The Y2K Bug and What You Can do About It

The Y2K or "Millennium" bug as it is sometimes called, has garnered a lot of attention recently and for good reason. If it were simply a matter of your own computer's operating system, then it might be manageable. However, like every self-respecting glitch capable of calling itself a "bug," the Y2K bug can potentially afflict much more than just your computer's operating system.

First, what is it? It is a major foul-up, a super-glitch, and a "who-was-asleep-at-the-wheel" oversight on the part of the early computing pioneers. And it is one that we all accepted ostensibly because we apparently believed the world would blow up well before the year 2000. Well, it didn't. In the early days of computing, when your typical computer weighed in excess of two tons and occupied several rooms in an office building, data fields were "precious." Especially those data fields that were super-repetitive, like the year. Take your typical date. It is usually given as something resembling "09/10/98." No problem, until you look at the last 2 digits. "98" really means "1998." And that is the problem. Computer operating systems as well as most of the software applications provide for 6 digits in a date field (many simply auto-insert the slashes). They simply do not provide for nor recognize the "19" in front of the "98." Thus, when the year becomes 2000, the date is likely to be interpreted as 1900 or some other unintended date.

Bart Ziegler, a staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal, reported on August 6, 1998 that the high tech firm, Gartner Group, Inc.'s survey of 15,000 companies and government agencies in 87 countries found that 23% hadn't yet started any work on the Y2K problem. Why is this a problem? The Stamford, Connecticut based Gartner Group, Inc. estimates it takes about 30 months on average for a company or agency to fix the glitch in its most important computer systems. Lou Marcoccio, Gartner's research director, stated that about 10% of the Y2K induced failures will cause a business to be interrupted for 3 or more days.

It is perceived to be such a problem, that units of two New England firms (the law firm of Peabody Arnold,LLP (http://www.peabodyarnold.com/) and the Boston based full service communications firm, Clarke & Co. (http://www.clarkeco.com/), have joined forces to create a Risk Management Action Plan. This plan is designed to help businesses and organizations deal effectively with the many legal and strategic communications aspects of the Year 2000 computer issue. If you access the Peabody & Arnold Web site, click on "What's New" and then "Insights, July 1998, Into Year 2000 Issues." The Clarke & Co. Web site is easier to navigate in that a white triangle in the upper right-hand corner of the site announces "Year 2000 Services."

Both companies stress the importance of having a Year 2000 Business Action Plan (which I strongly advise reading). Clarke & Co. advises that each company needs to do two things:

• Have a strategic communications plan in place and operating now to assure your critical audiences that you are in control of the situation.
• Be prepared for the reality that if trouble does occur, or even if it is perceived to be occurring, the officers and directors of your business could be held personally liable for the resulting damage.

The Clarke & Co. plan also stresses "Directors and officers must treat their internal Y2K problems and must ensure that their organizations will not be crippled if their external suppliers, customers and business partners fail to adequately address their own Y2K problems. With the assistance of legal counsel, they must develop strategies to avoid or minimize legal liabilities."

Perhaps more pertinent to the real estate industry, does a company or a local or regional MLS have some potential liability for not addressing the Y2K bug in a timely enough manner to avoid computer crashes, "frozen" screens or "out of date range" error messages? How about an entire database of either MLS records or member profiles that suddenly becomes "corrupted" at 12:01 a.m. in the year 2000? What about the individual practitioner and the real estate firm?

When I searched the Virtual Library section of Realtor.com (ABI/Inform database) in early September 1998 by simply entering "Y2K", over 50 articles were returned. How could a REALTOR=AE firm, or a local or regional MLS justify, especially in view of so many articles being available through NAR, not being prepared for the millennium? How could any REALTOR AE entity additionally justify not assuring itself that its vendors were also prepared for the Y2K bug??

If your MLS provider is Interealty Corp., then you're in luck. Interealty maintains a Year 2000 Archive that is well worth reading. You can access it at the following URL:

http://www.interealty.com/Year%202000/yr2000_solution_798.htm. If you are using some other MLS vendor, I urge you (whether you are a Multiple Listing Service, real estate firm or solo practitioner) to communicate with the provider and find out how it is planning to handle the Y2K problem. Sometimes, just the "perception" that the problem is being ignored, whether it truly is or not, is enough to trigger lawsuits.

Finally, for a most helpful site, you might try Jesse Berst's Anchor Desk at ZD Net, and his Y2K Survival Kit http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/story/story_2318.html.