Y2K was not the world-ending catastrophe that the media, governments, and tech gurus had predicted. But it still led to some weird, expensive, and sometimes hilarious glitches.

was anyone else disappointed that planes were not literally falling out of the sky on Y2K?

anyway, here are some real world examples of actual problems that did occur

I did like the Leonard Nimoy video with experts attempting to rate how bad things were going to be :)

and of course the Y2K survival kit commercial was unintentionally hilarious with the shattered glass and sirens going off in the background

did anyone here have to deal with issues caused by Y2K, or spend time preparing systems beforehand?

  • @groucho
    7•1 year ago

    I was interning at a power company at the time and they were mostly worried about weirdos and militia trying to pull a stunt. I walked into Operations one day and there was the scariest man I’ve ever seen, in a black suit with a shoulder holster. He said his job was to keep an eye on things and get to know everyone. He looked like a Dashiell Hammett character and smiled all the time, especially when nothing was funny.

    IT came around, pulled everyone’s computer apart, and then sealed them back up with tamper-evident tape. And of course everyone asked me if their power would be ok and I legally couldn’t answer. Clock hit midnight and nothing happened except Scarface wasn’t around when I got back from holiday vacation.

    We’d handled everything like a year beforehand but it was a weird couple of months.