For someone for whom Y2K is really, really over, he sure keeps in touch.

[cut-to-chase-level-of-snip]

[one step forward]
"Final note? Just because this particular power problem was not a Y2K problem is not a guarantee that Y2K problems affecting power will not arise in the future. But, based upon what I've seen, I doubt Y2K will result in any significant power problems. Each day I receive more information about the power industry and each day my confidence in the technology grows. The evidence is suggesting that it is not as reliant on date calculations as was once feared."

[two steps back?]

"But . . . as I'm well aware, even this growing level of confidence is not a guarantee we won't experience problems."

[do the hustle]

"(An aside -- every time I make this statement, a handful of people disagree but I have yet to receive a verifiable instance where Y2K will disrupt power distribution. Until I do, the statement stands. If I do receive information to the contrary the statement changes, and will be documented on this site, to reflect that new information. Fair?)"

Link, as if you couldn't already surmise what he wrote

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), August 31, 1999

Answers

I wasn't a reader of this forum when de Jager was ringing the Y2k danger bell. My guess is that many people here probably quoted him as an expert who lent credence to the doom and gloom scenerios. As time passed, de Jager changed his stance and stated in his "DOOMSDAY AVOIDED" article that "We've finally broken the back of the Y2K problem." If you were one of those who "supported" de Jager in the past, but now feel he is "wrong" in his stated position, can you site specific reasons why you feel this way. In other words, what specifically caused you to lose faith in the information he was providing? Thanks

-- CD (not@here.com), August 31, 1999.

CD: oh, I dunno, maybe the elapsed time between "hey!" and "oh, ferget it". To wit: Nov. 17, 1998:
Open letter to President Clinton

"Either way, action, real action, not soothing words and platitudes, is required at the highest levels either to correct an unacceptable situation or to correct the notion that your administrators are incapable of executing their mandated mission statements."

Dec 14, 1998, in Failure as evidence of Effort":

"The bad news, and there is bad news, is that in waking up the giant, we also scared the wits out of the general population. General perception has transformed worst-case scenarios based upon lack of effort into inevitable, unavoidable consequences. Any good news which does arise is cast aside as merely a positive spin. Bad news is accepted at face value. But good news, no matter what supporting evidence is offered, is discounted, ignored and discarded." Eight months later, he's still marginally wobbling. That, or he agreed to debunk any untoward article presented to him.

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), August 31, 1999.

Couple questions Lisa-

Did you believe what he had to say prior to his December 14 article?

You said you feel "he's still marginally wobbling". Because of this, do you feel he can no longer be referenced as a valid source of information?

-- CD (not@here.com), August 31, 1999.

CD, suppose we should take this offline, but to answer your questions:

Yes, I did agree with his position prior to Dec 14, that everybody (business, govt here and everywhere else) was pitifully behind. Can he be referenced? Absolutely. As evidence of what happens when you sqwawk about Y2K...no doubt he's sick to death of Y2K (as we all are, I would venture) but he's still writing about it. Took on Jim Lord, specifically, who was essentially positing that "utilities may not be as prepared as we've been led to believe".

Even though de Jager is here mouthing roughly the same words in this article: "The evidence is suggesting that it is not as reliant on date calculations as was once feared..." The evidence is no longer supposed to be suggesting anything to anybody. Utilities are a closed case, remember? The time for evidence was back in the assessment stage, which was generally completed by the industry like a year ago, right? My point is, I believe he was made into a (unpaid, this time) mouthpiece. "So far what do we have? A problem which occurred during a Y2K upgrade activity, which is not that unusual. An example of some shoddy reporting of facts and figures, again unfortunately, not that unusual. And an inkling of what will happen every time any computer related problem occurs anywhere in the world in the coming months. Prepare yourself for numerous repetitions of this 'El Zero' effect.

It should be interesting to note that during this same period several thousand other Y2K upgrades took place around the world successfully. [lisa: yeah, that's what we largely expect to happen] These success stories received no worldwide media coverage. First rule of Journalism? Good news does not make good copy. [Bad news made de Jager some good copy and excellent $$$. Here his credibility is impeccable.]

Lord was trying to demonstrate that there may, indeed, be problematic power anomalies around the rollover, while de Jager is still mumbling about what the assessment data suggests, in September. Why is he attacking any analysis of power vulnerabilities but still hedges his position on the subject? Is he dancing because it's fun, or because somebody handed him the London and Lord situations and said: "Spin 'em." ?

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), August 31, 1999.

BTW, CD, are you his agent or something? Or - gasp - the man himself????

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), August 31, 1999.

"no doubt he's sick to death of Y2K (as we all are, I would venture) but he's still writing about it." - "Is he dancing because it's fun, or because somebody handed him the London and Lord situations and said: "Spin 'em."? - "My point is, I believe he was made into a (unpaid, this time) mouthpiece."

I'm assuming it's safe to say your above quotes would basically sum up your reasons/answers to my original question. If I'm wrong, or if there is more to it than what my simple little cut and paste summarizes, please correct me. Thanks for your responses.

-- CD (not@here.com), August 31, 1999.

"BTW, CD, are you his agent or something? Or - gasp - the man himself????"

LOL

-- CD (not@here.com), August 31, 1999.

Sorry Lisa, CD asks pertinent questions here. Why did DeJaeger seem so credible prior to his more optimistic thoughts? Why is his new attitude toward the situation scoffed at? Are you intimating that there is no way that remediation work or proof of positive results that apparently crossed DeJager's desk can possibly be credible?

Point is, I had high regard of DeJager when I first became aware of the problems over 2 years ago. He was an original voice in the wilderness, in my opinion. Quite often, his name was linked with the Yardenis and Yourdons as being authorities on the situation.

Lisa, I won't shoot the messenger here and will grant him the benefit of the doubt for his change of heart. Since my logic isn't mired in any camp's philosophy surrounding this issue, I regard his words as good news.

Whatever happened to open-mindedness and the search for credible sources, anyway?

-- Bad Company (johnny@shootingstar.com), August 31, 1999.

de Jager NEVER provided any credible reasons why he changed so fast. And as lisa shows us above, it was indeed a FAST change. Too bad, because if he really had good, credible evidence that things suddenly went from night to day -- or even if he would say that HE overestimated the impact of Y2K (like, "Gee, folks, when I said that we HAD to have a FULL YEAR for testing, I just ASSUMED that you knew that I was joking, ha ha ha.") -- that would make more sense.

And this is really not a polly/doomer thing. If a well known polly suddenly became very pessimistic without providing much in the way of reasons, wouldn't you be curious (if not suspicious) as to why?

-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.com), August 31, 1999.

"If a well known polly suddenly became very pessimistic without providing much in the way of reasons, wouldn't you be curious (if not suspicious) as to why?"

Yes. I would be very curious. Did you not find this article by de Jager (which was referenced by Lisa) to be "credible"? ...

Failure as Evidence of Effort

-- CD (not@here.com), August 31, 1999.

imple - the man has no honour, no sense of duty, quite happy to make the mess WORSE (a little like Flint, scoofy hoffy etc. the pas de problem brigade) -

he has been bought off

BTW read what Hyatt says about him, the raving hypocrite divulged after an "all is well" lecture that he, personally, would be taking all kis judas blood money "out of the bank"

Bastard

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), August 31, 1999.

King, Andy, I am sorry that I don't archive articles. I have been reading DeJaeger's quotes for a long time now and I beg to differ with you on this one. While I certainly cannot provide you with evidence, I DO remember him giving a long diatribe as to why his change of heart had taken place.

I must state that the change of heart took place, at least partly, due to a flawed rationale IMHO. That is, I remember him saying that a large part of the battle had been won as the awareness of y2k had been embraced by the technological, corporate and governmental communities alike. (No defense for that sentiment----awareness does not supercede down and dirty remediation). Yet, this was a 'part' of his reasoning.

And King, you are correct. An abrupt about-face from anyone in either of the camps on this issue can only make one suspicious. Maybe it's a little easier for me to see that 1999 could have given him a lot of revenue with his speaking engagements and book deals had he kept his original 'sky is falling' philosophy intact. You must admit, doom sells.

From my vantage point, it took some guts to back off of that stance.

I remember Ed Yourdon being featured in the Albuquerque Journal last year being a little more upbeat about power and y2k than I had read previously. (And Ed, if you're out there, please correct me if I am wrong---or the author if he was misquoting). Point is, could it be that the general philosophies that the experts have about y2k are also somewhat subject to change from time to time?

-- Bad Company (johnny@shootingstar.com), August 31, 1999.

Bad Company, I agree with the basics that you have outlined, but I think it really becomes a matter of orders of magnitude of change versus the evidence on which it is supposedly based. I believe that Ed Yourdon (again, like you, maybe I'm making bold assumptions here) has indeed become somewhat more optimistic on some facets of Y2K, but more pessimistic on others, based on his writings, including the belief that we are in for a very rough 2000 kicking off a decade of depression. But you would EXPECT, given that Y2K is itself a dynamic issue, to see relatively minor changes such as this. And, again, Yourdon's writings always seem to explain what assumptions he is making.

de Jager did a nearly complete 180 degree turnaround in a very short period of time, and the only justification that I could get out of his writings were that his new found optimism was based on the following two points:

1) Y2K AWARENESS "=" Y2K FIXING

2) He is getting self reported good news -- including reports of Y2K test failures -- so that means that the problem is being worked on.

These points hardly begin to address all the claims that de Jager made previously, in particular that a full year of testing is needed AFTER code has been remediated. Neither of these points, even IF valid, give a positive answer to the following question: Will Y2K be fixed and tested IN TIME FOR THE IMMOVABLE DEADLINE OF JAN 1, 2000?

de Jager's drastic changeover does not add up. At least not in any technical context. Political, maybe; financial, maybe. Not technical.

-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.com), August 31, 1999.

Personaly my reasons for doubting DeJagger's change of heart is because 1. he did it in a very short time frame, and 2. in that short time frame he never took the time to analyse and explain rationaly what made him change his mind (at least to my liking). Ed Yourdon, Jim Lord, Rick Cowls are example of experts who will. DeJagger was never as much of an "expert" source for me as these other 3 were; even when he was "sounding the alarm", his style was superficial and glossy, not to mention his afinity for hyperbole. He didn't give me the impression of being an "authoritative" expert on the issue, more like a man full of himself.

After reading Dave Welden's thread on Open Mind vs Closed Ones which stirred my thinking, I'd venture to say that DeJagger strikes me as having more of a closed mind due to an agenda than Yourdon or Lord.

-- Chris (%$^&^@pond.com), September 01, 1999.