On June 20, radio host Jeff Rense interviewed half a dozen Y2K programmers and also spoke to Mike Adams (Y2KNewsWire). Some of the programmers were involved in contingency plans, which I thought some of you might find interesting. Here is a link to the Real Audio archives of the Jeff Rense program, which includes that June 20 broadcast.

Jeff Rense archives

Regarding 9/9/99, I recently read an article that put it into perspective. Sorry I don't have it handy but I'll sum up what I recall its saying. It noted that long ago (and maybe not so long ago) it was common practice for data entry clerks to type 9/9/99 to represent an "impossible" date, one beyond the system's horizon. In some cases, the clerk hitting the "Enter" key where a date was requested would result in 9/9/99 being stored.

The problem is what those systems might do when encountering a data record with 9/9/99 when that date is no longer beyond the system's horizon. Example, if an organization used membership expiration date of 9/9/99 to indicate that a person is a life member, that person might cease to be regarded as a member on 9/9/99 or 9/10/99. This example may seem fairly innocuous, but suppose the organization was the military.

9/9/99 may cause disruption, though it is definitely not of the same order as Y2K. The former is record or transaction based rather than systemic.

If I can locate the article, which I think may have been written by Ed Yourdan, I'll post accordingly.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), September 07, 1999

Answers

I read in the SF Chronicle (sorry no link - it was the dead tree version) that the govt is planning massive Y2k testing on 9/9/99.

-- R (riversoma@aol.com), September 07, 1999.

Yup, I can see something like this happening. I don't think very much of it though. I agree, not of the same order as Y2K.

Tick... Tock... <:00=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), September 07, 1999.

Here's the link to the article on 9/9/99. I was mistaken as to the author; it's Ed Yourdon rather than Ed Yourdan.

Ed Yourdon re: 9/9/99

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), September 07, 1999.

I just wonder why Georgia Power chose 9/9/99 as the day to do testing? And others as well, for that matter. Seems to me that things are already falling apart and it gets harder to hide it.

-- April (Alwzapril@home.com), September 08, 1999.