VOICES / A FORUM FOR COMMUNITY ISSUES : Essay : ‘Y2K or Not Y2K’: That Is the Question

We humans can be strange birds, to mix metaphors. At times, we answer clear danger with alarming arrogance. The “impregnable” Maginot Line in 1940, the “unsinkable” Titanic, the literal hydrogen bomb of the Hindenburg.

Then we turn around and make symphonies out of single notes. A laboratory rat gets cancer after ingesting the human equivalent of a half-ton of some food additive, and we ban the stuff. A film comes out about a killer comet--the sort scientists say hits Earth once in 100 million years--and suddenly people want NASA to orbit nuclear weapons to shoot down the space debris.

The king of this camp is the so-called Y2K problem. A significant number of people expect real difficulties next Jan. 1. Some anticipate far worse, a planetary near-meltdown. The world’s computers will quit. So will everything with a computer chip: power, phones, planes. Banks will fail. Missiles will launch. With Hamlet-like agony, we cannot decide what to do. Some plan to hole up in the hills with a six-month supply of food, water, cash and bullets to wait out the storm while civilization dies.

When not writing, I work as a computer consultant. I’ve worked on three Y2K projects this year alone, so I know whereof I speak. And I can tell you flatly that this panic is utter nonsense. Yet I fear that the fear has reached such a fever pitch, no facts I may present will smooth any feathers.

Nevertheless, let’s try.

Computer memory is so cheap today we find it hard to understand how expensive and precious it once was. So much so that, in years past, programs and chips were coded with two-digit years to conserve space. Thus, this year is 99; next year will be 00, etc. Such code could conceivably think next year is 1900, not 2000.

But so what? At worst, your mortgage company’s computer may think in January that you haven’t made a payment in 100 years. It will send you a late notice. You’ll contact the company. A clerk will note the correction on paper, the way business was conducted before computers, remember? Temporary workers will come in later and key in the updates. A few bucks will be spent. End of problem.

That’s right, end of problem. Why would the computer do worse? Why, for instance, would electricity grids shut down? Although computers are quite ubiquitous, most of us are ignorant of how they work. They are not smart; they know only two things: the on and off of their electronic circuits. Their singular virtues are that they operate very accurately and very fast. In this way, they mimic intelligence in the same way that a movie mimics motion, even though it is no more than a large number of still photos flipped past our eyes in a smooth, swift flow.

As with comet disaster films, too many movies have made computers into more than they are. They have absolutely no imagination; they do precisely what they are told, no less and no more. Unless a computer routine’s logic specifically says “Look at the calendar year; if it’s earlier than last year, go bonkers,” the machine will not.

This year, I have tested hundreds of business and government computers. I advanced the dates on these systems and watched to see if they “burped” when 11:59 p.m. 12/31/1999 became 12 a.m. 1/1/2000. Number of failures or problems: zero.

“Then why,” you ask, “are corporate and government leaders shelling out hundreds of billions to correct a nonproblem?” I’m not sure. As with the lab rats and comets I mentioned before, some “problems” grip the human imagination like a vise. I am merely a computer jock and part-time writer, not a shrink; perhaps a psychologist could better explain the hysteria. But on a bright note: Guys like me have been making a ton of money this year off of Y2K. We then go out and spend it, keeping demand for goods and services high, creating jobs for folks like you. So if you see me in town, shake my hand. Buy me a beer. Just do so before Jan. 1; we all know the bubbles will go flat after that.