The reader is squarely confronted with the scope of the Y2K problem, involveing the collapse of such essential services as telecommunications and banking.
A worldwide computer time bomb is ticking toward a cataclysmic explosion. This detonation could cause total collapse in international business, financial and defense markets unless partially identified hardware and software corrections can be implemented on an unprecedented scale. Without attention, almost all of the world's microprocessor dependent systems progressively will become unreliable between now and the year 2000. The global market for correcting the problem could total $200 billion to $400 billion by the year 2000, according to a widely touted estimate. An independent MITRE Corporation assessment of military vulnerability to the software problem describes it as real and potentially catastrophic. Military logistics systems, in the process of creating five-year stockpiles, already are encountering the problem, as are financial and insurance institutions. Critical systems in the U.S. Defense Department could face substantial failure if the department does not aggressively address what is known as the year 2000 problem. The problem arises from the once-common practice of representing years by only their last two digits, for example, 1996 as 96 and 2000 as 00. While the year 2000 obviously occurs after the year 1996, two-digit representations change this relationship. This is because computers use mathematical comparisons to determine time sequence. A computer employing two-digit year representations would determine incorrectly that the year 00 occurs before the year 99 when a simple greater than comparison is done. In other words, because 99 is greater than 00, the year 99, or 1999, is calculated to have come after the year 00, or 2000. A host of mistakes can result from two-digit year representations.
"Time Bomb 2000" describes how the year 2000 problem can potentially affect all facets of business life if not properly addressed. Chapters are devoted to effects on home PCs, on the job, the news, airplanes, and more. Advice is given on how to deal with the problem if and when they actually occur.
This collection of essays examines responses to the Millennium and whether or not the year 2000 could be claimed as a specifically Christian time. It also considers how other religions reacted to the moment and what millennial celebrations reveal about religion in a secular age.
Religions of Modernity' challenges the social-scientific orthodoxy that modernization inevitably erodes the sacred, and documents - in rich empirical detail - how modernity spawns its own religious meanings by relocating the sacred to the self and the domain of digital technology.
On New Year's Eve 1999, millions of computers are likely to go haywire - affecting missile defence systems, stock market trading, even lifts. The authors highlight the blunders that allowed the 'millennium bug' to remain hidden for so long.