Re: The Great Year-2000 Hoax!

In article <53t723$jkb@newsgate.dircon.co.uk> news-uk@dircon.co.uk (Phil Edwards) writes: >I've read and re-read this posting & I'm still not sure what point >it's making. The argument seems to be: >1. Year 2000 FUD abounds (true) >2. People are making money out of it (true) >3. Nobody's saying the FUD isn't justifiable (true-ish, although I >expect to hear a lot more nay-saying over the next year) >4. The FUD really isn't justifiable, and the year 2000 is going to >come and go without any of the "magnificent disasters" (curious >phrase) which have been foretold (highly debatable) >5. Joe Public doesn't know what the issue really is (sadly true) >6. Joe Public is going to take his revenge on the computer industry >when he sobers up from New Year's Day, 2000 and discovers the world's >computers are still running (highly debatable). >The argument seems to hinge on point 6, which strikes me as plain >weird. "Revenge"? Sure, the popular standing of the industry might >take a knock, but it's not as if it ever was all that high - IT has >never been regarded as a capital-P profession, after all. In any case, >the scenario in point 6 depends on businesses _not_ taking measures to >prevent Year 2000 problems: if it's generally perceived that >businesses have taken such measures, a disaster-free 1/1/2000 would >only go to prove how effective those measures were. (Catch-22?) Although point #6 is the strongest word, the key is really #5... Joe Public does not have a basis for comparison -- and we'd better make it part of our business to give him one. Joe Public is just beginning to get an inkling, from all of this, how utterly dependent he is on computerized data systems; what -could- happen. But he doesn't know where the realistic ends and where absurdity begins. Point is, we can say "the sky is falling!" and perhaps reap a short term profit or watch while the stock-market does so for us ... but we'd better be taking the long view instead. Especially when one of us gets on the radio, or even the Internet. Long-term, it's a matter of trust, credibility, reputation. Balance. A matter of what we say as an industry, especially given that it will be interp- reted by people who understand a fraction of what we tell them and only what we tell them. This is the asset upon which all of our careers ultimately depend. We'd better be careful in the next four years, and beyond. That's all.