Ed Yourdon: Sayonara Y2K

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y2k Today 6/2/99

 

ED YOURDON'S FAREWELL: "SAYONARA Y2K"

 

Author: Ed Yourdon

 

The time has come for me to say goodbye to Y2K. I'm removing the Y2K

articles, links, and resources from my web site, and dropping off the

Y2K radar screen. Y2K has been part of my life since early 1995 and has

occupied every waking moment since the summer of 1997 -- and while it

will continue to have a significant impact on personal and family life,

I no longer plan to play a public role . I realize that this may raise

some questions, perhaps cause some commentary and debate, and I've

attempted to answer the more obvious questions below.

 

Why? Why Now?

 

No, I haven't been abducted by aliens. I haven't been kidnapped by the

CIA or the mysterious people in helicopters. I haven't been threatened

by the FBI. I haven't been bribed by banks or the government (or anyone

else) . There is nothing deep, dark, or mysterious about my decision.

 

I simply feel that I've done everything I can do to raise the alarm

about Y2K. I've co-authored two books, dozens of articles and essays,

spoken at hundreds of seminars, conferences, meetings, and gatherings. I

could continue doing the same thing, over and over again, but I would be

repeating myself.

 

More important, I would be preaching to the choir; those whose opinion

and outlook on Y2K are compatible mine would nod their head in

agreement, and those whose opinion and outlook are incompatible with

mine shake their head in disbelief, just as they have for the past four

years.

 

Yes, there are still some people who are undecided, and who continue to

listen to both the optimists and pessimists before making up their own

mind. But I think that a more accurate term for "undecided" is

"indifferent" -- i.e., there are many people who still don't care, who

don't think the topic is worthy of serious attention, and who not focus

on Y2K until this fall -- and quite possibly not even until midnight on

New Year's Eve.

 

Meanwhile, I sense a hardening of positions: those who are pessimistic

about the outcome are even convinced than they were a year ago, and

those who are optimistic are even more convinced, especially they see a

steady stream of upbeat press releases and government status reports.

 

More than just hardening of positions, though, I sense an increasing

degree of confrontation and hostility the two camps. It's reflected in

flame wars on the Internet discussion groups; emotional rhetoric in the

statements government officials and media articles (e.g., warnings

against "frivolous stockpiling") ; McCarthy-esque threats both sides

that "we're taking names" in preparation for some kind of undescribed

post-Y2K retribution against who express an opposing point of view; and,

overall, a sharp decline in civility.

 

I expect this to continue for the remainder of the year, and I don't

think it's a productive use of my time (or else's) to continue

attempting to respond to messages and commentary whose purpose often

seems to be " ignore the message, shoot the messenger." Why isn't it

productive? Because it doesn't change anyone's mind about topic. Perhaps

we could use the services of some of the gifted statesmen who have

helped negotiate peace in northern Ireland, or the middle East; as for

me, I don't have the skill, the patience, or the training in this kind

of diplomacy.

 

Does This Imply A Change of Opinion About Y2K?

 

No doubt there will be some who gleefully proclaim, "This just proves

that Ed was wrong about Y2K all along! He has given up on his 'doomer'

position, but he's too much of a coward to say so!" Well, time will tell

whether any of us were right or wrong about Y2K -- but for now, my

perspective on Y2K remains essentially unchanged. I stand by the

comments I've made in all of the articles and essays that I've written;

at a "macro" level, I still have a pessimistic outlook about the outcome

of Y2K.

 

We can argue indefinitely about whether the large government agencies

and the large companies in England, Canada, Australia, and the U.S. will

manage to muddle through, and whether the failure or bankruptcy of a few

such organizations and/or agencies will have a dramatic impact. But even

amongst the optimists, there seems to be a common consensus that small

businesses, small towns/counties, and small (a.k.a. Developing Nations)

countries are so far behind that they're unlikely to finish repairing a

significant percentage of their mission-critical systems.

 

The "fortress America" attitude amongst the optimists seems to be,

"Well, so what if half of the small businesses don't do anything about

Y2K until they see what breaks? So what if Eastern Europe, Africa, South

America, the Middle East, and most of Asia don't manage to repair their

systems? Why should I believe that this will have any impact on *my*

life?"

 

Similarly, we can argue indefinitely about whether the governmental

authorities and the private-sector organizations (e.g., the banks, the

utilities, the telephone companies, etc.) are doing a good job or a bad

job in terms of reporting their status and progress to the public. But

there is a widespread theme that they're in control of the situation,

and that (notwithstanding the possibility of a few "glitches") there's

really nothing serious to worry about. Yet the federal government has

acknowledged that it doesn't have the resources to provide emergency

relief to all of the towns and communities across the country; local

communities are being told that they're on their own, and that they

should make their own contingency plans.

 

But the federal government can't force them to do so, nor can it force

small businesses to make Y2K a top priority, nor can it issue ultimatums

to foreign governments to do anything about Y2K. I don't even think it

has control over the outcome of Y2K repairs within its own agencies, for

non-compliant code doesn't listen to the rhetoric of politicians -- it

either works, or it doesn't work. Ultimately, there is only a limited

amount of control that corporations and government agencies have over

the technological outcome of Y2K; yet the prevailing attitude seems to

be that government and industry are in control, as long as they can

"manage" the perceptions of the public.

 

I have believed, all along, that Y2K is too big, too complex, and too

systemic in nature to be "controlled" from a technological perspective;

and I believe that the public's *perception* of Y2K will ultimately be

shaped by tangible events that impact their lives, much more than it's

shaped by the "spin control" efforts of government and industry.

 

For the past few months, the PR spin control has been quite effective,

and I fully expect that it will continue throughout the summer as

government and industry seek to "reassure" the public. And since the

public would generally prefer to be reassured that the government is

taking care of any problems looming on the horizon, rather than face the

possibility of serious disruptions, the spin control efforts may

continue succeeding even into the fall of 1999.

 

Those who want me to continue participating in the public debate

sometimes ask me, "But isn't it possible that things will change in the

final months of Y2K?" And the optimists ask a roughly similar question:

"Yes, I agree that things look bad in small companies, small towns, and

small countries -- and maybe even in some of the big companies and big

agencies. But don't you agree that with a lot of hard work, we can

redouble our efforts, achieve a quantum leap in productivity, and make

enough progress in these last few months to avert disaster?" To which

answer is, quite simply, "No."

 

If you believe in the Tooth Fairy, or in the kind of implausible

miracles favored by Hollywood script-writers, then perhaps you can

sustain your belief that everything will somehow work out in the end. If

you're looking at an individual company, or an individual government

agency, perhaps you can make a plausible case -- yes, sometimes we get

lucky, sometimes the combination of inspiration and perspiration are

sufficient to overcome enormous odds. But at the macro level, I don't

think it makes sense.

 

We have 30 years of data in the software field that tells what to expect

in the "average" case -- i.e., 25 percent of all projects are canceled,

15 percent are delivered behind schedule, and the resulting systems have

an average of one defect for every thousand lines of code.

 

If a miracle were to occur, it would have occurred two, or three, or

four years ago. If President Clinton had addressed a joint session of

Congress in 1996 and declared a state of emergency until Y2K had been

completely conquered, perhaps we could look forward to a successful

outcome at the end of this year. I'm not talking about the martial-law,

conspiracy-theory form of "state of emergency," but rather a "fireside

chat," followed by a series of actions that would make Y2K the

highest-priority activity in the land. It didn't happen then, and it

isn't happening now. I'm fairly convinced that it won't happen during

the remaining seven months of 1999 -- and even if it did, now too late.

If a high-level executive issues a thundering edict to the Y2K

programming staff, "Redouble your efforts! Work harder!", the response

from the programmers is likely to be, "Boss, we're thinking as hard as

we can!" Software is an intellectual activity, rather than something

requiring brawn and muscle-power; you simply can't order people to think

harder.

 

I believe that we are entering the "end game" of Y2K, and that the

outcome isn't likely to be changed significantly because of last-minute

strategies, edicts, proclamations, or demands for death-march-style

overtime on the part of programmers. About the only thing that's still

an option, both for organizations and for individuals, is contingency

planning and preparations for some degree of disruptions. But again,

this involves preaching to the choir: those who believe it makes sense

to develop and implement contingency plans, are already doing so --

indeed, some 90 percent of private-sector organizations are planning

"war rooms" or "control centers" to cope with whatever problems arise.

 

Meanwhile, those who think it's unnecessary will continue to do nothing.

Yes, it's possible that there will be a last-minute surge in

preparedness activities, especially at the personal level; but it

probably won't happen until this fall, at which point it will lead to

the very phenomenon of shortages and panics that government spokesmen

have been warning about. Meanwhile, it's going to be a long, hot, quiet

summer of Y2K-denial, unless some significant, undeniable, tangible

event occurs.

 

What About All The People Who Don't Know About Y2K?

 

When I decided to move from New York City to New Mexico last year, some

of the Y2K activists criticized me severely for "abandoning" New York.

"You've doomed eight million innocent citizens to their fate!" I was

told. "It's your responsibility to stay in New York, and warn all those

people -- so they'll be ready for Y2K!" What a mind-boggling concept! If

8 million oblivious residents of New York City are entirely dependent on

me, or any other individual, to learn what Y2K is all about, then we're

all in a lot more trouble than we ever imagined.

 

There is no shortage of information about Y2K. If the 8 million New

Yorkers, or the 250 million Americans, or the 5 billion citizens of the

world, want to know all about Y2K, there are dozens of books, thousands

of articles, and tens of thousands of references on the Internet.

Ignorance was a plausible excuse in 1995 and 1996, perhaps even in 1997

-- but not now. If someone doesn't know about Y2K, it's because they've

chosen to ignore it, and/or because they believe the assurances of

government and industry spokesmen who tell them there is nothing to

worry about.

 

In terms of personal responsibility, I am my brother's keeper. Actually,

I don't have a brother, but I do have five sisters for whom I feel a

sense of responsibility, along with my children, my wife, and my

parents. I also feel some degree of responsibility for my neighbors and

my community -- partly because I have a personal relationship with many

of them, and also because it will do little good for for my family to be

personally prepared if my neighbors are not. Beyond that -- i.e., at the

state, national, or global level -- I've been happy to spend a

considerable amount my time and effort helping those who are helping

themselves. And because I've enjoyed a good living in the computer field

that was at least partially responsible for having created and

perpetuated the Y2K problem, I've felt a professional responsibility to

ensure that people understand what the problem is all about, and why it

has been difficult to solve.

 

But there comes a time when it seems appropriate to say, "Okay, I've

done my best to tell you what's going on. Now it's up to you to decide

what (if anything) you're going to do about it." For me, that time has

come.

 

Conclusion

 

I suspect that there are also a number of Y2K activists who will be

frustrated that they can no longer send me email messages, asking me to

provide an interpretation or analysis of the day-to-day Y2K

announcements from the media and the corporate PR departments. To which

I offer two responses: (1) you're intelligent adults, and you can use

your own common sense to decide how to interpret the news; and (2) the

debate between the optimists and pessimists will continue, with ever

more emotion and rhetoric, right up to Jan 1, 2000 and beyond. If you're

waiting for someone to produce an absolute, guaranteed, indisputable

"answer" to the Y2K debate, you've already waited too long. It's not

going to happen. As I suggested in one of my earlier essays , everyone

will have to decide for themselves when the "moment of truth" has

arrived, when they will make a decision about their own personal Y2K

plans, in the presence of incomplete, fuzzy information.

 

I also suspect that there are a number of Y2K activists who will

continue doing everything in their power to raise the alarm, alert the

government, and encourage their neighbors and fellow citizens to

stockpile and prepare -- right up to the last moment. They have my

respect, my admiration, and my best wishes. As for me, it's time to get

back providing for my family.

 

If there are any major developments this summer or fall, where I think

my background and experience in software engineering might provide a

useful perspective, I'll dust off my soap-box and offer an appropriate

commentary. And when the dust settles, in the days and weeks after Jan

1, 2000, I'll reappear to offer an appropriate *mea culpa* if my Y2K

outlook proved wrong. Meanwhile, my best wishes for everyone as we move

into the Y2K end game. It's time for me to say, "Sayonara, Y2K." I'll

see you on the other side.

 

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