit" then?
-- (1998@1999.2000), September 26, 2000.