Oh sure, everybody these days is pontificating about the Y2K problem. I read or hear their dire warnings and stern prognostications ad nauseam—and on an almost daily basis, too. You can find these near-sighted prophets in the newspapers, on the Internet, in bookstores, and on TV spreading electronic doom.

“Repent ye of the wicked chip,” they cry, “or ye shall not enter the new millennium.”

“Computers will crash, the elderly will stop receiving Social Security checks, the power grid will collapse, and life as we know it will end!”

“Be prepared,” they warn. “Better store food, fuel, and water. Arm yourselves.” Blah, blah, blah. Big, hairy, silicon-based deal. To borrow Spiro Agnew’s single catchy contribution to political discourse, today’s oracles, like yesterday’s war-skeptical media, are nothing more than “nabobs of negativism,” whatever a nabob happens to be. Besides, they’re missing the real story.

I mean, it doesn’t take a savant to predict problems at the turn of the century. The date rolls over in less than a year, after all. And with the human penchant for procrastination (I myself meant to issue this warning six months ago), some things are bound to be overlooked. Even if they weren’t, there’s always some percentage of the population that will create its own problems believing, for example, that aliens are hiding behind their AS/400, just waiting to take them home. So suck it up and evolve; we’re going to have some disruption of our cushy, computer-generated existences, and that’s just the way it is.

As ubiquitous as these predictions are, about the only place I felt safe from gloomy assault was in the john. Of all my errant appliances, at least I could take refuge in the fact that my toilet was Y2K-compliant. Or so I thought. In the end, if you’ll pardon the expression, even the bathroom may not be a safe haven because the 57 sewerage pumping stations in my town are apparently electrically operated, and if the power goes out for any length of time, the whole system is likely to back up. Happy New Year.

But before you start to pooh-pooh my tale, I’m not here to talk about Spiro or your neighbor’s sewage paying you a midnight visit. (Is that redundant?) That’s another story, and let it not detract from the real looming disaster.

There’s a much bigger problem just around the corner that no one is taking about. Not the government, not the newspapers, not computing magazines, not even Oprah. And

this one is going to be really BIG. Bigger than Sam Donaldson’s ego. OK, maybe not quite that big. But you’d best sit down if you’re standing. Are you ready? It’s the Y10K problem.

That’s right. You heard it here first. Hey, I’m talking about a five-digit date. It’s never happened before in recorded history. Think about it. Every date field, prompt, or report you’ve ever seen supports—at most—a four-digit year. Suddenly, overnight, nothing will make sense. Nothing will work.

The problems will be somewhat different, but no less serious than a nation facing cold-turkey movie deprivation when its VCRs malfunction. What, pray tell, will befall those poor souls who happen to be teleporting through time when the date changes to 10000? God only knows where they’ll end up. And how about the billions of General Motors’ date-sensitive human implants that jolt folks when it’s time to buy their new intergalactic all-terrain vehicles? The economy will be ruined. And a lot of folks who met through disreputable televideo dating services and who are in the throes of millennial passion are going to be really disappointed to discover that the only person who would marry them was an android. From “Harry, you’re the best!” to “Please enter the correct date.” It’s a real romance stopper. Only lawyers won’t notice any difference because, as we learned in our own century, they pretty much don’t care whom they abuse.

Now that you know what we’re facing, I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s not too early to start checking your heritage software. It’ll probably still be around in 9999, just as your old stuff survived into the coming millennium. And I can almost guarantee there won’t be any COBOL or RPG programmers then, and Java will be remembered only as an ancient island covered by the oceans when the ice caps melted. So, do your descendants (especially Harry) a favor and get Y10K-compliant now.

A word of caution to all you procrastinators: Don’t expect Windows 9995 to solve the problem for you. Most likely, Microsoft will still be in litigation. The 250th cloned generation of Bill Gates will be fighting off the cloned descendants of Janet Reno, refusing to release the Y10K fix until the government allows Microsoft to bundle Windows with its all new (meaning “incompatible with anything that came before”) Universe Management software. “It’s better than God,” Gates will claim, “and bigger, too.” Besides, Gates will astutely argue that since his last competitors dried up about 7,900 years ago, Janet has no case. Being the only galactic software provider, of what concern is your Y10K problem to “Dollar Bill” anyway? Let them eat virtual reality.

So, you’ve been warned. Don’t be complaining to MC when your AS/4000000 rolls over and dies just a few thousand years from now. Oh sure, it seems like you have forever to fix the problem. But that’s what you thought about Y2K, wasn’t it? So how you doin’?

We at MC take pride in staying well ahead of industry trends. We will leave no stone unturned in our continued commitment to bring you the information you need to run your enterprise without threat of interruption from the vicissitudes of time.

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