Time Bomb 2000!: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You! [Paperback]

Edward Yourdon (Author), Jennifer Yourdon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 24, 1997 | Series: Yourdon Press Computing Series

This is the first practical guide to the Y2K crisis for everyone! This expert guide discusses what problems are likely to occur, how they will impact individuals and society, and what you can do to prepare as an individual. This book is aimed at everyone whose life is affected by computers - whether or not they ever touch a keyboard. It poses the question: "What if the computer industry fails to fix the Year 2000 problem?" Then, it systematically reviews the consequences for employment, the economy, health, transportation and many other issues --assessing the relative probabilities of failure. Best of all, the book presents practical contingency plans and fallback positions for individuals in the event the worst happens. Anyone with an interest in the Y2K problem.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Writings on the year 2000 (Y2K) problem, or the "millennium bug" as some would have it, have been limited to highly technical analyses of specific problems and their solutions. Very little attention has been paid to how the Y2K problem will affect the lives of average people and everyday systems, even though many prognosticators believe this is where the problem will have the largest impact. In Time Bomb 2000: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You, Edward and Jennifer Yourdon do just that by presenting a collection of scenarios ranging from the best we can hope for to the worst cases. Each chapter investigates a different area of computing and the possible effects of this disaster on each. From home PCs to world financial networks, the Yourdons explore a variety of "domino effects" that January 1, 2000, could trigger and the necessary time, effort, and cost to fix the aftermath. The impacts on real life could be anywhere between annoying and catastrophic, and the authors examine each extreme. Each chapter contains "fallback advice," describing the amount of time required to repair these systems. (The authors liken Y2K to a hurricane--it only lasts a day, but requires a year of cleanup.)

Although the Yourdons insist that their overall view is optimistic, it's hard not to feel doomed when reading some of the worst-case scenarios brought on by the year 2000 problem. While Time Bomb 2000 is meant to be an alert, it's not time to start stockpiling canned goods yet, and we can probably still party like it's 1999 right on schedule. However, we should remain extremely mindful of what may await us the next morning.

From Library Journal

Optimists may be gleefully eyeing the approaching millennium with great expectations of the innovation that will undoubtedly accompany its dawning, but those with perhaps a more grounded gaze see January 1, 2000, as the day of reckoning for computers and their infinite applications everywhere. The Yourdons (Edward is the author of 25 computer books) offer a doomsday scenario of what life might be like if techno gurus aren't able to correct, on a universal scale, an oversight born when programmers failed to see the significance of the double zeros at the beginning of year 2000. Will ATMs work on January 1 of that year? Will medical devices work? Social Security checks arrive? Will basic services like electricity, water, mail, and food delivery be affected? No one is claiming to know everything for sure, but the Yourdons' harrowing account of what life could be like if computers all shut down at once is both frightening and useful for the solutions it offers. For all computer collections.?Geoff Rotunno, "Tri-Mix" Magazine, Goleta, Cal.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Prentice Hall Ptr; 1 edition (December 24, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0130952842
• ISBN-13: 978-0130952844
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (76 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,234,705 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice. . ., February 3, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Time Bomb 2000: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You! Revised & Updated Edition (Paperback)

Credit to Ed Yourdon for inventing a new literary niche --pointing out a nonexistent crisis, writing a book about it, then writing another book debunking it! He hasn't, at the time of this review, written a book celebrating victory over the fearmongering that he helped to spark, but I'm certain it will be forthcoming.

Yourdon's last shred of credibility evaporated on 01/01/00. Hopefully he made enough off this book to retire. If he didn't, he's going to need to find a new line of work.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Ed's a charlatan, August 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Time Bomb 2000!: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You! (Paperback)

Ed Yourdon is a well-known fake. Years ago, he wrote a book about how the entire US software industry was going to collapse. After it didn't, he had the nerve to write a sequel about how disaster was narrowly averted. Yawn.

Then there was "Death March", where he discusses the problems many software projects face, only to say there is no hope and we are all doomed. Yawn again.

Now, Ed has taken up Y2k as his latest cause. Nevermind all the money he is making from these books, his web page, consulting, speaking, etc. Nevermind he has glossed over facts, and circulated data from well-known Christian Reconstructionist Gary North. Nevermind he claimed that we'd be seeing massive Y2k problems by now in both domestic and foreign governments.

No doubt Ed is already writing a sequel claiming that he helped avert a Y2k crisis. Yawn.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars What a joke., January 7, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Time Bomb 2000!: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You! (Paperback)

This book isn't worth the paper it's printed on. There isn't a choice for no stars. If there were, I'd give it that.