In computer news this week, 01/19/2000

The Y2K panic and its similarity to the great virus panics

The PC industry has more hype than Hollywood. I've said that before, and I'm sure I'll say it again. People have a hard time believing that though. They think the PC industry is totally organized, with rules and standards, and everything goes according to a master plan. But there is no master plan. The closest thing to a master plan is Microsoft and all the products they've developed. They claim to be "the industry standard".

Then you have all of Microsoft's competitors who don't want to adhere to this so-called master plan. They want their products to become "the industry standard", so that they can control the industry, instead of Microsoft. That's why you have trying-to-compete Office Suites, like Word perfect office, and trying-to-compete operating systems, like Linux and Novell. None of these are doing a very good job, which is why Microsoft is the industry standard.

So you may wonder, well then, why are there computer viruses, and why was there a Y2K problem.

I remember the first PC world virus way back in the mid 1980's, and when it showed up, most of the people I knew didn't believe it existed. But it did and it was, and it was destructive, and it was followed by dozens, and then hundreds, and now thousands of other computer viruses, all designed to attack PC's running the so-called industry standard software. Now the virus software industry is a huge part of the marketplace,

and all the companies that used to virtually give their software away, like McAfee & Associates, and now tightly controlling its distribution and registration, and making and charging big bucks for it.

Now we have an elastic demand curve for virus products. Everytime still another potentially killer virus appears in the press reports, the herds of users panic and run to the stores or the internet for the latest virus software programs. The virus software publishers smile and fan the flames.

So an outside observer might ask a very logical question about this scenario; "If viruses are so common, why doesn't Microsoft - the industry leader - and the others - just make all their products and their operating systems virus-proof?" And the answer is, that's a very good question.

I also remember when we first started hearing about the upcoming Y2K crisis a few years ago, and again most people just couldn't imagine it would happen. After all, this was the PC industry, with all its wonderful standards and organization, and it just couldn't be so. But then, as the doomsday approached, and the press attached itself to the subject, the herds of users panicked again and ran to the stores or the internet for the Y2K software programs.

And again, an outside observer might have asked a very logical question about this scenario; "If the Y2K problem was known, why didn't all the software and hardware people make their products Y2K ready ?" And the answer is, that's a very good question.

But Y2K was bigger even than the PC world, and we heard doomsday prophets urging us to have year supplies of food and fuel, and generators, and movies were made about how it was going to be the end of the world, and when the horrible day came, millions of people hunkered down and waited, just like they do when that horrible virus is supposed to trigger on an upcoming day.

But January 1st, 2000, came and went, just another day, and life and the pc world went on. A few glitches perhaps, but nothing major.

And somewhere, someplace, a little child observed that the King wasn't wearing any clothes. And other folks were reminded of the story of the little boy who called wolf, and then the realization sunk in that they had panicked, and now they felt a little foolish.

Much ado about nothing.

But somewhere in the PC world right now, the Hollywood producers are thinking up the next big hype.

And believe me, it will happen. Because this is the PC industry.

For Raw Bytes, this is Frank Delaney

3414 E. 30th

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(509) 245-3736

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