* * * 19991012 Tuesday

Subject Line: [Utilities] "TV Stations Begin Y2K Testing" (AP) "... Southern Company, which provides electricity to 3.8 million customers in the southern United States, was blindsided recently by an unexpected Y2K bug." ... Or, the Y2K Duh Files"

'Nuff said ...

Regards, Bob Mangus

* * *

For educational purposes only ... blah, blah, blah ...

< http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/19991011/tc/tv_y2k_bugs_1.html >

Yahoo! News Tech Headlines

Monday October 11 2:34 PM ET

TV Stations Begin Y2K Testing By DAVID BAUDER AP Television Writer

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - Southern Company, which provides electricity to 3.8 million customers in the southern United States, was blindsided recently by an unexpected Y2K bug.

The company conducted a dry run of its computer systems last month to predict if any glitches would pop up when the clock turns to the year 2000, and alerted the media to its plans. As luck would have it, the test coincided with thunderstorms that swept through the Atlanta area, knocking out power to thousands of Southern's customers.

Fair enough. Storms happen, and Southern dispatched crews to repair its lines. What utility executives didn't expect was to hear television reporters wrongly claim the power outages were the result of Y2K problems.

Southern now lives in fear of a different kind of damage to the company's reputation if there's a bad storm on Dec. 31, spokeswoman Laura Gillig said.

``With some portion of the media, there's a tendency to hype things up, to sensationalize them,'' she said, ``and we perceive that could be a problem. It's the great unknown.''

Gillig told her story at a workshop sponsored by the Radio and Television News Directors Association in Charlotte, where Y2K experts advised local electronic reporters how to cover the story.

The session made a couple of things clear: It's never too early - and is quickly becoming too late - to plan coverage effectively. And there's no end to the story angles, and the potential pitfalls for incautious journalists.

Robert Alloway, director of the National Leadership Task Force on Y2K, and author Peter de Jager, whose Web site tracks millennium-related bugs, said most problems have been spotted and corrected already. About 95 percent of the computer systems won't fail at all, Alloway said. But that still leaves plenty of potential glitches.

``The world is not stopping on January 1st,'' he said. ``It is slowing down a little bit.''

Based on what utilities are reporting, Alloway foresees no major Y2K-related power outages. Problems are much more likely to appear in municipal water systems, the experts said.

If they haven't already, journalists should be questioning companies throughout their regions about their Y2K preparedness - utilities, transportation authorities, banks, supermarkets, small businesses like dry cleaners. Reporters should compile phone lists of where company representatives will be on New Year's Eve so they can be easily reached.

``Your electric utilities are probably going to be fine, but have you made the call?'' asked David Bernknopf, director of news planning at CNN. ``And have you gotten beyond the answer, `we think we have everything under control?'''

Reporters need to be able to recognize ahead of time which problems are Y2K-related and which aren't, like Southern's storm-damaged power lines. For example, up to 5 percent of automatic teller machines aren't working at any given time, de Jager said. Will a live camera crew be standing beside one of them and blame a Y2K bug when money doesn't come out on Jan. 1?

``In about five seconds of reporting, you can precipitate a bank run - unless you do it right,'' he said.

The Canadian computer expert plans to spend much of New Year's Eve and Day in an airplane, flying from Toronto to London and back, partly to show his confidence that air travel will be safe from Y2K problems.

Dismissing survivalists as nuts, De Jager said reporters shouldn't waste time covering people who are stocking up in anticipation of disaster. CNN's Bernknopf, though, said it's important to follow the human response to the situation; he's more worried about people predicting the end of the world and then turning to terrorism to fulfill their own prophecies.

Standing before a room of reporters, de Jager was contemptuous of the profession. He said he expects the media to make Y2K worse than it really is.

``When you want to show restraint,'' he lectured, ``you're incapable of it.''

But a reporter from the Seattle area told how information problems go both ways. Steve Krueger of KPLU said he was stunned when a half-dozen companies he surveyed flatly refused to reveal anything they were doing about Y2K, or even confirm that they were conducting tests. The prominent exception was the airplane maker Boeing, which replied in meticulous detail, he said.

``If I was a public relations man, I would want to tell the world that we're on top of this,'' Krueger said.

The experts urged reporters to keep trying, and even publicly embarrass authorities who are keeping silent. ``People are surprisingly cooperative on this because they don't want a panic,'' Bernknopf said.

Many television and radio stations already have emergency staffing plans in place, preparing to have reporters ready round-the-clock on New Year's weekend. The experts warned stations not to exhaust their staff, because many Y2K problems won't become evident until many businesses go back to work on Monday, Jan. 3 and for weeks and months to come.

``This is an event that is going to continue like bad chili for a long time,'' de Jager said.  Related News Stories 7 Y2K Crisis: Apocalypse Not? - Industry Standard (10/11/99) 7 Project Management: Post Y2K - Computerworld (10/11/99) 7 Russia Starts Y2K Tests At Nuclear Power Plants - Reuters (10/11/99) 7 Y2K Asian Update - Computer Currents (10/10/99) 7 U.S. Cargo Railroads Y2K Compliant - AP (10/09/99) More In Full Coverage Related Web Sites 7 CompuMentor Y2K - download the Year 2000 Workbook for Nonprofits, a guide to performing an organizational Y2K audit. 7 EIN Media - Y2K Watch - Y2K news and information from Prague to Beijing. 7 getting on target with Y2K - Y2K preparedness tips from PBS Online. 7 Health Care & Y2K Personal Planning Guide - what steps are being taken to address Y2K concerns within the health care industry and what steps consumers can take to be prepared. 7 International Y2K Cooperation Center Audio 7 Don't count on 9999 to go by unnoticed - CBC News (09/09/99) 7 How Y2K could affect the internet - NPR (08/17/99) 7 Y2K could sink boaters - CBC News (08/02/99) More In Full Coverage Video 7 Australia is likely to be almost bug-free - BBC (09/14/99)

Copyright ) 1996-1999 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

[END TEXT]

* * *

-- Robert Mangus (rmangus1@yahoo.com), October 12, 1999

Answers

what does bad chili continue on like? An interesting eupemism; does it imply montezuma's revenge type symptoms?

-- Jay Urban (jurban@berenyi.com), October 12, 1999.

euphemism
-- Jay Urban (jurban@berenyi.com), October 12, 1999.

What kind of empty, stupid gesture is riding around on a jet on the day of turnover? Isn't duhJager the one who used to get so upset when some moron (less on) would say "planes will not fall from the sky." What fucking airline is padding his pocket to make such a silly spectacle of himse

-- De (DeStupid@Jager.con), October 12, 1999.

hmmmm...

"What utility executives didn't expect was to hear television reporters wrongly claim the power outages were the result of Y2K problems."

Did you not want the Doombrood to read the truth?

Keep up the good work of debunking Y2K.

-- You Knowwho (debunk@doomeridiots.com), October 12, 1999.

* * * 19991012 Tuesday

You Knowwho (debunk@doomeridiots.com), wrote on October 12, 1999:

> hmmmm... > > "What utility executives didn't expect was to hear television > reporters wrongly claim the power outages were the result of Y2K > problems." > > Did you not want the Doombrood to read the truth? > > Keep up the good work of debunking Y2K.

You Knowwho:

Were the "thunderstorms" and "Y2K testing" a fortuitous coincidence of "convenience" for Y2K event consequence deniability by Southern Company?

The reader only has a non-IV&V SELF-REPORTED account from Southern Company.

Think, don't leap, out-of-the-box!

Bad test planning on the part of Southern Company. Southern Company should have reasonably/realistically anticipated, and scripted, rescheduling ANY Y2K tests in the event of untoward weather within their service region!

Without meticulous and diligent test scripting, discerning the source cause-effect of real-time power grid tests--notice Southern Company failed to disclose the nature of the alleged Y2K test--is virtually impossible (i.e., was the storm or test the cause of subsequent damage?!).

That's the unvarnished "truth" that does nothing to debunk Y2K!

Regards, Bob Mangus

* * *

-- Robert Mangus (rmangus1@yahoo.com), October 12, 1999.

"potential pitfalls for incautious journalists"?! Holy sheepoly, Batman!

-- PH (ag3@interlog.com), October 12, 1999.

"Dismissing survivalists as nuts, De Jager said reporters shouldn't waste time covering people who are stocking up in anticipation of disaster. CNN's Bernknopf, though, said it's important to follow the human response to the situation; he's more worried about people predicting the end of the world and then turning to terrorism to fulfill their own prophecies."

DE JAGER IS A TOTAL TURNCOAT. his statement on "people predicting the end of the world and then turning to terrorism..." is incendiary. what a creep. gee, the wise people that are smart enough to prepare are in his words "nuts" and he is making imaginative statements about something that may not have any base in reality. he is towing someone's party line here.

do you think maybe he has been invited to the bilderbergers meeting?

-- tt (cuddluppy@yahoo.com), October 12, 1999.

Um... It was the CNN spokescritter who talked about "turning to terrorism", not Peter d.

Not sure why they're all so worried about terrorists. Anyone arrested for that should reasonably expect a full pardon from the current administration.

Visions of SNL's Miss Emily Latella saying, "What's all this talk about domesticated terriers? My little Sparky is a very well-behaved Jack Russell and has never bothered anyone, so why do I keep hearing all these people getting all worked about these cute little dogs? I suspect it's all those cat lovers out there, stirring up mischief and getting people all worried..."

-- Mac (sneak@lurk.hid), October 12, 1999.