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Technology Stocks : Discuss Year 2000 Issues -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Christine Traut who wrote (5043)	3/26/1999 8:21:00 AM
From: flatsville	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9818

Welcome back! I picked this up this morning: ------------------------------------- The NJ Story will remain somewhat ambiguous until the details are published in a respectable technical periodical. (At least one I respect.) Supposing the most plausible explanation I have heaard is true (y2k remediation messed up some input checking code) it raises an issue I have seen in one of my IEEE pubs (sorry I forget which one, sorry) that used the acronym Y2kA, for Y2k aftermath. The people who fix their codes hastily, or trust automatic software fixers, or y2k consultants in business for the last 6 months or trust a slew of other sloppy fixes ... those folks may be bitten harder by the new bugs the sloppiness introduced than by the y2k bug itself. Compliance testing and regression testing is not easy for any operational distributed systems (is there any other kind?) The hard part of y2ka is that no one will really know where to look for the problem. Y2k fixes are focused by the nature of the problem, but sloppy maintenance can ooze a surprisingly long way from the actual deltas. Assuming there is good configuration control and someone actually knows what the deltas were, 6 months later. ---GaryFostel--- (Apparently Gary Fostel ignores his spell checker as well...<ggg>)

To: Christine Traut who wrote (5043)	3/27/1999 12:01:00 AM
From: Ken Salaets	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

The Gartner Group is projecting something like 25 percent of the problems to occur during the latter half of this year, 10-15 percent or so in the first two weeks of '00 (ggg), 55 percent during the balance of 2000, and the rest thereafter. 'Spect the chaps on Jenkins Hill will use this info to determine an appropriate sunset date for your favorite legislation, aka the Y2K liability bill. Speaking of which -- or bills, more accurately -- Hatch was able to toss his hat next to McCain's before the break, so it's Commerce 1, Judiciary 1, Special Committee 1 (i.e., Dodd's). The Connecticut Peddler was going to, then wasn't going to, and finally did drop his bill, or so I've heard. The friendly receptionist in his personal office didn't seem to know. ggg. Other news: the Bemers of NY are projecting a $535M price tag to repair their own systems. Dang! And a Santa Clara (or perhaps San Jose -- it all looks the same from the freeways!) IT firm ran a test on their remediated LAN and it shut down the bulk of their systems in three of the campus buildings. To top it off, all of the doors with electronic key systems locked up tight as well. Guess the employees weren't too pleased about it. Looks like the GIS shop won't be invited to this year's picnic. ggg. By the way, thanks for the report. Is there more? Ken

To: Christine Traut who wrote (5043)	3/27/1999 8:22:00 PM
From: Christine Traut	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

A few more thoughts on attending that big deal computer conference. This is a yearly event. It attracts the big thinkers and strategists. If ever there was a place to talk about the Y2K issue from an overall industry viewpoint - this was it. Not even on the agenda. What was interesting, though, was that two of the 'special guests' mentioned it. One was Katherine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post, addressing the group at dinner. She was listing issues that are on the minds of her readers - Y2K was first. Then there was Mary Lou Quinlan of the McManus group. She does market research with women. She showed a tape of one of her focus groups and there was a woman who looked very worried, saying that Moms ultimately had to do everything around the house and it was Moms who were going to have to deal with Y2K. People laughed. A lot of people. I am still amazed, not to mention disappointed, that the leaders of high tech companies do not seem to feel any responsibility for what is an industry wide quality control problem. Even if Y2K did nothing more than scare people - and I think it will do considerable harm - the industry ought to be reaching out and taking responsibility. Instead, we've got Microsoft misleading people into thinking that "Y2K Compliant" means that their software is fine just as it is when it is going to require patches and updates. And many of the technology elite laughing at Moms and Y2K. We don't do it very often, but part of the purpose of this board is to discuss Y2K's impact on the stock market. I am beginning to believe that there could be a tremendous public relations and trust issue with technology companies. Long before 01/01/00. I've always realized that geeks are not the most emotionally intelligent people in the world. But messing up, being uninterested in cleaning up the mess, failing to take responsibility and then laughing at people because they are frightened - not a good recipe for keeping up the value of a brand.

To: Christine Traut who wrote (5043)	3/27/1999 11:21:00 PM
From: C.K. Houston	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 9818

Christine, I sent this PM to you, but thought it was worthwile to also share with others. Hope you don't mind. ========================================================= <Outside of my bringing up the Y2K subject, it was remarkable how little anyone was paying attention. I mean, the subject was Not Even On The Agenda!> Unfortunately, Christine - that's what it's like across the board. Not just in the IT industry. I may have mentioned that I have some friends who are MAJOR independent oil-producers with holdings throughout the world. Last year I put some technical info together for oil industry to share with these friends - gratis. NO INTEREST WHATSOEVER. One of the guys has a private oil company $600MM and his brother went public last year with another company listed on NASDAQ. They and they're friends are doing "da nada" re Y2K. Fix on Failure. Wish I could convey a Texas twang ... "Don't you worry. My boy and I saw something on 60 Minutes about that Year 2000 stuff. Bill Gates is going to take care of it." Another friend who's president of an int'l independent oil company (he previously owned mucho rigs) ... "Don't tell me about the problems. Tell me how I can make money from this Year 200 stuff." Another friend who had a oil equipment manufacturing plant ... when I sent him information and spoke with him ... "It's not my problem anymore. Last week I sold the company for $45 million cash to an Austrian." My "ex" sold his company for $25MM to a company listed on NYSE, which is comprised of about 12 companies acquired over past 6 years. It took me 6 months to convince him they had a problem - and he's an engineer! He then went on a personal campaign to alert the NYSE listed company that bought his. They laughed at him. He made sure he had his recommendations in writing. Then just gave up. I was a lunch partner with guy heading Y2K for Shell. I played the dumb female role to get info. He told me that they couldn't test and remediate rigs unless they were shut down - too many safety hazards. "Of course we could shut down to test and remediate, and don't have to worry about safety risks. Only have to worry about money." Now I've seen where he's quoted (he was president of trade organization) about embedded "chips" not being a big problem. He could safely talk about "chips" cause that is relatively accurate. Embedded systems are the problem. About 100-150 embedded systems on a rig, comprised of about 10,000 embedded "chips". All it takes is one stupid little chip - at a key point - to create havoc. November '97 I met with the technology editor of TIME Magazine to explain the "embedded systems" problem. I wanted engineers & CEO's to understand where vulnerabilities were. All to no avail. When "embedded systems" then became more prevalent in media - he chose not to write anything anymore cause it was no longer a "scoop". Two years ago I thought this problem could be solved. I don't anymore. I gave up "trying to educate and save the world". I'm tired of being laughed at. My energy is better spent elsewhere. Probably the strongest emotion I have with this whole Y2K mess, is an overwhelming sense of sadness. I also feel anger, because we should NOT be at the point we are. We should be further ahead. If I was capable of understanding this in the Fall of '97, and knew where to find the technical information to help others ... why in the hll haven't those in key decision-making positions been able to??? Greed and ego is what I personally attribute this to. Cheryl P.S. I don't know what oil prices are like on the East coast, but has anyone noticed what's happened to oil price on West coast??* A few weeks ago a gallon was just under a buck. Now we're around $1.50! FYI - My friends (a couple & non-Y2k'ers) asked their friend - who owns several gas stations what's going on. They were told that the major oil companies (i.e., Chevron, Shell, Arco, etc.) are rationing gas and attributing it to decreased supply because certain key oil refineries have been shut-down because of explosions. I saw the same explanation on LA news shows two days ago. Maybe it has something to do with Y2K - Maybe it doesn't.