Y2K and how it is affecting forumites (thoughts on)

S

SycoticSamurai

Joined
Jun 29, 1999
Messages
267
I've noticed that lately there have been an aweful lot of closed threads, and appologies posted on these forums. This in not unexpected, considering that it is almost 2000. I've noticed that lately (the last three months or so) EVERYONE, including those here on BFC have been short tempered, and easily offended. I think that this is easily explainable- Y2K. People are so fatigued with worry, and not to mention media saturation of the subject- I swear that I'm going to the tv station with a gun next time I hear Y2K on the news (see, even me!)- that we are becoming more easily susceptable to rage, and it is starting to show. Let me give you an example;

Last nite I was out buying shotgun ammo (not Y2K related
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) with a good friend of mine. We were leaving a store when we noticed a problem at a Wendy's drive thru a couple hundred yards off. A man in a ford truck was trying to exit the parking lot, and a woman in a white T bird was trying to enter at the same time. Hearing some yelling, my partner and I decided to have a look. So we got in the car and drove closer, parking where we could intervene should it turn violent. I noted that the man in the truck had plenty of room to go around the woman, but he merely shouted out the window that it was "a matter of principal now (expletive deleted)". The woman also had the option of going around and entering the drive thru correctly (it was an exit only where the truck was), but she just sat there, and picked up her cell phone. At this point I turned to my partner and noted that this was just childish, to which he replied that we were witnessing the decline of modern society. The woman was apparently on the phone with the police as not one, but three patrol cars pulled up right then.
We were distracted from the drive thru scene by a Sheriff tapping on my arm and asking for some Id.
I must rant here for a minute. Why did he ask me For ID? I was just sitting in my car, minding my own business, and he has to come play Operation Harass My Ass. But knowing full well that we were doing nothing wrong, we complied, and he looked at them and walked off, handing them back. WHAT THE F**K IS THAT??? Any way, back to the story.
So, the cops go over and tell the woman to back up and they all leave. Two grown adults needed to call the police to accomplish this.

The moral of the story? Next time stop and think before you post something here. If you are angry, get the persons Email address and send it to them privately. These forums are here for US, and others like us. We are guests in the house of Turber, lets act like it. We are the Elite core of knife people, we determine where the trends fall, and we are all good people. Set the Example for the lurkers, and the new members.

Joe Glessner, owner
Sycotic Samurai Cutlery

P.S. Merry F***ing Christmas!
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hello,

Sounds like Mr Policman was kind of wondering the same thing i am,,,,why even involve yourself with the problem in the first place. I mean the Age of Chivalry
is over. If and I mean if, i stumble across
a Situation in my path of travel that would require an outsider intervening, and if the innocent party was at risk of bodily injury or death, and was at a Distinct Disadvantage of surviving a violent attack, Then i may intervene if i figure i can alleviate the treat without greater risk to the Victim or myself.

Its a sad fact that involving yourself in others conflicts can tend to bring swift Reversal to the point your are also a victim.

I mean what if you would have gotten more invloved than just watching,,which i think you did basically buy "Driving over to get a look", What if the Offending party
in his rage would have considered you a threat?? Bad idea.

Im not Thrashing your idea of being concerned,,,but alot of Concerned people
that have interviened in others problems can now be found in Grave sites across are great land,,,and for no other reason than they didnt think, or act rationally to a matter that wasnt even a concern to them.

For a LEO to Roll upon a sceen and be able to at said scene ask you as a bystander for ID is unusal , unless your Proximity to the Scene ,gives the officer a Probable thought that you may be invloved, ie...to close to the situation.

Remember in my opinion that a Threat or tacticl situation is like a Chess Game,
the player who can think moves ahead to a given responce usally is the victor.

anyway im just a bald knifemaker so take my advice or leave it.

Take care,
Allen Blade
 
First off, my partner and I are more than capable of defending ourselves, he being an ex Marine, and I having qualifications of my own
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. We were a good five hundred feet away from the situation, more than adequate for disassociation. I was not even worried for myself, I was however worried that this woman who is obviously stupid, was going to get herself hurt. Unfortunately too many feel that the age of chivalry is dead, and therefor they make it so. I however don't. Point being, too many people are not thinking, they are just reacting. BAD idea.

Joe
 
Well said.
I haven't woried about y2k that much myself as I think it is all a load of $#!*. But the media is getting pretty damn annoying.Which news station are you heading to? I'll head for a different one when I lose it too.
The Sherrif was probably getting your name in case idiot 1 or idioy 2 decided to take things to court and make up what had "really happened" Then you would have been called as a witness.Its nice to find someone who's willing to help other people still. Any more people worry about what will happen to me? Instead of do they need help and what can I do ?

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Fix it right the first time, use Baling Wire !
 
Hello,

I didnt mean to infer that you and your friend werent or arent carring Humans.

The point i was trying to make was that even if the woman was "STUPID" does that make it a situation where in all probability
if you would have had to close and assist somhow make it worth you possibly becoming
a victim yourself. Anyones Prior Service or SKills learned,,,,means nothing to a Assailant bent on Producing TRAUMA to your body. In fact i think this woman wasnt STUPID at all, maybe initially for not moving, but atleast she stayed in her car and was on the Phone to the cops, in a since she did React to the threat the best she knew how.

Didnt mean to offend your Kind Act of concern
but just making the point that not all good intentions end up for the best all the time.


Allen Blade
 
I too was worried about y2k for a while, but like Matt Shade, I have come to the conclusion that it is a crock of S!@t. Most people around me aren't too worried about y2k, and of my friends who are in Computer Science, none of them are worried. The y2k problem is only a computer thing.
Let's not forget that the new millenium doesn't really start until January 1, 2001! Everyone who's fearing the new millenium is simply off by a year.

~Mitch
 
Hello,

And one other point id like to make, not relating it to anyone in particular.

All the training in the world doesnt matter for anything, because you can never be trained for everything that may come along.


I talked to Jim Keating one time and asked him.

Me: " Jim if you were walking in a group of people minding your oun buisness on a street , and a person unkown to you desided he didnt like your bandana, and just walked up without foreknowledge to you from behind and shoved a knife into your Ribs, what would you do?

( quoting here) JIM: I guess id DIE!

the moral to the story is, Train Train and train some more but never belive you cant be stopped Dead in you tracks by someone who just doesnt give a rip!!

Beacuse no matter how much you train in or how bad you think you are there is somone out there to prove you wrong.

remember " Fear is the Beginning of Knowledge" and Knowledge makes Fear a friend!

.02 worth maybe

Allen Blade
 
It's pretty ironic ... years ago some geeks noticed there was going to be a problem if nothing was done about it in advance. They told the responsible people about it and weren't listened to, so they went to the media with it. The media jumped all over it, naturally; impending disaster is always news, and then the responsible people were forced to listen and fix the problems. You didn't really expect the media to drop the story then, did you? "Disaster No Longer Impending" isn't as good a headline as "Impending Disaster Even Worse Than Previously Thought" ... and by now a bunch of people have built careers out of it -- what do you expect them to do now, go back on welfare?


So the first week or two of January the big story will be "Geeks Issued False Alarm and Got Us All Upset for Nothing -- Let's Lynch 'Em" editorial later in the broadcast, "Let's Never Listen to Anyone Who Predicts a Disaster Again." (Wanna bet those stories aren't already written and on file ready to go? All the reporters can take a vacation that week....) Nobody is going to admit they refused to listen when they were told the disaster was no longer impending; they'll blame the prophets for succeeding ... you've heard of a self-fulfilling prophecy? Well, there are self-averting prophecies, too....

Mark my words: everybody who yells "False alarm!" and "Never listen to doomsayers again" is a dork. Maybe I could take a vacation that week, too, just save this post and repost it everywhere....

-Cougar Allen :{)
 
WEll, I am 85% sure that I will not be postin up here much int othe next year. Not because the forums sucks or anything, but because I will be unable to, due to ISP failure, gas shortage, electric outages, or so on. Some feel a war will break out, others see nothing. The thing is, these ideas are being said by people whom have ZERO clue on what the situation is even about. I've read a bout it a bit, and feel that a worldwide recession is easily possible, and plan on that to prepare against.

Assuming you KNOW (pretend you know) that we would be experiencing a recession at the very least, what would you do?

Would it hurt to buy some extra stuff? No. Will some people not buy extra, because nothing is going to happen because "they don't think so, even though they know nothing about it." You bet. Pretty sad too
 
I say this as the individual responsible for networking ops for a fairly large, publicly held company. I will be on call that night, with systems checks scheduled for Sunday. I did, however, let them know that if I was sitting on anyone's roof overnight with a shotgun, it would be my own...

There will be some minor problems here in the States, but most major systems, especially banks and infrastructure, will be unaffected. There is concern, however, over the readiness of several cities' 911 call centers.

Overseas, there are varying levels of readiness, however a lesser degree of reliance on computerized systems (read antiquated systems) will mitigate the effects of many Y2K afflictions. Eastern Europe and Asia are in the worst shape. The remaining functional reactor at Chernobyl is causing some concern.

My personal take is that if you have money in overseas accounts, you might want to shift some things back here. Otherwise, no real worries.

My question is: Are you guys going to eat those expensive MREs, or just let them go bad down in the shelter?
 
I think it could be other factors too. Holiday shopping perhaps? Every year around this time, America is pretty short on temper.

Not everyone worries about Y2K. I'm sure there are some indigenous tribes in the Amazon jungle who couldn't care less... unless their newly acquired machetes had embedded chips in it.
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Y2K. Well, within this century, we've went through two world wars and one economic depression (that actually impacted us deeply)... not to mention the Cold War, especially the Cuban Missile Crisis. Through it all, the United States was able to survive intact and move on. Y2K is just a wannabe next to these crisis juggernauts.

That is not to say that I don't think everything will go smoothly and we should not prepare. But preparation is something that I think we should do even if Y2K never existed. Plan for natural disasters, fires, and burglaries. If we've kept up our training we should be OK. And another thing. By now, we should have learned to remain calm. Panic is for the unprepared and the untrained.

Actually, it would be quite amusing to see an electronic apocalypse. Ah yes, Windows will explode and along with it, Microsoft. Meantime, Linux and BeOS will remain intact and humming right along to rebuild the digital age. Their Y2K doesn't come along until the end of 2047.
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I don't see any major meltdowns happening either.

What gravely concerns me is that something pretty "minor" in the scheme of things will act as a catalyst for a group of people to act really stupid, in turn causing problems that spiral out of control. I do not underestimate the stupidity of people as a whole especially when in large groups.

So, it's not the computers, but the people that scare me.

Spark

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Kevin Jon Schlossberg
SysOp and Administrator for BladeForums.com

Insert witty quip here
 
I have to go with Spark on this one. There will probably be some localized technical problems on the scale of a bad snowstorm due to Y2K but I am far more concerned about the impacts of irrational behavior. There may well be a recession but I believe that it will be caused by people's reactions more than technical problems.

In engineering terms "Human Behavior is the only truly Stochastic Process".

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AKTI Member No. A000370
 
The bottom line is there was life before computers and electiricity and gas and cars, and there were knives before all that too. So I'd say everyone here at least isn't going to miss out much on what they like. They have their knives and their life.The only thing I'm worried about if there is a big problem is I won't be coming here for these great discussions anymore. As for the computers I have talked to friends and family who work for large corporations(ameritech, AEP, Battele) and none of them are worried in the least about the computers.Most of the companys mentioned have upgraded everything to be compliant or replaced what couldn't be upgraded. If we have any problem at all, I think it will be people themselves. The media has made such a hype about it that I figure at least one or two sick minded individuals are planning on causing some trouble. I think if we see anything happen it wil be looting and rioting by a bunch of idiots. Lucky for me I live in the country and don't have to worry much about that either.Even though I'm not worried, I sure as hell am staying out of any planes on that night.

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Fix it right the first time, use Baling Wire !
 
The uninformed masses will be the biggest problem of Y2K without a doubt. Everyone in this country is capable of preparing for this but it's the stuborn people who refuse to that will cause rioting and panic.

How does that saying go? "Hope for the best, prepare for the worst." Something like that.

Anyway, Y2K or not I'll be ready. If Y2K does become a big problem and you're not prepared, you're screwed. But if you're prepared for a tough time and Y2K is a *****cat, what's the worst that could happen? You have a few extra boxes of ammo and a bunch of extra cans of food?


I don't believe it won't let me say pu$$ycat!
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[This message has been edited by Disco Stu (edited 06 December 1999).]
 
Well I am not taking any chances. I went out and got some extra beer, just in case.
 
I think what spark said is the bottom line.

99% of those who come here can take care of themselves just fine even if all ---- breaks loose. It's those people who depend on our wounderfull government and others for their existence that worry me. Those who never plan ahead, those who live hand to mouth, those who could care less about their family's. These people miss one meal (and there's alot of them) and you never know what fear will do. Computers can't cause problems- they don't think. PEOPLE cause problems.

I like what Uncle Bill said--- I'm planning to be wrong.
Thanks Uncle Bill.

John Yeackley
 
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