by Al Massey
“My old English professor said a double negative forms a positive. He went on to say there is no language wherein a double positive could form a negative. Yeah. Right.”
This talk of double negatives reminds me of Microsoft and the Department of Justice. I was going to skip Microsoft this month but it is too much of a target rich environment to pass up.
This week (May 7, 1998) Chairman Bill, the head Microsofty, assembled his coven in New York City to inform the world and our Department of Justice that“ What’s good for Microsoft is good for the country.” Where have I heard that before? Oh, I remember, it had something to do with General Motors and, before that, Standard Oil. Of course, shortly after the phrase was uttered about Standard Oil, they were folded, spindled, and mutilated into a lot of sub-standard oils.
On hand for this “major announcement” were such notable wizards as Intel Corp. Chairman Andrew Grove; Dell Computer Corp. CEO Michael Dell; W.J. Sanders III, chairman and CEO of Advanced Micro Devices Inc.; Compaq Computer Corp. CEO Eckhard Pfeiffer; Lewis Platt, CEO of Hewlett-Packard Co.; James Halpin, CEO of CompUSA Inc.; Dwight Steffensen, CEO of Merisel Inc. and Terukai Aoki, CEO of Sony Electronics Inc.
I won’t dwell on this too much today but it is interesting to note that one day after James Halpin of CompUSA went on record to beg the government not to delay the release of Windows 98, his company was awarded a $19 million, three year contract to supply Microsoft licensing to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Gates, Pfeiffer, Grove, and Halpin warned of economic disaster if government officials postpone the Windows 98 release date.
Microsoft CEO Bill Gates warned of broad negative economic effects if the latest version of the operating system is blocked as a result of the government’s antitrust investigation of the company. “Any government actions that would delay or derail Windows 98 would hurt the American economy and cost American jobs,” Gates said. “It would also create an opening for foreign companies to move into a position of leadership in an industry that has been a strong exporter for America.”
OH GOOD GRIEF! Give me a break. The world won’t quit spinning on its axis if Windows 98 fails to ship on time. After all, this is not a cure for world hunger. The rarified air these people breathe is having a debilitating affect on their ability to think straight. They need to come down out of the clouds and mingle with us mere mortals for a bit.
If they played nice with the user community for a few months they would realize that what WE really need are products that work, at least most of the time, and while MORE, BIGGER and FASTER is nice, it’s not a requirement for world peace. When these fellows quit chewing pizza and start sucking on silicon their neurons quit firing and they stop thinking before they speak.
Remember when: “Compress was something you did to the garbage, not something you did to a file. And if you unzipped anything in public you’d be in jail for a while.”
I had the opportunity to discuss the Year 2000 problem with a bunch of super geeks the other day and, as always, it was fun. I say fun because I truly pray that I am still around when the millenium passes by. This is going to be the most fun you can have with your clothes on. In light of all the publicity revolving around this simple little two-date field, I can’t believe how little interest it is getting at the top. The only people even mildly concerned are at the lower end of the corporate ladder or work at the lowest levels of government.
A recent survey by RHI Management of our nations top executives asked the question: “How concerned are you about the financial implications if the world’s Year 2000 computer date conversion projects are not completed in time?” The results were: Very concerned 17%, Somewhat concerned 34%, Not too concerned 28%, Not concerned at all 21%.
At the meeting, concern was raised that many countries appear to be ill prepared for the disruption in basic services that the year 2000 problem will cause. In attendance was the spy chief assigned by the CIA to study the issue, Sherry Burns.
“We’re concerned about the potential disruption of power grids, telecommunications, and banking services” among other possible fallout, especially in countries already torn by political tensions, Sherry Burns said. She said that said CIA systems engineers and intelligence analysts were focusing beyond the technical problem of reprogramming computers to recognize dates when the new millennium dawns on January 1, 2000. Instead, the agency has begun to collect and analyze information on preparations for the “social, political, and economic tumult” that could result from interruptions of essential services in some fragile societies.
Millions of computers and embedded chips—some central to financial markets, air traffic control systems, and even elevators and heating systems in office buildings—cannot distinguish between 1900 and 2000 because years have been expressed in two-digit shorthand in old programming. The glitch, known as the Y2K problem, may trigger widespread disruptions because not all computers will be fixed by December 31, 1999.
With the world’s computer networks largely linked, the use of data that has been converted to the new millennium standard improperly—or not converted at all—could infect newly reprogrammed systems, Burns said. According to the CIA assessment, the threat of turmoil is greatest among people who are unaware of the key role that bits and bytes play in providing essential services and bringing goods to markets, even in less-developed countries.
“There is very little realization that there will be disruption” of basic services as some computers shut down or go haywire, even among business leaders, Burns said. “As you start getting out into the population, I think most people are again assuming that things are going to operate the way they always have,” she said. “That is not going to be the case.” Many governments are “unprepared for what could potentially be some fairly tough circumstances,” she added.
Remember when: “Meg was the name of my girlfriend and gig was a job for the nights; now they all mean different things and that really mega bytes.”
There is little doubt the information age has redefined warfare, and the United States faces the urgent task of defining a new national security sanctuary and then finding the means to protect it from “soft” warfare.
Those who fight, what they fight about, the weapons they wield, the targets they choose, the rules of engagement and the laws, and ethics that govern human behavior all have changed in ways that we do not yet understand, raising issues that cannot be resolved by technology or analog-age policies.
While industrial-age warfare muddied the distinction between civilian and military targets, war in the information age will make that distinction invisible. War is no longer solely the province of nation-states, and nonphysical destructive techniques now are capable of doing what only violent kinetic energy could achieve in the past.
Aggression no longer means, “armed” in the traditional sense, nor does it have to be physically destructive to constitute a legitimate threat to national security. Technology now provides nondestructive means to persuade, coerce or compel an enemy (or competitor), and the United States must rethink the roles that its defense sectors play, as well as the weapons and tactics that its armed forces employ in this new form of conflict.
Al Massey is a HAL-PC member who can be contacted at almas@hal-pc.org.
E-mail me at webmaster@hal-pc.org with any comments you have and tell me what you want to see here.