Slashdot Mirror


Am I Alone After the World Collapsed?!?

petitclv writes "I just noticed that the last slashdot article was posted at 5pm, 'the day before the Y2K bug destroyed the whole world in flames.' So I wanted to know if I was the latest /. reader to be able to read it. Surely I'm not (partly because most of the people are celebrating as I'm writing this), but I just wanted to make a check. Do you think that the Y2K bug already has made a few troubles, but the media just don't want to put an end to your parties?" Well, petitclv, I crawled out of *my* bunker just now and the world still seemed to be going. (More below.)

My trusty Linux box seems to be working. No nuclear-looking glow from Washington DC (20 miles South of me). Guess all that's left to do is drink up the the stock of bourbon whiskey I accumulated "just in case."

No word from Holland, Michigan yet, but I suppose if the Midwest had been nuked or otherwise returned to the stone age, somebody would have submitted it by now, so I guess CmdrTaco, Hemos, CowboyNeal and the other Geek Compound denizens are okay (aside from possible massive hangovers, but you didn't hear that from me, oh no no no...)

So here we are in Y2K, preparing to face a crisis The Mainstream Media hasn't hardly mentioned: The Wetware Rollover Bug!

Do you have any idea how many people are going to write the wrong date on checks and other documents for (at least) the next month or two?

A frightening thought!

But Happy New Year anyway. ;-)

- Robin "roblimo" Miller
(on behalf of sleeping friends and co-workers everywhere.)

284 comments

  1. meta first! by cxreg · · Score: 3

    First Post of First Article of the Millennium! or something.

    1. Re:meta first! by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      Aaargh! You #@£*$ bastard! You beat me by one minute!

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

    2. Re:meta first! by cxreg · · Score: 2

      Yes but you got First Reply to First Post to First Article of the Millenium. Must count for something =)

    3. Re:meta first! by QuoteMstr · · Score: 1

      The millennium does not begin under Jan01, 2001.

    4. Re:meta first! by cxreg · · Score: 1

      You're right. It begins *on* Jan01, 2001. ;)
      But despite the fact that everyone seems to know and accept this, no one really seems to care. I cant help but wonder what next year will be like. "Lets bring in the new Millennium... again!". People are weird.

    5. Re:meta first! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      People likes to party.

    6. Re:meta first! by SanjuroE · · Score: 1

      That is what everyone is saying, but can you explain me why?

    7. Re:meta first! by Issue9mm · · Score: 2

      Because the first year in "the Year of Our Lord" begins with 1. There was no 0, therefore, we have hit the last year in our millenium, and not the first year in the next. We are in the 999th year of this millenium.

    8. Re:meta first! by Zan+Thrax · · Score: 1

      No one likes a math geek Scully

      --

      Intolerant people should be shot.
    9. Re:meta first! by Ventilator · · Score: 1

      I think, it's much more impressive for people if they can turn over three or four digits on the year-count, since that doesn't happen very often.

      In Zurich (Switzerland) where I live, they decided to celebrate the beginning of the 20th century at it's correct beginning: 01.01.1901. The rest of the world however celebrated it at 01.01.1900 and when they did in Zurich, nobody noticed about it. They didn't want to be that embarassed again.

      --
      --- If OS were buildings, then the first woodpecker to come around would erase 95 % of civilization.
    10. Re:meta first! by Syberghost · · Score: 2

      Hey! You got First Pedantic Correction of Incorrect Millenial Year Assertion of the new millenium!

    11. Re:meta first! by sweet+reason · · Score: 1

      and i claim first pedantic correction to the first pedantic correction of the first year of the second millennial end-of-millennium debate. (did anyone actually debate this a thousand years ago? they didn't count years then as we do now.) because cxreg was the first and last to spell 'millennium' correctly.

      --
      Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. -- A.E.
    12. Re:meta first! by Tony-A · · Score: 1

      It's the First Post of First Article of Last Year of Second Millennium.
      Curious. Days, weeks, months start counting at 1. Hours, minutes, seconds start counting at 0.

    13. Re:meta first! by Syberghost · · Score: 2

      (did anyone actually debate this a thousand years ago?

      The last millenium was celebrated by Western culture in 1033, which was regarded as the millenial anniversary of Christ's death.

      I'm sure that scratched on the stone /. tablets of the time was a raging debate on whether it should instead have been celebrated in 1029 or something.

    14. Re:meta first! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, and you're an anal retentive asshole. Who cares when it starts? Really. Who cares? Only anal retentive assholes who like to go around correcting people care. And, well, that's great. Because no one likes to be corrected by an ARA.

    15. Re:meta first! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My first? I actually had a Y2k problem...

      Figured it would be cold enough outside to put the booze and ice on the balcony overnight to keep cool - now I have warm beer and no ice...DAMN! Think I'm gonna head over to the geek compound...

    16. Re:meta first! by webword · · Score: 1

      Your post = 5:04 AM
      First post = 5:01 AM

      You were beaten by 3 minutes, not one.

      Interviews with Usability and Web Design Gurus

    17. Re:meta first! by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      Actually I was referring to my original post which appeared at 5.01 AM by your clock.

      Notice how my manque first post has been moderated down twice as a troll, but the winner has been moderated up to +4 "funny".

      Go figure.

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

    18. Re:meta first! by Zugok · · Score: 1

      did anyone actually debate this a thousand years ago? I think the tedious few that argued the new millennium started in 1001 were probably beheaded, and bloody rightly so too.

      --
      "I just can't sit while people are saying nonsense in a meeting without saying it's nonsense" J Watson, Sci Am 288:(4)51
    19. Re:meta first! by dave256 · · Score: 1

      Does that mean you're not going to inflict upon us any more postings for an entire year?

      link



      I want a rock.

    20. Re:meta first! by DarkClown · · Score: 1

      don't mind me - just testing my abacus

  2. Apropos of nothing by ralphclark · · Score: 0

    First post of the millennium! Yay!

    Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
    Thought exists only as an abstraction

    1. Re:Apropos of nothing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      1, 1001, 2001 ... You're a year too soon, the 3rd millennium starts in 2001

    2. Re:Apropos of nothing by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      I knew that!!!

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

  3. Heh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Now if sites like www.y2ksurvive.com would only get rm -rf'd. =)

    1. Re:Heh by jeremy+f · · Score: 1

      ROFLMAO!

      Look at the site =)

    2. Re:Heh by shaum · · Score: 1
      Now if sites like www.y2ksurvive.com would only get rm -rf'd. =)
      The following quote not appears on the main page of that site:

      "The Y2K threat appears to have been overestimated. Time to get a real life."

  4. Looks like year 2000 is sunny by joannak · · Score: 1

    It's 1:05 PM here in Finland and everything seems to be OK. No power outtages, no melted nuclear reactors, even network works.

    Amazing. Happy new year.

    Joanna

    1. Re:Looks like year 2000 is sunny by Ventilator · · Score: 1

      Same in switzerland. All in all, it was a lame event, after the press has told us, what _might_ happen.

      At least, I got a Y2K-Bug here! It's on my old 80286 DOS-Machine. The programs name is GraphicPacket V1.61 (HAM-Radio-Terminal) and it shows the date 01.01.100. (99 + 1, eh?) To make it sound even more apocalyptic, the TNC (modem that connects to the transceiver) get the date set by GraphicPacket and therefore has the same date.

      (But don't tell anyone, that the program is still usable... (-:= )

      --
      --- If OS were buildings, then the first woodpecker to come around would erase 95 % of civilization.
  5. everything fine here by kck · · Score: 0

    so there

  6. Am alive too! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Happy new 2000

  7. first post of the millennium by *DogShu* · · Score: 0

    you know it sweetheart

  8. OPEN SOURCE COLLAPSE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    as long as natalie portman is ok, i can't imagine what else really matters.


    thank you.

    1. Re:OPEN SOURCE COLLAPSE by DjDevaut · · Score: 1

      that was geekdom in high form, I give you a 9.6.

      --
      My god, when will you people ever learn?
    2. Re:OPEN SOURCE COLLAPSE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Obviously *you* gotta huge stockpile of hot grits.

    3. Re:OPEN SOURCE COLLAPSE by Money__ · · Score: 1

      The hot grits factory is ok too.
      wheeeeew
      _________________________

  9. Loser #1 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Here I am, 5 am CST, 1/1/00, reading /.

    But I am alive!

    1. Re:Loser #1 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bah, I was up at midnight Eastern chatting on IRC and reloading Slashdot

  10. suk me beautiful by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    UNIVERSITY OF WATERLOO RAWKS! -r.

    1. Re:suk me beautiful by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yo, Pink Tie Bitch. The 'Loo sucks. Otherwise we would all be getting laid instead of posting at 0500hrs from the MC because there are no chicks at UW.

      Yeah, so you might say "there is a frosh quota this year", but remember the UW Sexual Capitalist Motto: "Those that are getting some will get more, and those who are getting none will continue to get none."

  11. Nothing has changed by tgeller · · Score: 3
    Not only is the world still here, but geeks without lives are still spending New Year's Eve READING FRIGGIN' SLASHDOT!!!

    Now let's see what kind of loser would be on the computer right after midnight instead of at some party... whoops, that would be me.

    [gildaradner] Nevermind. [/gildaradner]

    --Tom

    --
    Tom Geller
    1. Re:Nothing has changed by Sc00ter · · Score: 1

      Most of us are stuck at work :/ Oh well. Y2K ended up being Y2Lame. At least the overtime is nice :)

    2. Re:Nothing has changed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No OT....salary. :~(

      well anyways happy new year to all.

    3. Re:Nothing has changed by pbr · · Score: 1

      Yeah, there have got to be a bunch of torqued off survivalists out there going "What? No major cities went boom? Jeesh... how anticlimactic..."

      --
      -PBR
    4. Re:Nothing has changed by C.Lee · · Score: 0

      >Most of us are stuck at work :/ Oh well. Y2K ended up being Y2Lame. At
      >least the overtime is nice :)

      Makes one wonder if we're going to be seeing lawsuits aimed at consulting firms like Gartner and other slime that basically created and hyped the Y2k hysteria.

    5. Re:Nothing has changed by Ateran · · Score: 1

      Speaking of Gartnet, just saw this article over at nytimes.com... My favorite quote is:

      "Shareholders will want to hear convincing reasons for spending on this
      scale. Lawyers will be urging action for companies to seek compensation if
      huge sums were judged to have been spent unnecessarily."


      Gee, and I wonder how they're going to prove that... Maybe they'll bring in some "expert " witness and ask her to stare into her crystal ball...

  12. Vancouver checks out by kafer · · Score: 1

    All systems are go here. Happy new year everyone.

    kafer.

  13. You're not alone by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    As far as I can see, Europe still exists... The NATO headquarters haven't been nuked. Funny thing is, everybody expected a worst-case-scenario.

    1. Re:You're not alone by ralphclark · · Score: 4

      Funny thing is, everybody expected a worst-case-scenario.

      Not here in Europe we didn't. Millennium paranoia (stockpiling water, food, guns & ammo etc) seems to be almost uniquely an American phenomenon.

      British concerns are really more or less limited to the effects upon business. Apart from that I guess we're only expecting some minor inconveniences over the next couple of months.

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

    2. Re:You're not alone by WSSA · · Score: 1

      Not here in Europe we didn't. Millennium paranoia (stockpiling water, food, guns & ammo etc) seems to be almost uniquely an American phenomenon.

      I quite agree. As an Englishman living in New York I have found US citizen to be a very panicky lot. Case in point: various vague threats were made by the usual bunch of terrorist lunatics and the authorities actually sent out warnings to people to 'keep clear of crowds', and so on. In the UK the reaction to such threats is "business as usual", they are ignored. Perhaps it's because Britain has been numbed to it by years of IRA threats.

    3. Re:You're not alone by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 2

      I know one french guy who was fucking freaking out. He 's in an apocalyptic cult, so ... But I know of many more merkins who are freaking out. Oh yeah they'r christians, that's why. When the god you believe in is depicted as such a rude and demanding one ("don't do this! don't do that! do this or you will burn in hell! do NOT look at naked women EVEN if I made you fancy it!"), you can understand it.

      Now, Monday, I will give them a ring, "Hey, whassup dude? How's your apocalypse going?"

    4. Re:You're not alone by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Heh.

      You really think America is still (if it ever was) "Christian"?

      You probably also believe California has earthquakes daily, and Chicago is full of mobsters with machine guns.

      Do the research, bud.

    5. Re:You're not alone by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 2

      My girlfriend's american. My cousin's girlfriend's american. My uncle lives in California. Some of my best friends are american. So yeah, I think I have some clues.
      Are americans christians? Well much more than the french. French politicians don't bother showing at Church to get good press. When French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin says he's an atheist, nobody thrashes him, unlike Jesse Ventura.
      BTW my girlfriend believed the american motto was 'in god we trust' (which was just added on the bills in the 30s I believe), whereas it's 'e pluribus unum' if I'm not mistaken. So ...

    6. Re:You're not alone by BinxBolling · · Score: 1
      Funny thing is, everybody expected a worst-case-scenario.

      No, they didn't. If they had, we'd have seen far more stockpiling of food, bottled water, etc. than we did.

      But really, we're not out of the woods, yet. The power hasn't gone out, nuclear weapons aren't launching themselves, and our credit cards are (mostly) still working. But it's possible and maybe even probable that more subtle Y2K-related flaws exist in various institutional software (particularly in developing nations) that will continue to have effects in the months to come.

    7. Re:You're not alone by Enahs · · Score: 1

      We just won't mention that whole irrational fear of mutant corn. :^)

      --
      Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
    8. Re:You're not alone by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ventura never got attacked for being an atheist. He got attacked for attacking other people's beliefs. Of course, tolerance only goes one way for Europeans. Besides Americans being more Christian is better than the French being more adulterers.

    9. Re:You're not alone by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, I live in California, and we DO have multiple earthquakes daily.
      check out http://www.scecdc.scec.org/scecusers/.plan for a list of earthquakes over the last few days.

    10. Re:You're not alone by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      Ventura never got attacked for being an atheist. He got attacked for attacking other people's beliefs. Of course, tolerance only goes one way for Europeans.

      What's your problem with Europeans? I think we should all be much more tolerant of other people attacking our beliefs.

      So for example it's OK for Ventura to attack religious bigots if that's what he feels is right, and it's OK to attack homosexuals and other perverts too if you feel it's wrong.

      People performing these attacks are just expressing themselves in a completely natural way. It's unhealthy (as well as unfair) to force people to repress their deepest feelings.

      (I think...)

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

    11. Re:You're not alone by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 2

      Besides Americans being more Christian is better than the French being more adulterers.

      Well, it's just a blowjob, so it's not adultere, right?

    12. Re:You're not alone by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      There was meant to be a pseudo html tag for "irony" in that post but Slashdot swallowed it...

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

  14. y2g, yo by klyX · · Score: 1

    Red Hot Chili Peppers and 311 rocked the LA Forum into the 2g!

    1. Re:y2g, yo by RAZOR · · Score: 1

      :-) Hey there
      Been there, done that ;-)
      Too bad it was kinda short (RHCP were performing only 1.5 hours), Metallica was on stage for 2.5-3 hours!!!

      Well, anyway Happy New Year!!!

      P.S.
      Is it me, or Flea totally gone nuts? ;-)

      --
      ------------ Internet? Is that thing still around? H.J. Simpson
    2. Re:y2g, yo by jeremy+f · · Score: 2

      Live was supposed to play their hometown show in Hershey last nite, but they crapped out when Ed got sick, and apparently he passed it onto the rest of the band :-(

      If they hadn't gotten sick, I WOULD have had plans last night :-(

    3. Re:y2g, yo by Eponymous,+Showered · · Score: 1

      Flea was born nuts and will die nuts. He's a freak. That's why he's so excellent. Read his nuttiness here

    4. Re:y2g, yo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I saw them in San Francisco a couple days ago.. worse concert that I've ever seen... 311 were pretty good, but the bicycle thieves and red hot chili peppers were just plain awful...

    5. Re:y2g, yo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fuck that. GWAR rocked Denver! YAY GWAR!

  15. It's the end of the world as we know it... by swordgeek · · Score: 3

    ...and I feel fine.

    A much better song to usher in the 2000s than Prince's stupid "1999", in my opinion.

    Now that the afterlife has started for pretty much the whole world, things don't feel much different, but there's something downright weird about saying farewell to the 19xxs. It's like a door has closed. Hopefully, another one has opened as well.

    Best wishes you /. folks. Hope all of your geekery is successful in the near and distant future.

    --

    "People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
    1. Re:It's the end of the world as we know it... by Zan+Thrax · · Score: 1

      I like Silverchair's Anthem for the Year 2000 better, myself.

      --

      Intolerant people should be shot.
    2. Re:It's the end of the world as we know it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Have you ever tried to sing-a-long to the verses in that song?

    3. Re:It's the end of the world as we know it... by jeremy+f · · Score: 1

      A much better song to usher in the 2000s than Prince's stupid "1999", in my opinion.

      I don't know about you, but it sure didn't seem like I was partying like it was 1999 last night. Doh.

    4. Re:It's the end of the world as we know it... by Steve+X · · Score: 1

      it's great fun. was even more fun when they played it in concert and sped it up to about twice as fast as it was in their recorded version. i think i managed keep up with at least the first verse.. :-)

    5. Re:It's the end of the world as we know it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Since you seem to be a fan, I was wondering: why do so many people consider their 80s work better than their 90s stuff? I listened to a few of their IRS albums and it was all incoherent mumbling set to weak little jangles. I don't get it.

  16. Y2K fun... by Bryan+Andersen · · Score: 1

    I was at a new years party and one of the other geeks there needed to log into the systems at his work. So he fires up his laptop (provided by work). Jan 4th, 1980... It even had a Y2K ready sticker on it. We all had a bit of a laugh. As for the systems at work, all up and running fine. They were all UNIX boxes of one sort or another.

    On the way home I went past one stoplight that was out. Don't know if it was Y2K related or not.

  17. vaporware by byteb0y · · Score: 0

    y2k is nothing but vaporware

    1. Re:vaporware by nd · · Score: 1

      Troll? Hahaha.. No offense, to the moderator who did that. But, who, exactly, is he trolling against or offending?

      "Y2k is nothing but vaporware???? is not!!!! screw you!"

      or perhaps y2k is a user/person on slashdot and felt offended.

  18. Apart from the small nuclear war by Dacta · · Score: 2
    between India and Pakistan everything seems to be fine.

    Only joking...

  19. The best way to avoid hangover by Skinka · · Score: 2

    don't stop drinking.

    1. Re:The best way to avoid hangover by joliveir · · Score: 1

      AMEN BROTHER !!

      ooooh my head :-/

      *groan*

  20. Perl! by yist · · Score: 3

    Actually I've seen a couple of badly programmed Perl scripts around the world (They at first displayed the year in a two digit format, '99' became -> '100'), looks kindof funny :)

    1-1-100

    1. Re:Perl! by gpoul · · Score: 1

      That's why you should always add 1900 to this year format :-)))

      I think we will have a great time hacking all our perl scripts to handle these things right.

      Seems I'm lucky. All my scripts seem to work right at the moment. (Also the shell scripts which use `date')

    2. Re:Perl! by Jonas+�berg · · Score: 1

      Sure, but we should also hack all our C, Python, Basic, whatever programs since some of them suffer from the same problem. It's not a Perl feature :-)

    3. Re:Perl! by sith · · Score: 1

      yeah, when you use localtime it gives you that back.. Most of the matts script archive code does that. The message board program even has a reference to "19$year" - not a good idea anymore. $year = $year + 1900; will take care of things..

  21. One cheque wrong already -- the wrong way! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Just wrote a cheque which was supposed to be dated Dec 31, 1999, and dated it Dec 31, 2000 by accident.

    1. Re:One cheque wrong already -- the wrong way! by Vacuum · · Score: 1

      so you truly are awaiting the new millenium

      --
      -sometimes the majority only means that all the fools are on the same side
  22. Sweden by Jonas+�berg · · Score: 1

    12:16 in Sweden and all is OK. :-) Except for a hell of a lot of snow that is.

    1. Re:Sweden by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wish it would snow here -it all does is rain and get bloody cold...(London)

    2. Re:Sweden by _GNU_ · · Score: 1

      Ack, I acctually see the snow as a Y2k bug :P
      Swedish winters just suck, I had to ride my bike across town this morning, with a major hangover from the partying..
      only problem I've had with Y2k so far :)

      my puters date says "2000-01-01", as it should.

  23. Maybe it was the end of something... by Curious+G · · Score: 2

    I suppose that, given the amount of people that, whether they would really admit it or not, actually thought something momentous would happen, this might actually have been the end of the world as we knew it. Maybe now people will really start to think in the long term. A victory for Danny Hillis. Either way, it is now 3:18 in Los Angeles, and we're all still here. Happy new year, everybody.

    --
    -- I'll be more enthusiastic about thinking outside the box when there's evidence of thinking going on inside it.
  24. Getting Worried There :-) by JoshuaS · · Score: 2

    Over here in Australia, I woke up in the early afternoon, (and was surprised to see that my old Sparcstation IPX _did_ rollover to 2000 correctly)... I was then even more surprised to see that no new articles had appeared on slashdot for hours. Everything was fine here... though I heard a rumour about some troubles with Japan's nuclear reactors...

    1. Re:Getting Worried There :-) by mihalis · · Score: 1

      I fired up my NeXT cube and logged into my Linux box over the network and ran top in a shell window. Everything ticked over to 2000 nicely and kept working. Actually I wasn't really surprised at all, but it was fun! We don't know yet if my girlfriends Windows PC will be ok next time it boots, but then I don't really care (have had to reinstall it twice from scratch in the 9 months we've had it so a little Y2K bug would be no big deal there, useless piece of junk) Whoops, end of rant... ;^)

      Chris Morgan

  25. Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan? by Rectal+Prolapse · · Score: 4

    I'm wondering how the wacko cults are handling this...the world hasn't ended. Armageddon hasn't happened.

    And I still can't believe that my apartment managers decided do shut down the elevator before midnight "To show that management is prepared for Y2K".

    Please! In this supposed time and age, why do people insist on believing outright fallacies...UFO's, alien abductions, the Aurora Project , Y2K bug, armageddon, demons, virgin Mary visions...the list goes on and on.

    What will be the new demons of the next century? Solar flares wiping out life on Earth? The conjunction of the planets coming, I believe, in May, causing major natural catastrophies (like, all the volcanoes on Earth erupting at once...talk about extra fibre in your diet!). Or maybe there'll be a widespread and deadly flu epidemic...Or perhaps the world will be destroyed sometime in 2040 like some nostradamus enthusiasts believe.

    Choose your poison...but hey, maybe it'll make you rich!

    At any rate, hear's a toast to those of us who aren't hiding in makeshift bunkers!

    May this year be the Year of the Space Moose! :)

  26. I exist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    look at me, i am up at 5:22 am on 112000 and i havent seenanythingbroken except for awebpagethat says the date is jan1 192000 and i dontusethe spacebar asmuchasusual.

    -quadong -rf

  27. You legend by The+OPTiCIAN · · Score: 1

    ;)

    --


    Believe with me, my saplings.
  28. Maybe one bug... by Trickster+Coyote · · Score: 1

    A nuclear power plant in Japan had a radiation monitor fail shortly after midnight. CNN story here. No leaks or anything, just a failed monitor. They not certain if it was Y2K related or if the timing was just coincidence.

    Has anyone heard any reports from places like Iraq which had allegedly done no Y2K preparation at all?

    --
    Ideology is for ideots.
    1. Re:Maybe one bug... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I work in chemical plant... False alarm is current. Bye!

  29. damn it! by datazone · · Score: 3

    This sucks! I thought the world was going to end.
    now i have to find some way to explain to my boss that i didn't really mean those things i said to him last year. Hmmm... I really wish i hadn't quit my job, and invested all my money in 2 ply toilet paper. Oh well, i will figure something out by monday...

    --
    Its spelt "L-I-N-U-X", but pronunced as "Free Beer"
    1. Re:damn it! by HermDog · · Score: 1

      I just checked my wallet and my credit card has failed to disintegrate last night. I'm taking this as a bad sign that I still have to pay off my balance.

      --
      JADBP
  30. Sydney coming up on Jan 2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    We'll we've just watched the last rollover in Samoa on TV. NZ should now be on Jan 2 and we'll be there in under two hours.

    We started up our machines at 9am AEST (I work for the largest IT distributor in Australia) and so far no problems even with our AsiaPacific WAN (crosses fingers).

    (Airport announcers voice simulation says) - "Boarding now on the 2038 bandwagon - Gate 12, paranoid passengers first."

    Geez, I'll be 69 by then :-(

    Anyone got any idea how much of the 'Net went off? (BGP flap stats would be a good indicator)

    Alex "Just get over it and use OpenBSD" Hafey.

  31. Japan had some nuclear-problems! by ^ZuLu^ · · Score: 1

    As I was on my way to look for happenings of this kind I stepped over heise's newsticker. They reported that two japanese nuclear powers plant seemed to have some Y2K-problems. Although they were (according to japanese officials) not really threatening it worries me to see people pretending to be Y2K-ready and then really having some major problems!

    1. Re:Japan had some nuclear-problems! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      From what I can see, those power plants did not have any "major problems".

  32. Congratulations... by MartyJG · · Score: 5

    to the rest of the IT industry - we pulled it off! The biggest scam of the last millenium!

    We knew all along there was nothing to worry about. Most programmers have thought they were working in 2001 for the past twenty years anyway.

    We worried the banks, we scared Wall Street witless, we even joined forces with Micro$oft to spread the word of doom.

    We told the suits-that-hold-the-purse-strings that all our computers needed replacing immediately, when we weren't due for a real upgrade for another 18 months.

    We convinced everyone that IT staff would need to be paid extra for millenium cover, but knew all along we wouldn't get a single serious call.

    We got all the braindead Windows@Home users to rush out to their nearest PC stores to replace perfectly good 166mmx's, and to stock up with a years supply of tinned beans on their way home - simultaneously bringing down the prices of PC's and geek-food ATST!

    In short, we win!

    --
    insignificant sig
    1. Re:Congratulations... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      nnooo.

    2. Re:Congratulations... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nice if true, but it's not. There has been a freeze on software development for at least the past year in most big companies. As a result, the IT labour market at least in the UK has almost completely vanished. Contractors (like me) were hit hardest of course. 1999 has almost completely wiped me out financially.

    3. Re:Congratulations... by Greg+Merchan · · Score: 2

      I have been wondering...

      Where did all the money supposedly spent on fixing this 'problem' really go?

      Hmm...

      More importantly, to what extent am I joking?

    4. Re:Congratulations... by Fufie · · Score: 3

      OK, now we don't need the COBOL programmers for 8000 years, their glory days are over now.

      and Happy Happy Joy Joy! in 2038 it's glory days for C programmers. C programs calculate time as seconds back from 1.1.1970 and the counter is a typedef long int __time_t; which should be fun. A few needed hints to make sure as many C programmers as possible get paid really well:

      • Never ever use sizeof(), use integer constants directly, esp. with malloc() and timing functions.
      • Use pointer arithmetics all the time and never ever with sizeof(), use integer constants: foo += 4; is much better than foo += sizeof(int); or even better foo += sizeof(long);
      • Remember that __time_t is a long which currently tend to be 4 bytes, so just use 4 directly :-)
      • Make sure that subtle side-effects rule your programs and your programs only work because the size of e.g __time_t is 4. Use electric fence and make sure it never ever finds your small overwrites :-)

      Make sure your fellow C programmers get well paid jobs for 2038.. heck it worked very well for the COBOL people :-)

      It's should've been end of the world, and I feel fine.. :-)

    5. Re:Congratulations... by Ateran · · Score: 1

      Don't kid yourself; we'd probably have a very different situation today if that money hadn't been spent.

    6. Re:Congratulations... by Signail11 · · Score: 1

      If the foo is a pointer to an object of type int, the operator += acts on foo as a pointer expression. The result of the additive operator has type pointer to type int as well. Section 6.5.6, item 8 of the ISO C standard clearly indicates that "When an expression that has integer type is added to or subtracted from a pointer, the result has the type of the pointer operand...In other words, if the expression P points to the i-th element of an array object [see 6.5.6 item 4 for implicit conversion], the expressions (P)+N (equivalently, N+(P)) and (P)-N (where N has the value n) point to, respectively, the i+n-th and i-n-th elements of the array object, provided they exist."
      6.5.2.1 item 4 states that "In the expression (*((x)+(i))...i is adjusted according to the type of x, which conceptually entails multiplying i by the size of the object to which the pointer points"
      Combined, this indicates that foo+=4 has a very different meaning than foo+=sizeof(int) even if sizeof(int)==4 and the type of foo is a pointer to type int. The type of time_t is implementation defined; it does not have to be a long. __time_t is in the reserved namespace of the implementor; the programmer should not use this identifier.

      Oh well, that was my first language lawyer comment of the new millenium.

    7. Re:Congratulations... by mafried · · Score: 1
      Why was this moderated as funny? It's the truth!

      enjoying my new workstation,
      -mafried

  33. Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by ralphclark · · Score: 2

    I rebooted my Win98SE box about 2am local time (GMT) and it promptly refused to go back into windows (gets stuck at the waving flag boot logo). My motherboard and BIOS are supposed to be fully Y2K compliant (and DOS boots OK anyway), and the Microsoft Y2K page doesn't list *any* known problems at all. And my Linux box which has the same Aopen AX59Pro (rev1.0) motherboard in it, is still going strong.

    So, either Win98SE *does* have a fatal Y2K bug and Microsoft just aren't talking...or else I've been hit by one of those Y2K viruses. I *did* have Norton Antivirus on my system a few months ago but was forced to remove it because of the stability problems it seemed to be causing :o(

    Catch 22 eh?

    I'm running that old NAV from the rescue disks right now. It's been going for about 9 hours now and still hasn't found anything. But they are not exactly up-to-date anyway.

    Has anyone experienced any similar problems? And does anyone just happen to have, handily downloadable from their home page, a set of NAV rescue floppy images with up-to-date virus defs? Pleeeeeease?

    Happy new year everybody. Even Microsoft.

    Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
    Thought exists only as an abstraction

    1. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by MKalus · · Score: 1

      Well...

      I am writing this on a Win98SE Box (Notebook) and it rebootet just fine...

      So my guess is Virus.

      Michael

      --
      If you want to e-mail me, use my PGP Key.
    2. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by Hermetic · · Score: 2

      I'm On a Win98 box right now. I couldn't dial up either of my ISP's at first (I was freaking out!), but then I rebooted and everything seems ok. Sound, TV, Modem, Unreal Tournament...

      All is well.

      --
      Computers can only simulate determinism. ~Hermetic.
    3. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by Skinka · · Score: 1
      Has anyone experienced any similar problems? And does anyone just happen to have, handily downloadable from their home page, a set of NAV rescue floppy images with up-to-date virus defs? Pleeeeeease?

      I'm running Win98 SE and am having absolutely no problems (actually, it has crashed 4 times after midnight, but that's normal for this box :I). I've never used NAV and thus have no idea where to get it, try F-Prot (DOS program) instead. It's allways very up to date, defs were updated yesterday.

    4. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by mangu · · Score: 1

      Perhaps it's just a hardware failure? Not every problem that happens on 1/1/2000 is Y2K related!

    5. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by jeremy+f · · Score: 2

      Even my 95 box survived the crossover...

      VERY good thing, because I just can't squeeze the fps from Q3A Linux & UT Linux I can from their Windows counterparts -- plus, I'm too lazy to configure pppd, so until I get back to college, no net in Linux.

      I had that kind of problem last year, last time my Windows system went kaput. Very likely you'll have to format c: -- :(

      You can check bootlog.txt & see just what it stops loading at -- for me, it was when it was trying to load the driver for the floppy drive -- I wouldn't have ever guessed :)

    6. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by Levine · · Score: 1

      My Win98SE boxen booted up just fine today. No fatal errors, no Windows Protection Errors, and no giant man eating ladybugs popping out of my screen.

      Well, yet, at least.

      Levine

    7. Re:Windows98SE box slagged. Who'da thunk it? by ralphclark · · Score: 2

      Thanks very much for that link, Skinka. I downloaded the shareware and scanned the C: drive but no viruses were recognised. So either it's super-stealthy or else it's just a routine Win98SE screwup. They do happen often enough I suppose. It's just odd that it should have died so spectacularly at that particular time.

      Why me! WHY ME???? Boo hoo - now I'm facing the umpteenth reformat and reinstall along with twenty apps and all their patches :o((

      Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
      Thought exists only as an abstraction

  34. Dissent... by EEEthan · · Score: 1

    I'm sorry to say that the world did end for me. My computer crashed horribly, which released the safeties on the small nuclear arsenal I keep in my dorm room...the arms race between myself and a suitemate escalated, and both of us were obliterated by retaliatory fire. Our rooms are heaps of glowing ash, and we can only assume that our tragedy was repeated on a large scale with the nuclear destruction of most of the inhabited cities of the world.

  35. Big Y2K Problems in Australia!! by jdigital · · Score: 4

    Well.. Whilst you all may be rejoicing over the survival of your linux boxen etc.. Down here in australia things havent gone so well..

    As you know we were one of the first countries to go through the rollover, and whilst your media was preparing to televise and stream your parties, they seemed to neglect the tremendous chaos that was going on down under.

    As the clock approached midnight, i was at a friends apartment for an intimate gathering, and we had the tv on with a big display counting down.
    00:05

    00:04

    00:03

    00:02

    00:01

    00:00




    Cheers everywhere from the drug induced gathering, except for one guy who had his watch upside-down and was convived we still had 6 hours to go.

    Anyway, my point is that nothing went wrong during the actual rollover, but during the next few hours things started failing... the first thing i noticed was the some street lamps, and some shopfront lighting dimming. I was drunk, so i didnt take much notice of it, but in retrospect it was the beginning of the end.

    As people crammed on the special 24 hour public transport, some trams started to fail. Most people figured the heavy load at 3am was stressing the system, and although mentioned briefly over the city-wide PA, the announcers were cautious to stress that this was not Y2K related.

    I came home at around 4am, between 2 parties to have a quick shower, and check slashdot.. Just wanted to see how the world was faring up against this genormous evil that was facing the computers.

    Slashdot didnt have much to say, nor did my computer.. I switched it on, heard the HDD start spinning, and jumped into the shower whilst my pc booted. I got out of the shower to find that my computer (which i was quite sure was Y2K compliant) was just booting, spinning the HDD, and rebooting.. I was a bit baffled and went to turn up my dim lights... Although when i got to the switch, they were already on full, but only shining half..

    This scenario was not new to me, we have a power pole with a transformer on it just outside my window, and every now and then a possum manages to fry himself on the terminals and gives us a brown-out. So i popped outside, expecting to see a fried carcass.. But it was hard to see, all the street lights were out... Now that was fscked up, because the street lights run on a different grid in out street. Some serious shit was going down.
    Anyway, i stayed at home for the next few hours, phones were dead, and lights were dead.



    To cut a long story short, its 10:30PM here, and all the computers are still screwed, and we are without power.

    I havent even been able to see /. yet :(

    I think im gonna start suffering withdrawal symptoms soon


    Um, doesn't the millennium start in 2001 ?



    PS: my websites down, i forgot to pay the DNS fee.. Any windows geek wanna pay it for me ??

    --
    :wq ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
    1. Re:Big Y2K Problems in Australia!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, doesn't the millennium start in 2001 ?
      of couse it does. this whole end-of millennium thaing is for people that cannot use induction to figure it out...

    2. Re:Big Y2K Problems in Australia!! by incubus · · Score: 1

      Makes ya glad you had that y2k compliant laptop, battery, modem, and sattelite phone combo so you could continue to post to slashdot while everything else is dead!
      I commend you on your forethought and would pour you a drink, but my bouron was not y2k compliant... which meant.. of course... that I had to finish it before y2k!

  36. Hello Montana! by Trickster+Coyote · · Score: 2

    I bet there's quite a few people down in bunkers in Montana and other places who are feeling a tad foolish right now.

    Hey guys, you can come out now. No, we are are not radioactive zombies who want to eat your brains.

    Honest.
    (heh heh)

    --
    Ideology is for ideots.
    1. Re:Hello Montana! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Can I eat their brains anyway?

    2. Re:Hello Montana! by otis+wildflower · · Score: 2

      Can I eat their brains anyway?

      I doubt you'll derive much nutritional value from their brains..

      (and FYI, I did Y2k work for an investment bank for awhile, and we found some really interesting bugs, but most of the issues were cosmetic, and Y2k was not something to stick with: it tended to suck out all of your will to live...)

      Your Working Boy,

  37. Seattle by dlb · · Score: 1

    All is well in Puget Sound. You could hear the sounds of rebooting in Redmond miles away.

    Even though they cancelled the Space Needle party, the crowd in Pioneer Square just outside Zazu was an acceptable substitute. (not to mention the 3 or 4 SPD officers stationed just outside each bar)

    The funny thing was, since there wasnt a giant clock to watch, you had this huge mob of people standing around looking at the their watches/pagers/cell phones, waiting for the big moment.

    As far as rioting goes -- there wasn't any at all where I was. The only injury I sustained was getting stuck in the leg by some guy's lit cigar.

    1. Re:Seattle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It wasn't perfect though... The flashing clocks in our house when we got up to feed the baby triggered a quick look at my Linux log files. Sure enough: Jan 1 00:01:51 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart. Jan 1 00:15:16 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart. Jan 1 00:33:30 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart Not sure how long it was out for each time. It stayed on at least 4 mins based on another log entry (xntpd). ... Ok, after some searching of the local (online) newspaper reports I found: Just after midnight, there were momentary flickers in the north end of Capitol Hill and on Queen Anne Hill, attributed to fireworks going off too close to power lines. So I guess we were just unlucky... Or do y2k fireworks count as a y2k bug? :-)

    2. Re:Seattle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      It wasn't perfect though... The flashing clocks in our house when we got up to feed the baby triggered a quick look at my Linux log files. Sure enough:

      Jan 1 00:01:51 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart.
      Jan 1 00:15:16 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart.
      Jan 1 00:33:30 srv syslogd 1.3-3: restart

      Not sure how long it was out for each time. It stayed on at least 4 mins based on another log entry (xntpd).

      After searching the local online newspapers I found: "Just after midnight, there were momentary flickers in the north end of Capitol Hill and on Queen Anne Hill, attributed to fireworks going off too close to power lines."

      So I guess we were just unlucky... Or do y2k fireworks count as a y2k bug? :-)

  38. Checks by Krux · · Score: 1

    I'm goint to start dating my checks January ##, 0 or even 1900 just to see if it causes an issue..

    --
    "One of these days... milkshake... BOOM!!!!" - emb
    1. Re:Checks by johnburton · · Score: 1
      Why would you be writting checks any more, this is the 21st century?

      Seriously though I don't expect to be using any checks ever again, there is just no need with credit/debit cards and online banking money transfers. I did wonder at my sanity for joining such a bank with one month to go until the y2k problem but it seems to have worked out.

      --
      Sig is taking a break!
    2. Re:Checks by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 1

      this is the 21st century?

      Not for another year.

    3. Re:Checks by C.Lee · · Score: 0

      >Why would you be writting checks any more, this is the 21st century?

      >Seriously though I don't expect to be using any checks ever again,
      >there is just no need with credit/debit cards and online banking money
      >transfers. I did wonder at my sanity for joining such a bank with one
      >month to go until the y2k problem but it seems to have worked out.

      Maybe because myself and one hell of a lot of other people don't *WANT* to use credit/debit cards? Or have *ZERO* interest in using or being a part of online banking money transfers? Every credit card application I get goes straight into the round file after being ripped into tenny-tiny pieces, especially those "pre-approved" scam cards I keep getting from my bank and other places.

    4. Re:Checks by johnburton · · Score: 1
      this is the 21st century?

      Not for another year

      Bah. It's usually me saying that.

      --
      Sig is taking a break!
  39. Mainframes by Detritus · · Score: 2
    While I was happy to see 2000 arrive without any major incidents, I will feel better when my next paycheck is generated, hopefully without any errors. I keep thinking about the billions of lines of COBOL that are running on mainframes.

    Happy 19100 :-)

    --
    Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
  40. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by tconnors · · Score: 1

    The amergaddon people are now saying that it will be a slow death - technology will kill us within a few years, not a sudden fiery death on 1/1/100. Notice they said that on the 1/1/2000 paper, not before.
    I always did chuckle when their newsletters asked for renewal submissions for after the new year.

    Keep bringing on the beer, I say!

  41. We had two problems by rash · · Score: 1

    I heard on the news that here in sweden the problems were. 1. A retierment home's alarm system went ded. 2. Am alarm centre went ded. Two verry similar problems. The same manufakturer? How is that last word speled?

  42. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by Dr.+Weasel · · Score: 2

    I'm wondering how the wacko cults are handling this...the world hasn't ended. Armageddon hasn't happened.

    Well quite a few will be trying to figure out what to do with a two year supply of canned beans. Perhaps a few will kill themselves to escape the embaressment of being so paniced about the biggest non-event of the milennium. But I figure most will just find some excuse about how the NWO canceled their evil(tm) plans because the nutbars were too ready for them, or some such nonsense.

    On the up side, we should see slashed prices on generators. Giving us all a great way to keep our machines up durring power outages.

  43. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by incubus · · Score: 1

    Hmm.... roping y2k into all those others is really casting yer net too wide.
    y2k is a real problem, turned into a surreal media frenzy.
    the story resonated and gave justification to any loon's cockamamy (sp) reason for why the universe will implode on y2k.

    The formula goes: Problem + Media = Random Number Generator


    Wonder if there's a bit of chaos theory in there... try to predict how the media will *report* the problem to viewers... as compared to the actual nature of the problem.... can't be done :-)

  44. NT not OK? by The+Original+Bobski · · Score: 1

    Well, I just logged into the network at work and discovered that the NT server is locked up. All the Linux boxes are still humming along!

    --
    satire, n: 1) witty language used to convey insults or scorn; 2) a form of humor lost on most slashdot moderators.
    1. Re:NT not OK? by Darchmare · · Score: 1

      Yep, must be another day of the week, eh?



      - Jeff A. Campbell
      - VelociNews (http://www.velocinews.com)

      --

      - Jeff
    2. Re:NT not OK? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hmmm I just logged in and all 127 NT servers are working fine without issue. But no linux boxes are running. (don't use it at work.)

  45. Netscape/Java Y2K bug? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Netscape bug?

    Get the following on most java enabled sites with NS 4.7 export:

    #Error: Issue Certificate is Invalid (-8516)...
    #jar file c:\PROGRAM

    ..oops.... doesn't happen with MSIE 5.

    1. Re:Netscape/Java Y2K bug? by The+Original+Bobski · · Score: 1

      No problem with Netscape on Linux.

      --
      satire, n: 1) witty language used to convey insults or scorn; 2) a form of humor lost on most slashdot moderators.
    2. Re:Netscape/Java Y2K bug? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      have you tried www.abcradio.com or www.ninemsn.com.

      The error message is something about an unsigned certificate/issuer certificate is invalid.

      This is with NS 4.7 under win98.

  46. While the rest of you feared falling back... by dithi · · Score: 1

    We here at Louisiana State University have used the Y2K bug to propel us much further beyond other institutions.. In fact our Web page proudly proclaims the date a good 190000 years ahead of the rest of the world. Thank god i'm not in computer science here.

    www.lsu.edu

    --
    I am that that is, not that that is not, that is.
    1. Re:While the rest of you feared falling back... by jbell · · Score: 1
      The funny thing is, it took me all of 30 seconds to locate the problem. ;) They screwed up in the index.html file:

      var now = new Date();
      document.write(dayNames[now.getDay()] + ", " +
      monthNames[now.getMonth()] + " " +
      now.getDate() + ", 19" + now.getYear());

      They probably fixed the now.getYear function, and didn't realize how the webmaster had implemented it. ;) All they need to do is remove the 19.


      --Jason Bell

      --


      --Jason Bell
      Faster than the light of speed!
    2. Re:While the rest of you feared falling back... by DJStealth · · Score: 1

      Here's the problem with Java/Javascript..
      It was always semi-Y2K compliant...

      now.getYear() returns a 2 digit date if the date is = 2000

      so it would work previously, but not after 2000

    3. Re:While the rest of you feared falling back... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The Date.getYear() method has been depricated in favor ot date.getFullYear().

  47. It bit me! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oh god, I think I've been bitten by the y2k-bug!

    My head hurts, I feel kinda sick...and last but not least I woke up in a house I'd never been to before...

    I wonder why..can't remeber, so I guess it was the millenium bug.

    1. Re:It bit me! by jeremy+f · · Score: 3

      I found a sitting spider on my computer sometime around 12:30AM EST, so I named him the official millenium bug & celebrated by taking him to the porcelin water slide screw ride. When I pressed the metal handle to start the ride, I could tell he was having a great deal of fun celebrating his millennial status, swirling all around on the ride and everything.

      But something happened which I did not forsee -- the drain at the bottom of the ride was about 1000 times his size, and there was no mesh for protection. It was a short celebration, but I'm sure he was happy, being the official bug & everything. But the way his legs were moving around, seemingly trying to scramble up the sides of the ride -- now in hindsight, I'm not sure.

  48. A little history by cxreg · · Score: 1

    This keeps getting asked but the reason is purely historical. The Romans had no concept of the number zero so the first year after Jesus of Nazareth's birth was assigned the number 1. You could argue that the first day of a month is not day 0 however you dont go around saying the first day of July is June 30th now do you ;)

    1. Re:A little history by incubus · · Score: 1

      So is the year of that dude's birth:
      a) 0 A.D.
      b) 0 B.C.
      c) 1 B.C.
      d) 1 A.D.

      :-)

    2. Re:A little history by cxreg · · Score: 1

      T's what im sayin! Since they didn't have a zero, there was no 0 B.C. or 0 A.D. IIRC that means it must be 1 A.D. Poor kid musta always been a grade ahead of where he should have been, but then again, he was the Son of God(tm) so I bet he was a NHS geek anyway ;)

    3. Re:A little history by mangu · · Score: 3

      The right answer is 1 B.C., if we accept Dionysius Exiguus' count. So, Christ was born Before Christ, on 25/12/1 B.C. 1/1/1 A.D. was the day he was circumsized. But, from historic records, we know that king Herodes died on 4 B.C., so the real date must have been before that.

      Still, it's hard to believe that the Romans, who were very active bureaucrats, would leave no record at all of Jesus' crucifixion. There is no record of a Barabbas either. Therefore, scholars who have an objective viewpoint on this matter assume that Christ lived before that time. I think the most accepted date for his crucifixion is 88 B.C., there are historical records of a rabbi who was crucified in that year. If he was 33 at the time, he was born on 121 B.C.

    4. Re:A little history by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      hmm, so wouldn't the date have gone from the 31/12/1BC to 1/1/1AD ? If we treat BC as negative(seems reasonable) then wouldn't their computers have had trouble when caculating dates? since to find the difference in days you can subtract the dates, e.g. 1/1/97 to 1/1/99 is 99-97 = 2 years difference. so 1/1/1BC to 1/1/1AD = 1--1 = 2 years! When it's only actually one...They must have been good programmers..

    5. Re:A little history by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 2

      The roman had no year zero ... but on top of that, ask people in 10AD, they did'nt even know they were in 10AD!!! Therefore, the actual 'zero' is much later ... the new millennium probably start in something like 3210.

    6. Re:A little history by TimH · · Score: 1

      The new millinium wasn't declared until the fourth century AD. They had declared it began in the Jewish year 3930. So 3931 was 1 A.D.

    7. Re:A little history by Zog · · Score: 1

      It was somewhere within a few years of 0, but contrary to popular belief, it was in the spring.

      Spring??? Christmas is in winter!!! Shepherds were out watching their fields at night (Luke 2:8), and they only did that when their sheep were about to give childbirth, which is in the springtime.

      Christmas was later moved to winter in order to avoid persecution from the (no flaming intended) pagans, who had their rituals in the winter.

    8. Re:A little history by peterarm · · Score: 1

      I heard/read somewhere it was 6 BC...

    9. Re:A little history by Kento · · Score: 3

      well, there's some other evidence. Here's what I remember. On the shroud that Jesus was buried in for example, (yes we have it today, it's at the Vatican, and it's a long story how it got there and how we know it's authentic) there were 2 coins placed on Jesus' eyes (Jewish custom) which were minted by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in around 28 - 33 A.D. There was also the star - iirc, a supernova that there are records of. Herod the Great who was king of judea at the time Jesus was born was known for being a rather cruel king (executed 2 of his sons, that sort of thing) and probably wouldn't have had a problem killing all the baby boys under 2 years old if one of them was going to replace him. IIRC, there was also some stuff with Emporer Tiberius, I think when St. Paul went to Rome - I don't have my history book with me (trying to get *away* from school this vacation)

    10. Re:A little history by meridian · · Score: 1

      i thought the shroud was found to be false?

      --
      meridian at tha.net
    11. Re:A little history by asqui · · Score: 1

      Okay, now. I thought *I* was a sadcase for spending the new year at home, but aparently some are more experienced in this feild...

    12. Re:A little history by asqui · · Score: 1

      Cartman, what the *hell* are you talking about?

    13. Re:A little history by Kento · · Score: 1

      Nope. There was some readiocarbon dating done which dated it to the 15th century, but at that time, the shroud was in a church which burned down (it was sealed in a silver case or something), so the heat may have very well affected the shroud, and radiocarbon dating isn't known for reliability. Also, various things about the person buried in it (Jesus) can be reconstructed via computer today, so they can tell e.g. that he was scourged (whipped with whips that had hooks on the ends) by 2 people of different heights, 1 on each side and when they crucified him, the nails were about the size of railroad spikes, and went through the wrists (can't hold somebody up if it's through the palms) and severed the median nerves, so the thumbs were jammed against the palms.

    14. Re:A little history by Conor6 · · Score: 1

      Jesus was born two years before Herod died... which places it at 6 BC. Which means that any millenial apocalypse from a Christian God would have happened on Dec. 31, 1993.

      --
      Conor
      Programmer, Consultant, Geek, CTYer.
  49. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by kir · · Score: 1

    <useless comment>

    I love that book! It reintroduced me to something that American society is slowly forgetting to teach its youth... SKEPTICISM!!

    </useless comment>

    Actually, you can teach a donkey how to sing, but he will still sound like an ass...

    --
    Kir

    --
    3cx.org - A truly bad website.
  50. Everything's fine... by AndyElf · · Score: 1

    ...except my little alarm clock: Casio Digital Light Clock TCL-100 stubbornly shows date as


    12.31

    Anybody else out there with the same model by chance? :)


    The only trouble so far. Did not have to make a door stop out of my Palm IIIx, my Linux box is humming away peacefully... Weather is great: it is sunny and still...

    --

    --AP
  51. What happenerd to User-Friendly? by try67 · · Score: 1

    UF's first strip for this new Millennium (i feel cheap just for saying that...) seems to be encrypted is some way, or just plain mixed up...(also check the copyright year-left side of middle frame, pretty subtle...)
    Here's what i can figure out so far (pretty difficult since Pitr is known to have, well, "unaurthodoex" grammer: Encrypted=Decrypted
    L=Y
    X=K
    (i assume he's saying Y2K...)
    N=A,I
    V=I,A

    if G=S -> B=E
    if G=T -> B=O

    F=S (?)
    QVQ is said twice...


    Any thoughts?

    --

    To the fool, he who speaks wisdom will sound foolish. ---Euripides
    1. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by quadong · · Score: 2

      it is ROT-13

      jryy vg ybbxf yvxr gur l2x oht qvqa'g erne vg'f htyl urnq.
      well it looks like the y2k bug didn't rear it's unly head.

      lrc. gur qbbzfnlref unir orra cebira jebat lrg ntnva.
      yep. the doomsayers have been proven wrong yet again.

      qvq lbh frr gung gbb?
      did you see that too?

      ubhfgba. jr unir n ceboyrz
      houston. we have a problem.

    2. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by Vacuum · · Score: 1

      Uhh...that's AJ and Mike

      --
      -sometimes the majority only means that all the fools are on the same side
    3. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by Elvii · · Score: 2

      Drat. i didn't realize it was rot-13'd, (drinks still wearing off) but caught the 13 difference between each char.... and deciphered it manually... such things happen after drinking too much. :) oh well, still figured it out myself.

      Hapy 1900, everyone! (or 19100 if you'ew just cat'ing your dates still! :)

      David

      bash: ispell: command not found

      --
      This sig left intentionally blank.
    4. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by Eponymous,+Showered · · Score: 1

      How in the heck do you do rot-13 nowadays? It seems that Netscape used to have it on one of the menus a few years ago and now it's absent. What a pain.

    5. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by AdamT · · Score: 1

      Well bugger me - my script for downloading UF isn't 2000 complient. Oh the shame... :)
      wget -nc http://...chives/${year#19*}$mon_name/$date.html

      --
      ... with eskimo chains i tatto my brain all the way...
    6. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by proj_2501 · · Score: 1

      Mac users can get a program called MacROT13 that rot-13's the contents of the clipboard. Eudora still includes it; just paste into a text file.
      --
      "I was a fool to think I could dream as a normal man."

    7. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by gleam · · Score: 1

      The original poster of this comment, who is about 5 feet from me, says "it's still there".

      He said more, to be honest, but he won't let me type it in.

      You could also just make a little perl script! But we all hate perl here on slashdot, right?

      Yeah.

      -ed

      --
      this .sig is not a .sig.
    8. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      > How in the heck do you do rot-13 nowadays?

      Seesh, what's the world coming to? -rot13 is one of the options to figlet. Failing that, 10 lines of C will give you a rot13ing program.

      BTW, check out the "previous" button on

      http://www.userfriendly.org/cartoons/archives/00ja n/20000101.html

      Intentional?

    9. Re:What happenerd to User-Friendly? by BigDaddyJ · · Score: 1
      Nah, that's been the 404 message for UF for a while. They have to fix their links :-)

      --bdj

  52. Millenium starts whenever the crud we want it to by bug_hunter · · Score: 1

    Our whole year system is based on Creation being on 4000 BC and the world was meant to end on 1000AD. Jesus was recorded to be born on 4BC.

    Instead of recording years when some Roman religious nuts decided to we should count the date as seconds from when Unix was created.

    Also lets be good C programmers and say the new millienium starts on 2000 not 2001.

    --
    It's turtles all the way down.
  53. It's spelled: dead by rodent · · Score: 1

    damn /. won't let me post an empty reply!
    rodent...

    --
    rodent...
    Tactical nuclear weapons are a viable alternative!
  54. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by kcbrown · · Score: 3
    I'm wondering how the wacko cults are handling this...the world hasn't ended. Armageddon hasn't happened.

    "Oh, no! The world hasn't ended! Oh, wait...silly us...the new millennium isn't until next year. Keep preaching it, brothers!"


    --
    --
    Use 'slashdot stuff' in the subject line in any email you send me if you want to get past the spam filter.
  55. Shit, wrong word: Manufacturer by rodent · · Score: 1

    Generally speaking when Anglicizing words K's are replaced with C's. Stupid, I know but English is a pretty stupid and difficult language.

    rodent...

    --
    rodent...
    Tactical nuclear weapons are a viable alternative!
    1. Re:Shit, wrong word: Manufacturer by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 1

      English is a pretty stupid and difficult language

      Yeah - damn Chaucer for starting to publish his work BEFORE the great vowel shift. Maybe some day we will get a REAL language that will FACILITATE problem solving, like Loglan, rather than continuing to use the archaic meme-bases that place artificial limits on our conceptual capacity.

      At least English is better than Chinese. Ever try spelling in Chinese over the telephone??? Ideogammic languages have REAL problems.


  56. not only perl... by Pegasus · · Score: 1

    i discovered that webalizer 1.22 went from 1299 to 010 ...

  57. Happy New Year's! by teeheehee · · Score: 1

    OK, I wasn't near a computer to type this before, but as I'm visiting my friend in Germany, we had an ubercelebration and we had it first here! WOOOOO! Happy New Year's all!
    --
    BlackHat Linux 6.66 (Discordia) :: Hail Eris!
    Dan Kissam e-mail: teeheehee@yahoo.com

    --
    "We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream."
    Schmendrick the Magician
  58. "Common Era" is the "proper" usage now. by rodent · · Score: 1

    And unfortunately, this is from my brother who's a Lutheran Pastor (ELCA unfortunately). He's way too damn liberal for me and I wish he would just stick to AD. (Ano Domini I belive (sp?))

    rodent...

    --
    rodent...
    Tactical nuclear weapons are a viable alternative!
    1. Re:"Common Era" is the "proper" usage now. by trabic · · Score: 1

      Plus, dont you think that Common Era is more presumptious than AD. AD at least refers to a specific event no matter how arbitrary, and makes no bones about it. CE (not WinCE) assumes that that event is common to everyone without regard to whether or not they are Buddist, Shintoist, Jewish, Agnostic, or Whatever.

      To me its just another example of the PC (not the X86 crowd the other one) community trying to change the language to be less "offensive" and making it more so.



      --
      Extremism in the cause of liberty is no vice, Moderation in the cause of freedom is no virtue. --B.Goldwater
    2. Re:"Common Era" is the "proper" usage now. by mafried · · Score: 1
      You are both forgetting something - AD stands for something in Latin that translates to "in the Year of Our Lord". This is making the presumption that every person on the face of this planet considers Jesus to be everyone's 'lord' or 'savior'. This is most certainly not true, and as I myself am not Christain, I find this particularly offensive. CE (as in 'Common Era') Solves this problem by removing the reference to Jesus.

      Now CE still still starts at the same event as AD, but this is considered to just be out of a simple need of consistancy. And you can't say that CE is more presumptious than AD, as the AD system not only coincides with the birth of Jesus as well, but declares it outright! If you ask me, this change is more than needed as the world becomes more unified.

      -mafried

    3. Re:"Common Era" is the "proper" usage now. by lactose99 · · Score: 1

      I'd be careful using this. Use 2000 CE and watch Micro$oft try and take all your stuff away under some unbeknownst-to-all trademark.

      --
      Fully licensed blockchain psychiatrist
  59. Welcome to oblivion by downix · · Score: 2

    In fact the world did end, this is just a reasonable duplicate created by the producers at hollywood. Unfortunately they forgot the plotline, concentrating solely on the special effects, so this gets a big two thumbs down by me.

    --
    Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
    1. Re:Welcome to oblivion by jeremy+f · · Score: 1

      Sounds like a dud, but my movie review system wasn't compatible, so it only gets 1.900 thumbs down by me.

  60. Going to work soon by Hermetic · · Score: 2

    I have to go to work this morning, just to check everything out.
    Management decided to take all computer systems down: the servers, the digital phone network, the elevators (even though the building was locked yesterday afternoon), and the electroninc locks on the doors.

    Obviously nothing went wrong, I have dialed into the server that I didn't bring down and it is fine. So, I get a day of comp time for going in and playing Unreal Tournament.

    Y2K: The biggest hoax ever.

    --
    Computers can only simulate determinism. ~Hermetic.
  61. PC not Y2K1 compliant... by TicTacTux · · Score: 1
    My old C*q perfectly rolled over (sit down! give paw! play dead! roll over! brave dawg!), but when I sntpeed to our timeserver and adjusted the hardware clock (via util-linux clock 1.6) I got a date/time not set error at the next boot.

    Sure enough, the bios sez 01-01-2100.
    So I assume my PC is not Y2K1 compliant. :-(

    Apart from that I heaven't heard of any problems. I even did some online banking (pay my bills) w/o a hitch. Okay, the streets seem a bit duller than on other saturdays, the eyes are a bit redder and the heads by some degrees more tilted towards one or the other side.

    So, IT industry, the Y2K Goldrush/hype/hoax is over. Now concentrate on IPV6 and your fridge not getting that beer for with the tacos because the system ran out of IP addresses.

    What could panick the world more: no money on the teller or no beer in the refrigerator? Whoaaah!

    (This, of course, applies only to Zurich, Switzerland)

    --
    Use The Source, Luke!
  62. Settle down, Beavis! by Jake_Man · · Score: 1

    I hang out on a message board about urban legends, we debunk them and generally ridicule all people who get suckered by them. You know, people like /. that post stupid things like the post office taxing email...

    Believing in a global conspiracy to cover up Y2K problems is monumentally stupid.

    Anyway, I work in state government. If the levels of organization at this level is any indication of governmental organizational skills, I seriously doubt the existence of a global Y2K cover-up conspiracy.

    Further, it is patently stupid to believe that the media would willingly pass up what they would undoubtedly trump up as "the story of the millennium!" Therefore, the cover-up would have to be with all governments working together to keep things quiet...that just ain't gonna happen. Hell, Yeltsin just resigned. They don't stay in one place long enough to construct a global cover-up!

    So, I'd just like to remind you that there are other television programs besides the X-Files.

    1. Re:Settle down, Beavis! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is a conspiration: 1) How to make some more money for the *ews 2) Let's say there might be big problems, so everyone stays at home instead of going rioting because the government manipulates veryone. 88

    2. Re:Settle down, Beavis! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Eat sarin and die, nazi shithead! 88 up your ass!

  63. Nah, the media are dying for anything to report. by Zaffle · · Score: 1

    They *WANT* to report the world has ended. As soon as anything went wrong, the question was asked, "Is this the y2k bug?". The only *major* y2k-bug event I've heard of is the monitoring system in the nuke plant in japan, but last time I checked, "Its currently unknown wether this was caused by the y2k bug, and wether any further nuclear power plants will suffer similar problems in the future"...

    One thing I did find funny was Mercury Power (a power provider here in NZ) had ads weeks before the date, "There WILL be a power outtage in New Zealand on Jan 1 2000, just like there is one almost every day. More often that not, its caused by this: ***insert picture of car slaming into power poll***. Drive safe these holidays."

    Well, they were right, in Ottago, a drunk driver plowed into a power poll last night, and cause a 30 min outtage. Whats strange is the media were still saying its unknown if it was caused by the y2k bug AFTER it was established as being a drunk driver.

    Anyways, onto the topic again, New Zealand had the first millenium baby. (infact, I believe the first 3 or so). the very first one, a healthy baby boy was born 1 minute past midnight in Auckland. However, the family (good on them), are insisting on a media blackout. No reporters have been told any other information.

    Now the media WANT this millenium baby, but can you imagine what will happen to the poor kid. Then again, it could also be a good thing, if the parents run into financial trouble later on in life, they can just come forward as the parents :).

    As I've said to all those I've talked to, as I predicted, the bug will mostly be lots of small problems. We've already heard about a few, and come monday more will come, and come Mar 1, err, Feb 29, there will be more. Though I suspect most of the Feb 29 ones will be about wrong day of week for things. (You'll get paid one day later ;)). If we are very lucky, our banks will have problems, and you won't be charged for a days interest :)

    I admit, at the last minute I grabbed a few empty big coke bottles and filled 'em with water, but it was all for naught. Maybe in the year 3000 when we are REALLY computer automated we'll have some big problems, till then, its time to ask

    What am I gonna do with my .50calibre, the 10,000 rounds of ammo, and this damn bunker in my back yard?

    Happy New Year, keep on coding, and don't forget. Y2k is over, we can now start prepending all dates with "20" and only storing 2 digits again!

    --

    I use to have a funny sig, but slash cut it off, and I forgot what the punchline was.
  64. Linux Counter only briefly affected by Y2K by hta · · Score: 1

    The Linux Counter was only briefly affected by the change of the millenium, seeing a slowdown in traffic between the hours of 05:00 GMT and 10:00 GMT.
    See the traffic statistics for details.
    Geeks are a faithful bunch.....

  65. IE5 and Netscape come up with different answers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Strange, When viewed with IE5 is reads Saturday, January 1, 192000 but with Netscape navigator it reads January 1, 19100.

  66. But they weren't Y2K related by mangu · · Score: 1

    Put together Y2K and "nuclear" problems and you get the two stupidest fears humans have today. Well, Y2K is gone now, but how could we possibly make people understand that nuclear power is one of the safest technologies we have?

  67. Computercrash at fire department in Berlin by MadEagle · · Score: 1
    The only major malfunction in Germany seems to be a computer crash at the fire fighter hq in Berlin, Germany. They claim that it was not caused by the Y2K bug but you never know ;-))

    MadEagle

  68. The hospitals are eerily quiet in Edinburgh by Paul+Crowley · · Score: 2

    My flatmate works in a big Accident and Emergency department serving Edinburgh and a whole lot of places around it. They've drafted in scads of extra doctors who haven't been seen in years. The extra doctors are all sitting around reminiscing about the way the hospital used to be, because people don't seem to be doing themselves injuries at the rate expected.

    The total absence of Y2K related badness is almost suspicious...
    --

  69. The worst is... by Loopback · · Score: 1

    Having to go into work AGAIN....and test all the systems you know are still functional AGAIN, because you spent most of the summer prepping the whole damn infrastructure...paranoia in corporations is legendary, especially when fueled by the press, etc..

    I envy anyone sleeping right now. What the hell, if I can blow out of this damn popcorn stand -- I've got a LAN party to go to today!

    Fragging with UT/Q3A on new years day -- that's the REAL fun.

    Thank all the gods of electrons that we have power today...ever see a geek with no coffee/espresso? It ain't pretty.

    OH well -- enough rambling, I gotta go - assuming my ignition module wants to cooperate.

    LoopBack

    http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Dungeon/547 6

  70. this just sucks... by Evil+Poot+Cat · · Score: 2

    Even as the (millenium - 1) rang in, the hype was in overdrive about the mostly clean rollover, like Aibo was supposed to catch digital rabies and go on a killing spree. Wow, the sparklers and fireworks are "Y2K Compliant!" So is most everything else on the planet, since "compliance" seems more like "liability immunity" than system robustness.

    As usual, the verdict is already in before the opening arguments are complete. I guess the press needed something to do, and since there was no crisis, they reported the party as if it were a crisis. "The Y2k preparedness center has just received word that the entire town of Elko is out of beer. FEMA is on hand to deliver 6-packs to those left beerless by the disaster."

    The main impact, if any, will be on date calculations (duh? DUH!), like receivables, payables, debt collection and/or writeoff, bill creation, payroll, etc...It will take some weeks (or the whole year) to shake out the remaining bugs. All of this "No problems, told you so," is a bunch of self-congratulatory feelgood bs for a splashy headline.

    We'll need to watch the message boards for inside info on who got bitten, because no organization I can think of is going to stand up and say "Hey, we lost $xxx,000 this week because __________ didn't calculate dates correctly...."

    1. Re:this just sucks... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Bingo!

      It seems most /. readers (at least the "nothing happening" posters) are admin types who don't deal too much applications. Having been in mainframe systems support for many years, I still dread the coming week for a) the application failures that will happen and will be blamed on systems software, and b) the "Chicken Little" effect. We had applications problems on 9/9/99 that had everyone coming unglued. Turned out the application people RE-introduced a bug that had been previously fixed.

      No, the world's not going to end, but things will still be annoying for big company IS people for some time....

  71. All is fine in Brazil by KGBear · · Score: 1
    Just thought I'd report: Jan 1st, 2000 is pretty much like any other day here in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Besides all the rain yesterday the Sun is shining and the temp is high. All the computers I have access to (Linux, SCO, AIX) rolled over nicely, from 486s to RISC-6000s and everything in between. Despite the city-wide hangover (I assume from the silence outside everyone else is feeling like me), electrical power is up, traffic lights are working, phones and TV are OK. Best of all, my expresso machine seems to be Y2K compliant!


    All the best for you all!

  72. Re:Millenium starts whenever the crud we want it t by Profound · · Score: 1

    Good idea, I'm sure OS religious nuts make much better time systems than Roman religious nuts.

  73. The HYPE is finally over..... by jaxn · · Score: 1

    I am so happy the Y2K hype s finally over. I had to threaten to quit to get out of working...my boss is an MCSE with ZERO experience in this industry...so he wanted the whole IS staff on site. As my favorite pseudo writer Kilgore Trout would say "Tingaling you son of a bitch!"

    I need to go nurse my headache now...

    HAPPY NEW YEARS TO ALL THE /. READERS/POSTERS (and the rest of the world.)

    Jaxn

    --


    "Being alive is a crock of shit." --Kilgore Trout
  74. Y2K Boredom by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Visit the Y2K Boredom webpage www.geocities.com/y2k_boredom This is for all the Tech support people working during the Y2K rollover. please submit your stories and pictures of what you did to keep the boredom from driving you crazy.

  75. 2001ist, The Grit Boy, Nathalie Portnam and life by Nicolas+MONNET · · Score: 1

    Am I the only one to find the smart asses who keep educating you about the fact that 'the new millennium starts in 2001' utterly annoying?

    More annoying than Open Source Nathalie Portman and the grits troll ... and even worse: They exist IRL (In Real Life) insted of being limited to slashdot!

  76. Now, let's wait for 2038 by mangu · · Score: 1

    That's when the 32 bit Unix time will roll over. Pity, there will be some Linux boxes with 17000 days of uptime.

  77. Nuclear meltdown in my pants, baby! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This really happened...

  78. This may not be the end of the world.... by birder · · Score: 1

    ... but we can see it from here.

    - John Mellencamp

    Remeber, the Media has told us it could take weeks, even months before the full effect of the 'Millennium Bug' is known. We should hold onto John's words until around June.

  79. MTV 2 Europe hacked... by DrumManNO · · Score: 1

    Well, at least some hackers are still alive... or rather 2 of them are :) MTV 2 Europe has been given a little make over by some bored people without any firecrackers....

    --
    Georg
  80. Things look OK here in Finland too :) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Appearantly those Russian nuclear plants didn't blow up or anything ... Excellent!

  81. My prediction for the 21st Century by orcrist · · Score: 2

    The phrase "Y2K bug" will take the place in the English language formerly occupied by "making a mountain out of a mole hill"...

    Chris

    --
    San Francisco values: compassion, tolerance, respect, intelligence
    1. Re:My prediction for the 21st Century by freddevice · · Score: 1

      Thats a dam good idea. We get somthing out of it.

  82. ROT13 (spoilers inside) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Well it looks like the Y2K bug didn't rear it's ugly head."

    "Yep the doomsayers have been proven wrong yet again."

    "Did you see that too?"

    "Houston, we have a problem."

  83. Re:First response to first post of new . . . by Money__ · · Score: 1

    First response to first post of new . . .
    _________________________

  84. UF buglet... by arri · · Score: 1

    On today's cartoon if you press "Previous" you get a non-existing page :-) Oops...
    Buon Anno!

  85. Y2Kmistakes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Keep 'em comming!

    Visit:
    http://go.to/y2kmistakes
    To see screenshots of websites affected by Y2K.

    PLS send screenshots or URLs to:
    y2kmistakes@mail.com

    Thanx!

  86. Sure they were! by ^ZuLu^ · · Score: 1

    According to that article I was relying on they surely were.
    Don't get me wrong: I think nuclear power is the future but I hate seeing people playing things down a little bit too much.

  87. slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    freeBSD rules!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  88. The Register Y2K article not Y2K compliant? by loki7 · · Score: 2
    The Register appears to have a bit of a problem displaying today's date. The first article of the new millennium (millenium as per yesterday's suggestion?) doesn't use quite enough zeros in the date:

    BBC Radio One hit by
    Y2K bug...
    Updated Mother Shipton
    fired by Register
    Posted 01/01/0 9:08am

    I think that it's particularly funny that it's an article making fun of other people's web pages. Maybe it's subtle humour?

    /peter

  89. Bank Y2K bug!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    http://www.patelco.org/ reads "January 1, 192000"... Is this a joke or a bad mistake? At least their online banking works perfectly:-)

  90. Quote from our Governor... by Pollux · · Score: 1

    North Dakota's gov. Ed Schafer:

    "It was the biggest nonevent since Geraldo Rivera tried to open Al Capone's vault."

  91. Best Quote of Y2K... by Fross · · Score: 1

    "ah well, i needed a can-opener, anyway."

    Fross :)

  92. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by sjames · · Score: 2

    On the up side, we should see slashed prices on generators. Giving us all a great way to keep our machines up durring power outages.

    Good answer! I NEED one for this winter since we get power failures all the time normally (except last night when all was well). Should be pretty cheap!

  93. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by HermDog · · Score: 2
    I'm wondering how the wacko cults are handling this...the world hasn't ended. Armageddon hasn't happened.
    Well, happily for those of use who thrive on the entertainment provided by the prognosticators, there is always the real start of the millennium and centry in 36[56] days. Plus, we shouldn't forget that the placement of January 1 is rather arbitrary. We have two perfectly good equinoxi (equinoxes? Drat! You never can find a ancient Latin-speaking Roman around anymore. Not like the old days when they were all over the place.) and solstices coming up, not to mention a bunch of notorious dates that were set in the past 100 years alone.
    And I still can't believe that my apartment managers decided do shut down the elevator before midnight "To show that management is prepared for Y2K".
    I'm trying to follow the logic here, but I keep getting distracted by the lunatic giggling -- wait, that's me. In the off chance that the elevator might stop working, they elected to make sure it wasn't working? Did they think that it was going to plunge to the basement or launch itself through the roof, because, as we all know, that was perfectly acceptable elevator behavior in 1900 (or 1960 or 1970 or 1980 or whenever you'd like your elevator to roll over to today). So, did they turn it back on this morning? Unless we undergo a tremendous calendar shift, it's not going to be 19xx for a very, very, very long time, so I don't understand the concept of avoiding the first second of the 20xx era if you're just going to be turning it back on a few thousand or even million seconds later.
    --
    JADBP
  94. Re:2001ist, The Grit Boy, Nathalie Portnam and lif by delysid-x · · Score: 1

    Am I the only one to find the smart asses who keep educating you about the fact that 'the new millennium starts in 2001' utterly annoying?

    Them and the "millenium is spelled millennium" losers.

  95. I'm surprised... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...no one has yet put "y2k bunker" for sale on eBay. Of course, with eBay (ahem) shutting down for the rollover, that might have been hard to do.

  96. Atlanta by Zog · · Score: 1

    Apart from the mystery fog and old people sitting on their porches with shotguns (I actually saw a few...), everything's sane.

    The mysterious, lung-burning "mystery fog" which I encountered was later determined to be a combination of smogfog and fireworks smoke.

    1. Re:Atlanta by zigzag · · Score: 1

      And exactly what part of Atlanta did you see old people with shotguns?

  97. nonono by Zog · · Score: 1

    What the people who announced forgot was that TIME STARTS AT ZERO! So today is the new millenium.

    1. Re:nonono by Levine · · Score: 1

      Is there a 0th day of the month? Is there a 0th month of the year? Days, months, and years start at 1. Hours, minutes, seconds start at 0.

      Levine

    2. Re:nonono by Zog · · Score: 1

      It's the difference between 0 and 24 on our clocks, which are synonymous (sp?)
      Oh well, whatever year it is, it's a new day. :)

    3. Re:nonono by Wastl · · Score: 1

      You mean Jesus was born on year 1 *after* Christ???:-)

      Actually you can't say for sure when the millenium starts by 7 years as they (the scientists) can't determine exactly when Christ was born. So I think it is best to celebrate the millenium when there is a 2 at the first position instead of a 1.

      But you are certainly free to celebrate your millenium next year.:-)

      Sebastian

    4. Re:nonono by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You mean Jesus was born on year 1 *after* Christ???:-) Well, (let's forget for a second that Christ was not born at the beginning of the christian calendar) he was born at the beginning of the "year of the lord 1", so 1/1/1.

  98. Damn that Art Bell -- ! by RavinDave · · Score: 1
    I'm thinking that maxing out my gold card (since the banks records were gonna be lost anyway) might not have been the smartest thing I've ever done.


    Anyone know how to prolong a hangover??

  99. It Ain't Over! It Ain't Over! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sure, we may have survived Y2K. But when the popular press, including Slashdot, realizes that we still have to get through the Millenium, which we have not, they'll be more news on doom and gloom, and FUD on stocking up on food and stockpiling weapons. I suggest that all you people who stocked up on food and clothing donate it to your nearest homeless shelter. Well, the guns, I'm sure there must be a charity for them some place, too. Didn't the police have a turn in your guns campaign, once?

    But remember, with the Millenium coming, it just ain't over, yet!

  100. The REAL reason why you are still reading this by Cironian · · Score: 1

    You think the world went through midnight without problems? Wrong!

    Actually, you are all dead already and this (a world where net access still works) is just your personal paradise where you have been placed. To demonstrate my point of being in geek paradise, watch for flying cars etc. coming this century. :)

  101. The Media passes the buck by tdm8 · · Score: 1
    I was wondering if the Media was going to have egg on their face after pumping this Y2K stuff, but it seems they're already passing the buck. I heard one broadcast say "The date change has come with few of the problems that computer technologists feared."

    Those darn computer technologists, taking over our airwaves and making TV movies and filling news broadcasts with Y2K stories.

  102. You are not alone by dsplat · · Score: 2

    Hey, The first words heard after midnight at the party I was at were:

    "The lights are on. We still have power!"

    "Let's call Gary and congratulate him on a job well done."

    Half the people at the party were on call last night. Not a single pager or cell phone went off. And better still, mine didn't start going off at 6 am today. It was a quiet night.

    I still want to find the most alarmist Y2K book for a review in a few weeks. I want one that made lots of specific predictions of disasters. I want power outages and plane crashes and nuclear melt downs. I want to give some hysterical author and publisher who spouted gloom and doom to increase sales exactly what they deserve ... a really cutting review. And the later the publication date the better. That way we can honestly say that information about preparation for the Y2K non-event was available. I'm guessing from the lack of responses the last time I asked for recommendations on such a book, that none of us were reading any of them.

    --
    The net will not be what we demand, but what we make it. Build it well.
  103. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I agree a hundred percent with your post.They are just another reason for being,a false hope,blinding of reality.Some would call it the "god complex",Either way it is very possible for some of the things to happen the have happend in the past this is proven,and they will happen again It is only part of the cycle.And when the earth and this universe disapate it will give life to another organisum thus the cycle continues. >Or perhaps the world will be >destroyed sometime in 2040 like some nostradamus >enthusiasts believe. If i'am not mistaken the enthusiasts belive that the date is 2737 That is the date that nostradamus predicted.I could be wrong?

  104. Re:Millenium starts whenever the crud we want it t by RalphEJohnson · · Score: 1
    Our year system is NOT based on creation being on 4000 BC and the world ending on 1000AD. It IS based on the birth of Jesus, which was supposed to be 1 AD, except that it was probably more like 4BC or 8BC. The 4000 BC date comes from some mideval scholars who calculated that date from Genesis, and it is not exactly 4000 BC, just around that.

    According to Calendrical Calculations (a wonderful book on calandar conversion and computing with dates), the Jewish calendar starts when the world was created, which would be October 7, 3761 BC on the Julian calendar.

  105. ARGHHH! Dang Javascript documentation! by bons · · Score: 1
    If you're going to display a 2 digit year, keep displaying that same dang two digit year! Every script I looked at checked (if year greater than 97 or so cent=cent+1). NO ONE (including me) coded = fourdigityear =1900 + year (which is all I had to do.)

    argh... Thank god these were my personal pages.

  106. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by richieb · · Score: 1
    If you liked this book, you should also read several books by Martin Garnder: "Fads, and Fallacies in the name of Science" and "Science, Good, Bad and Bogus".

    The first one was published in 1952 (!!!). Things don't change that much.

    Also you should visit the website for CSICOP, the organization that tries to spread sanity thoughout the world. Carl Sagan was a card carrying member of CSICOP.

    ...richie

    --
    ...richie - It is a good day to code.
  107. 18 months? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Hell, we're on a 3 *year* refresh cycle for workstations here. :-( I LOVE the fact that Y2K came along or I'd still be using an old Sparc 5 running slowlaris instead of a new PIII running Linux. :-)

  108. Y2K by Cereal+Box · · Score: 1

    Hopefully this will be a wakeup call to the government and businesses: don't use old-ass COBOL-based systems!

    Who wants to bet that in 2031 the media is gonna ride the Y2034 bug?

  109. NOT A WETROLLOVER !!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What do you mean? All the slot mechines in Delaware stopped working

  110. Tombstones by TeChYMaN · · Score: 1

    not only are they a hefty investment, my grandmother was smart enough to get 20 printed in hers instead of 19! Saved her quite a few bucks I must say!

  111. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by DJStealth · · Score: 1

    The hotel where I stayed last night stopped the elevators between 11:55 and 12:05 last night.

    They said it was because of fear of power loss and NOT due to Y2K compliance issues with the elevator itself.

    But.. still kinda too precautionary for me.

    I personally turned on ALL my computers last night before I went out just to see if the logs would show anything funny.. (everything is working normal)..

  112. Paperware Rollover Bug by BinxBolling · · Score: 2
    Do you have any idea how many people are going to write the wrong date on checks and other documents for (at least) the next month or two?

    I sat down to write checks for several bills this morning. The date field on my checks already has a "19" filled in for the first two digits of the year. I toyed briefly with the idea of just writing a "00" after this, so that the checks would all be dated a century ago.

    1. Re:Paperware Rollover Bug by Nostafa · · Score: 1

      Ack, that would suck for me, my checks are not valid if not cashed within a year of writing. Hundred year old checks would be rejected.

  113. New Hundreds by Vector+Inspector · · Score: 1
    I guess you can say It's a new Hundreds, because we are now in the "twenty hundreds" as opposed to the nineteen hundreds. Worth something.

    Sometimes I get these Pounding Headaches, it feels as if my head is in a vice, and usually I find that's exactly the problem. Happy New Hundreds everyone.

    --


    spoo

    1. Re:New Hundreds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      It is, of course, the naughties.

      As to all the people who say it is not really the start of the new millenium. That all depends on whether you insist that the old one started on Jan 1, 1000 or Jan 1, 1001. If you believe it started on Jan 1, 1000 then saying today is the start of the new millenium is not incorrect.

      Ah, you say, but what of the first millenium? There was no year zero. That is true. But that's because the brilliant minds that invented the christian calendar didn't have the concept of zero. Just accept the fact that the first millenium had 999 years, limit the damage to that millenium and allow the collective cognitive dissonance about when the millenium starts resolve itself in favour of what everyone really believes.

  114. on the use of safety belts by dermond · · Score: 1

    while i agree that a lot of the y2k problem thing was a bit overhyped by
    clueless media. (i guess more in u.s. then here in europe) but i think it
    would be wrong to ridicule people who made careful but sane perpetrations
    just in case... (all i did was buy one extra six pack of beer - just in
    case). (and it is not clear yet weather or not the logistic software at the
    supermarket or the brewery does not have any problems. i suspect there will
    be more glitches with application software then with system programs).

    well the point is: it is wrong to ridicule the people who made
    preparations as much as it is wrong to ridicule people who use safety belts
    in the car or wear a helmet on their bicycle
    . most of the time you will not
    need the safety belt. you can drives somewhere and nothing bad will happen if
    you do not wear it. you can drive tomorrow and you can probably drive 10
    years without any problem. but someday you might have a bad car crash and
    the safety belt will safe your life.

    the y2k preparations are the same: we all knew that major problems where
    not all to likely but no one was able to estimate if the odds for some major
    problem is 0.1% or 1% or 0.01% or 10% in any case i would say that the
    chances where at least higher then those of you having a car crash tomorrow.
    still we use safety belts.

    plus: we have no way to find out what would have happened if people did not
    check their systems throughout.. there was one power plant in vienna that is
    said that it would have failed if it would not have been checked... (and
    what could have happened when it would have failed: the guy in the power
    plant calls anther guy to bring up some spare plant and this guy is not
    prepared for that and makes an error and then there are 2 plants that are
    not there and suddenly a power outage that causes problems elsewhere and this
    causes problems elsewhere.. the nature of y2k is that it can be like domino
    stones: if small problems occur at systems that are not critical nothing
    much happens. if a few small problems occurred at some critical points then
    all our infrastructure might have fallen down like domino stones in a raw..

    so really: i don't thing it is fair to ridicule the people who made
    preparations..

    greetings from vienna, austria.

    mond.

  115. Certificates Expired by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Verisign certificates were set to expire on 12/31/2000. This is normal. They just need to reissue their certs.

  116. yeah, it worked!/? by thissurfer · · Score: 1

    I can't believe we got away with that myself. IT folk are the greatest! I was hoping for more rumors of all sorts of $h!t going down....but it turned out to be dull news. Maybe our worst fears will come in 2001 when we are all unprepared, then we're all f*cked! Enjoy the new year everyone!

  117. REAL Y2K PROBLEMS!!! by DJStealth · · Score: 2

    We know we have REAL Y2K problems when....

    1) A First post message (done by someone other than the person who wrote the article) gets a score of 5!

    2) When you're watching the Y2K countdouns all over the world and you KNOW they're NOT using XNTP to synchronize time, because the time on the countdown on the TV is DIFFERENT from the countdown in the actual party which is different from the clock on the same TV which is even different than your sattelite clock synched XNTP computer

    3) When we suddenly discover the real power of theory of relativity because we are suddenly 17100 years in the future (19100) or 190000 years in the future (192000) and the technology hasn't changed.

    4) When we realize we travelled back in time to the year 100.

    5) When everyone get's paged just after midnight .. then when everyone goes to pick up their voice messages (which they know say something along the lines of "I'm still alive") using their cell phone. Either there are no cell channels available, or the pager system is overloaded. (This happened to me for about 15 mins after midnight.. kept switching between phone has busy system, then pager has overloaded system)


    Well.. Last night I turned on all my 4 computers @ home just to see if I can find anything in the logs over the midnight period.. It was nice to see no downtimes anywhere near the rollover.. my cable provider did go down for a few seconds this morning.. but nothing Y2K related.

    For those of you interested.. the year 100 and 19100 are perl script errors due to concatenating the year 99, or 100 to the end of "19" ..

    The year 192000 originated from problematic Java/Javascripts.. Java was written very stupidly.. If the year is = 2000 it would suddenly report a 4 digit year. this would make it slightly annoying to program something that is Y2K compliant and Pre-Y2K compliant.

    it would have to look something like

    if (now.getDate() 100) document.write(1900 + now.getDate());
    else document.write(now.getDate());

    Anyway.. Enjoy.. Happy Y2K.. l8z

    1. Re:REAL Y2K PROBLEMS!!! by DJStealth · · Score: 1

      sorry.. I meant to say now.getYear() rather than now.getDate()..

  118. Re:2001ist, The Grit Boy, Nathalie Portnam and lif by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    More annoying than Open Source Nathalie Portman and the grits troll ...

    it's not "nathalie" it's "natalie"

    i (the open source troll) am not the same as the grits troll.


    thank you.

  119. But have we survived? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So, the world didn't end. Definitely a good way to start the new millenium. But have we really survived? I imagine there can't be too many people using systems that convert text dates into numbers and then perform arithmetic on them during world wide mega parties. Heck I am using my computer now and I don't need to do that. But then, right now, I am not using my computer to execute commercial date related transactions or print monthly reports . Safety criticial systems tend to date arithmetic on integers without an intervening conversion to text so its not all that surprising that the power grids didn't fall over. Business systems do text/date conversions all the time. Not many people have been using business systems as they are normally used in the last 24 hours. Surely it is better to wait until Monday or Tuesday before we heave that collective sigh of relief? The infrastructure survived. This is good. But is every poorly constructed application going to survive the trauma of every day use? I think it is premature to say that they will. Pity the first company whose business systems fail on Monday morning. The media is hungry for a victim. To find the one company that let the side down. Just one? Sure.

  120. y2k killed my bank account by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oh well It was bound to happen to someone. My trusty ABSA atm card no longer works. "Unable to complete transaction" "Unable to complete transaction". !#@$*#$!#@$*!@#*$ inconveinient when I had to ask ppl for mulla to pay off the bar tab at 7am this morning. Tried like 10 different machines. My brothers works fine. I'm Closing the account on Tuesday. ABSA YOU SUCK PILES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Incompetent idiots. Now I will have to pay bank charges on a new account. hmmmmmmm. So much for the "this atm teller is y2k compliet" Does'nt help much if the bank systems are off line WHEN YOU NEED THEM THE MOST. It's now 8:02 pm and the card still does not work.

  121. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by mattc · · Score: 1

    slowly forgetting? I don't think so-- American society has always thrived on ignorance...

  122. Post-Apocalypse Love Bunker by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Amazon.com has some books published in the early 20th century listed as "expected publisher release date: 2008" and the like. Look up some old books by Winston Churchill.

    I've got some old scotch and young women here in my post-apocalypse bunker of love, but the SWAT team wants to make me give back the women.

  123. Overreacting Europeans by noc · · Score: 1

    I'd be careful speaking for all of Europe. I've got two friends in Italy--who don't know each other--who both went to France for the new year so as to be away from anything the Italian government was in charge of. It was very much along the lines of how I "stockpiled" wine (any excuse) and food (in this non-Apocalyptic world, the foods I chose happen to be the makings for a good paella). Or how CmdrTaco's preparations included a bunch of whisky and frozen lasagna. In case Italy exploded, they were safe(er) in France, in case it didn't, oh look, a trip to Paris/Marseille!

    1. Re:Overreacting Europeans by vigi · · Score: 1
      Overreacting Italians?

      Just figure, the government had a "war room" in permanent seating at some Secret Service site in Rome. They were all smiling on TV just hours before the millennium. They were still smiling minutes before the millennium. They still smiled after the millennium, but the wine stockpile was seriously compromised. In the afternoon of 1/1/0, the secret service kicked them out because "they were not doing anything useful in any case".

      The emergency committee moved at the Trade Department after not having received a single emergency call. AFAIK, everything worked perfectly ok all over the country.

      P.S.: the media reported some minor glitch, i.e. newborns on 1/1/0 had an age of "100" reported on some hospital's terminals, but that was all :-)

  124. Corporate Image vs. Reality by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    While the world hasn't suffered any major Y2K crises, some of the rosy corporate PR releases are bogus. I was on a team surveying systems at a US automaker through the rollover, and as we were recording bugs, we read a piece on cnn.com, posted at 1:30am EST, that the big three American automakers had reported no significant rollover problems. At that point, only about 5% of this company's US vehicle plants had even reported anything to the Y2K center. Either the corporate PR team was referring to Asian and European plants, or their statements had no connection to reality. I'm not saying there were big problems, but the company certainly didn't have much info at that time.

    As for the bugs we came across, there wasn't anything that would stop vehicle production, but there were some problems related to data collection, some mobile robots hangs, and other non-critical failures. Of course the plants are in shutdown right now, and things should be fixed, or workarounds put in place (like clipboards and pencils!), by startup.

  125. Re:Ever read the Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan by lotech · · Score: 1

    Yeah, and don't forget to watch out for next year's coming apocalypse: Y2.001K

    Be afraid. Be very afraid.


    -t

    Holy hyping hyper-hype!

    --
    My email addy goes better without spam.
  126. year 0? by jrennie · · Score: 1

    Assuming that 1 AD/CE was the first year of the common era, Jan 1, 2001 is the first day of the new millenium. Of course, that decision is almost entirely artificial and was not decided upon until much later. I think we should simply artificially insert a year 0 AD/CE (even though the people who lived around 1 AD/CE didn't necessarily understand the mathematical concept of zero :-). I don't see what is the point of arguing about such an artificially generated system, anyway...

    Btw, shouldn't we be happy to bring in 2000 as the first year of the 3rd millenium? This gives evidence of the most intuitive counting system begining with 0, not 1 :-)

  127. Slash not Y2K-compliant? by Kaufmann · · Score: 1

    Yeah, that's right. Look at the values for the articles.pl query-string. It reads

    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/01/01/055120 9&mode=thread

    You know what that means, don't you? Article 0551209 of January 01... 00?!?!?!?

    Good going, Rob! I hope you're feeling good about yourself. Y'know, I think you should read ESR's Cathedral and the Bazaar, in which he points out that "given enough eyes, all bugs are shallow"... and release the Slash source already!

    --
    To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
  128. metametameta first! by MostlyHarmless · · Score: 1

    First Reply to First Reply to First Post to First Article of the Millenium. Bwa ha ha. :-)

    void recursion (void)
    {
    recursion();
    }
    while(1) printf ("infinite loop");
    if (true) printf ("Stupid sig quote");

    --
    Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
  129. wold collaped by Bleedomatic · · Score: 1

    really i was the first persojn to past a reply

  130. ROT13 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    well it looks like the y2k bug didn't rear it's ugly head yep. the doomsayers have been proven wrong yet again did you see that too houston we have a problem

  131. Re: quick/simple rot13 decoding by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    tr [a-mn-z] [n-za-m]

  132. Hopkins is down! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Johns Hopkins university http://www.jhu.edu seems to be down! Could be something besides y2k though

  133. Media doesn't want to put an end to parties? by Asbestos · · Score: 1

    "Do you think that the Y2K bug already has made a
    few troubles, but the media just don't want to put an end to your parties?"

    We were talking about that a bit last night whilst drunk, and I think we figured they'd tell us, because keeping quiet about it wouldn't gain them anything, except for government-run stations. Then I fell over.

  134. Only in the US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I don't think anyone else is celebrating the new Millenium except in the US.

    From looking at the TV channels only American channels talked about "The Millennium(tm)", everywhere else was celebrating "The Year 2000" Well everywhere else means New Zealand Australia, Hong Kong, South Africa, France and Britain, I'm not sure about other people.

    I don't know whether you guys wanted to be different from everyone else or whether you where duped by some kind of marketing scheme.

    I know I'm looking forwarded to celebrating the new millenium in one years time.

  135. The world must of hand a major gravity shift by Nostafa · · Score: 1

    The gravity had to have shifted. why else is the world spinning and my head pounding? The world ended and I need some black coffee to make me feel better.

  136. yippity HYPE !?!!? by serialk · · Score: 1

    you have been 0wned by media HyPe !?!

  137. So how many of Nostradamus' predictions.... by otis+wildflower · · Score: 2

    .... are invalidated? Wasn't 1999 supposed to be the big year for the massive natural disasters, world war with nukes, etc?

    Inquiring minds want to know.. Any Nostradamus junkies out there looking to revalidate the master?

    Happy new year! ;)
    Your Working Boy,

    1. Re:So how many of Nostradamus' predictions.... by Lord+Bitman · · Score: 1

      Despite the Media hype generated by people who dont know what they're talking about, Nostrodomus predicted the end of the world in 2000, not 1999.
      I think in 6 months is when It's scheduled to hit.

      --
      -- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
  138. Well this is just great by CentrX · · Score: 1

    Now I'm all pissed that nothing blew up. Apparently, those darn terrorists missed my message.

    Chris Hagar

    --

    "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
  139. Huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Welcome to the Matrix (a.k.a Y2K).

  140. It's a fake I tell ya. by NoData · · Score: 1

    I just saw a fascinating special on the shroud on the Discovery Channel. First, simuluations showed that exposure to the type of fiery conditions endured by the shroud did not affect the amount of C-14 present in known samples and therefore this was largely dismissed as a source of error for the radiodating (which contrary to what you claim is quite accurate for determining when very old dead things once lived...given that the shroud is made of linen, which comes from flax, this is an appropriate technique for dating the shroud). Second, some physician whose name I can't remember discovered tiny microbes (fungi and bacteria) living in the fibers of the shroud. Since they're alive, this may have skewed the radiodating..perhaps giving a date that is the average of the microbes age (present) and the shrouds age. But the shroud would have had to been composed of 50% microbes to move the shroud's date all the way back to Jesus's time! Since the microbes' mass is in fact a tiny fraction of the shroud's composition, the error these critters produce in the analysis is probably negligible. One demonstration that really was compelling was one in which they (various shroud researchers) simulated the markings that would be left on cloth if a human body was wrapped in linen. The face would leave a very wide, distorted, moon-faced impression on the cloth rather that the very natural, human one seen on the shroud. This is due to the depth of curvature of the face...a face would produce a 'projection' onto the flat cloth quite unlike the face itself. Think of the impression left after wrapping a piece of paper around an inked sphere. The impression seen on the shroud, however, is very consistent with wrapping linen around a properly dyed bas relief sculpture of a face which has much less depth than an actual face. It's most likely the work of a medieval hoax.

  141. A.D. by pulski · · Score: 1

    AD:
    (Latin) Anno Domini:
    Transation: In the year of our lord.

    It is called AD because it is based on the birth of Jesus which was 1 AD which means that the Millenium starts in 2001 which is off anyway because people aren't all that bright and the Millenium really occured a few years ago. Thank you and good night.

    -----