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What’s the Big Deal About Y2K ?

"Y2K" is shorthand for the Year 2000 problem, or the Millennium Bug. When computers first came into widespread use, programmers only used six numbers for the date (two each for the day, month, and year), in order to save memory space. So 1995 shows up as 95. As a result, most computer programs and computer chips can only handle two digits for the year. The problem is that many of these computers, programs, and embedded chips will not be able to handle the change from 1999 to 2000. Some computers will automatically assume it’s 1900 instead of 2000, while others will just spit out bad data (or cease functioning all together) because they don’t see 00 (the truncation of 2000) as a valid date.

Pretty much everything in modern society is computer-dependent, so this has the potential for large-scale disaster. The y2k problem affects personal computers, software, and mainframes. This is only the tip of the iceberg. It also affects embedded chips. Embedded chips can be found in most cars made after the mid-80s, in elevators, in microwaves and coffee makers, in power plants, oil rigs, airplanes, train switching stations, water purification plants, telecommunication systems, satellites, factories, and on and on. I’ve heard estimates that say there are between 50 and 100 billion embedded chips in existence. Those estimates also say that between 3 and 15 percent of the embedded chips may fail on January 1, 2000.

Okay, so you want to know why they don’t just replace the embedded chips which will fail, and fix the non-compliant software. They’re trying, but they’re not doing it fast enough. And there are simply not enough qualified programmers to fix all the lines of software code in time. Every line has to be gone through by hand. There are companies and utilities and government departments with tens of millions of lines of code. Many programs are in old programming languages which aren’t used anymore, so they’re having to bring programmers out of retirement to fix them. Lots of the software has no documentation. It’s not like Windows 95, where they can just issue a patch for everybody; major software programs are custom-written for that particular use, and so they have to be gone through line by line.

And that’s just the software. All the embedded chips have to be tested, one by one. Each non-compliant chip has to be replaced. The only person who knows for sure if a particular chip is y2k-compliant is the manufacturer. Many of the manufacturers have gone out of business. What’s worse, many chips have no manufacturer’s name on them. Open up your computer and look at the motherboard. Look at all the chips. Look for the names of manufacturers. There will probably be several different manufacturers, and several chips with no name on them. And that’s just your own computer.

The vast majority of people seems to be shockingly complacent about this. "The government will fix it." "The corporations will fix it." "Bill Gates will fix it." It’s amazing to me how many people can serenely trust in some authority, and not consider the potential consequences for their own lives. The Big Boys have been trying to fix this for a few years, and they’re still not prepared. What difference is one more year going to make to that? Trust the government, but plant cabbages, to paraphrase. :-)

There’s also the idea that Y2K is a lot of hype, that it’s just a money-making scam, that there’s a rabble-rousing minority trying to scare everyone so they can make more cash. Sure, people are making money on this. People can smell a business opportunity, and the many, many people who are working on this problem do have to get paid, after all. People make money off uncertainty and disaster all the time: wars create income for arms dealers; earthquakes create income for contractors; etc. But people use the excuse of Y2K Hype to avoid thinking about the possible consequences of Y2K. It’s just too scary to think that there could be massive failures in the systems upon which we depend.

What Will Happen?

There will be problems. It is simply too late now to get everything fixed in time. But at this point, it’s impossible for anyone to predict exactly where the problems will show up, or how bad they will be. That’s why there is still so much inventorying and assessment and testing going on. Every single computer and program and embedded chip has to be tested to see if it is Y2K-compliant. Every single one! Many places have simply given up on non-essential functions, and are concentrating on "mission-critical" functions, that is, the hardware, software, and processes which are essential to that organisation. But that raises another question: as the owner of a small business myself, I have to say that there are no processes here which are not essential to my business. If they weren’t essential, I wouldn’t be spending time and money doing them. So how exactly are all these people defining Mission-Critical?

The plain fact is that nobody knows exactly what will happen or how bad any of the problems will be. Nobody knows. There are no Y2K experts, because Y2K covers so much ground that no one person or company can possibly fully understand the extent and effect of this problem. Estimates range from the blindly optimistic (nothing will happen) to the wildly pessimistic (the whole fabric of society will collapse and it will be the end of the world as we know it). But nobody knows for sure, and nobody is in a position to make accurate predictions. Maybe a few bank accounts will be messed up. Maybe the power will go off for a couple of hours. Maybe the 911 system will fail. Maybe the water supply to the cities will fail. Maybe the entire power grid and telecommunications system will go down. Nobody knows for sure, although everyone seems to have an opinion.

This is frightening because it affects absolutely everything in industrial countries. All supply systems and manufacturing systems and services are inextricably interconnected. For example, if the power goes out, how long can the backup generators at your local phone company keep the phone lines working? If gas can’t be delivered to homes in cold countries, how will you heat your home (remember, it’ll be January)? If vehicles stop running because their embedded chips are faulty, or because there’s no electricity to pump gas, how will food get to your local grocery store? If food can’t be delivered, how long do you think it’ll be before you start getting hungry? If computer systems in banks go down, do you think you’ll just be able to stroll down to the nearest money-machine and take out some cash?

What’s Being Done About It?

In October 1998, the Gartner Group estimated that US costs for fixing the Millennium Bug are about $150-$225 billion, with world-wide costs about $1-$2 trillion. So obviously, something is being done. But is it enough? The press releases and official reports are full of phrases like "we plan to be compliant by..." and "we’re currently working on..." and "we have every confidence that..." These are not phrases which fill me with a sense of security.

Some places have been working on this since 1988, and are still not Y2K-compliant. Some businesses, particularly small and medium ones, have done nothing at all about Y2K in their systems, because the problem is simply too expensive to solve.

Occasionally, some good news hits the media: Company X or government department Y has completed all of its testing, and is now Y2K-compliant! That’s wonderful news, and I sure wish we were hearing more of it. But what about Company X’s suppliers? Even if all of Company X’s systems and computer and embedded chips have been tested, replaced, retested, and finally proven to be Y2K-compliant, the company itself still depends, of necessity, on the outside. Can the company run without electricity? Without telephones? Without a reliable banking system? Without its daily deliveries of supplies? How long would the telephone system have to be down before Company X goes bankrupt?

Even though much is being done to ensure that the world runs smoothly at the turn of the century, the good news isn’t as good as it sounds. The good news doesn’t take the Domino Effect (also known as the Ripple Effect) into account.

So What is the Domino Effect?

It’s not just a matter of computers and programs and chips failing and then getting fixed. If something fails because it isn’t Year 2000-compliant, it cannot be fixed until it is Year 2000-compliant. The domino effect basically says that if one part of the system fails, other parts are likely to fail as well. For example, look at cases where one part of the electricity power grid fails, and then other parts of the system also fail - this happened both in Holland and in New Zealand within the last few years. There was also the Quebec ice storm - there were some places without electricity for over four weeks. Now think of it this way: if the power fails and it can’t be put back on right away (because it isn’t year 2000-compliant - they have to find the place that failed and bring it up to date before the power comes on again), you have no heat, no TV, no radio, no light. This means you can’t cook; you can’t find out what’s going on in other parts of the city or country; your house alarms don’t work. If you have no heat, your pipes might burst (remember, if this all happens, it’ll be January!). If there is no electricity, communication is limited, which hurts emergency services like police, fire-fighters, and ambulances. If people start looting (as they did during the Red River Flood in 1997, and in many other cases of natural disasters), the emergency services will get overloaded anyway.

How Are People Responding to This?

Many people haven’t even heard of this problem, or if they have, they don’t understand the extent of it. Common responses include "We used to live without computers, and we can do it again"and "I never did trust computers, anyway!" Many of those who have heard of it think that the governments and businesses will find a way to fix it. Others are taking it so seriously that they have sold their homes in the city to buy farms, and they are learning how to be self-sufficient. The Canadian military and the RCMP have already publicly announced that they are making contingency plans and are preparing for problems at the turn of the century.

So individual responses range from complete denial and ridicule to outright terror. At this point, it’s impossible for anyone to say which of those responses will end up being the appropriate one!

Many countries where the year 2000 first comes in are planning to have bank holidays for the first couple of working days in the year. They are scared that people in the rest of the world will see the failures coming and that there will be huge runs on their banks. Some North American companies are waiting for the clock to tick over to 2000 in other parts of the world. They figure they’ll be able to see the problems coming, and fix them before 2000 reaches their time zone. (Modern management - ya gotta love it!)

What Can I Do?

If you have good programming skills, check with your local or federal government to see if they can use your expertise. If you own or manage a business, make sure you’re doing something to ensure that your business is Y2K-compliant.

Check with your local utilities, your suppliers (grocery stores, health clinics, etc.), your hospital for medical equipment (including pacemakers and dialysis machines), and your government to see how far they’ve advanced with their preparations, and what contingency plans they’ve made. Get a statement from them in writing, and don’t settle for something vague. That will help you determine what personal preparations you need to make. If your electrical utility doesn’t sound like it’s going to make it, for example, you’re going to have to stock up on candles!

Check your insurance policies; many of them won’t cover date-related losses. Don’t trust anyone who tells you verbally that they’re completely prepared for Y2K. Get it in writing! Check into it now, and carefully review any new policies you receive.

Put the originals of any important documents in a safe place, and make sure you have copies for yourself. You don’t want a computer glitch at the bank to result in the repossession of your house or car!

In other ways, prepare as if for a natural disaster, such as a blizzard knocking out power and water for a while, and preventing food supplies from getting to your city. Think of it as your own personal insurance. Make sure you can heat your home, feed yourself and your family, drink clean water, and stay healthy. I can’t give you any advice about how mild or severe the problems will be, or how long they will last. Neither can anyone else. The best thing to do is to become informed of the progress on Y2K in your area, and base your decisions on that.

If have ever bought lottery tickets, you should understand this. You have a one in a gazillion chance of winning, but you still buy them. Now, you have much worse odds - and it’s not about winning, it’s about losing. Of course, the best possible scenario would be that the century change comes and goes and none of us even notice it, beyond a few fireworks and a bit of champagne. Let’s all hope for that, but let’s not bet our lives on it.