The Wall Street Journal may not care about Y2K but TheStreet.com does.
Back to the Future: Y2K Horror Stories
TheStreet.com, 11/10/97
So why don't people seem to believe this thing?
There were some 300 attendees at the recent SPG Year 2000
Conference and Expo in Dallas' Grand Kempinski hotel,
and they're all working on their companies' Y2K problem.
Previous shows had seen as many as 2,000 Y2K pros in
attendance. But all too few are willing to talk about their
own, real problems.
One reason for the silence is that tales of impending Year
2000 breakdowns are shrouded in issues of liability.
"We've done estimates of the potential liability for Year 2000
problems," says Steven L. Hock, an attorney with Thelen, Marrin,
Johnson & Bridges. "And we think damages could far outstrip the
actual cost of all the Y2K fixes -- we're talking upwards of
$500 billion."
But without anybody willing to talk on record about the
problem, we reporters don't have much to go on, because
we don't like to use unattributed anecdotes. Thus, the Year
2000 has become a silent killer -- a massive, broad-reaching
problem that no one will admit to suffering from.
So here are a handful of nameless, faceless and largely
unattributed stories about Year 2000 problems. You don't
have to believe them. You don't even have to read them. But
a couple of years from now don't say you weren't warned.
thestreet.com |
