off

-- opps (read it@again gov. trool), August 23, 1999.

Y2K Newswire was started because they care about people. They lost a lot of money in the beginning. To gather news, info, pay for phone, printing, postage, etc. costs money. I have met hundreds of people in the preparedness industry, as well asy2k paul-reveres and they work their butt off! Many started out to help local families, grew into a business and need $ to pay for the cost of doing business.

Only TOTAL imbicles think that it's ok to sell beanie babies (useless crap) and not-ok to sell beans (food for life).

PS: I have discovered if you don't put the rath of fear into the issue, people will do absolutly nothing. When the rath comes down in the next few months, people WILL do something.

-- dw (y2k@outhere.com), August 23, 1999.

Y2kLoserWire was started as an "experiment" by Michael Adams to see how much money he could make, while "fine tuning his web marketing techniques".

-- Hoffmeister (hoff_meister@my-deja.com), August 23, 1999.

Er, excuse me, but, regardless of the personal agenda of the individual(s) who started Y2K newswire, what did you think of the point made about navy spin? Just curious...

-- Uncle Bob (UNCLB0B@Y2KOK.ORG), August 23, 1999.

Personally, I make just enough money on my Y2K website to pay the rent, eat rice 'n beans, and have a beer once in a while. It's a losing proposition, as are most Y2K websites, I suspect. Information wants to be free, and it's worth a sacrifice to share this information, IMHO.

Send me money. Or not. I don't care...

-- pshannon (pshannon@sangersreview.com), August 23, 1999.

pshannon...

Regardless of your agenda, I find your daily email and info the best on the block. I'd send money but I'm a starving real estate appraiser..."will appraise your home for MRE's".

Keep up the great job you are doing and thank you for your insight.

-- Uncle Bob (UNCLB0B@Y2KOK.ORG), August 23, 1999.

Only TOTAL imbicles think that it's ok to sell beanie babies (useless crap) and not-ok to sell beans (food for life).

Hoff, can you comment on this please?

-- a (a@a.a), August 23, 1999.

"what did you think of the point made about navy spin?"

I think it was a Y2knewswire "spin" to keep a dying "scarey report" alive Uncle Bob. Do you think that's possible?

As Hoffmeister pointed out...

Michael Adams' experiment

Loosewire has been discussed on this forum before...

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0015rF

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0015zF

References to Loosewire articles have basically come to a complete stop on this forum over the last month or so. Seems the people here finally GI as far as this crap is concerned.

-- CD (not@here.com), August 23, 1999.

Uncle Bob, I'm not a great fan of Y2KNewswire, and have said so on more than one occasion. HOWEVER--I have no difficulty in conceding their valid points stated above. The bathwater may be murky but this particular baby is clean.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), August 23, 1999.

"...will appraise your home for MRE's". That's a good one.

I go to Y2K Newswire everyday to see what news they have collected. Sometimes I read the free commentaries. I haven't plunked down 129 bucks, and I won't. I think that most of the "Y2K" problems that readers are posting there are irrelevant.

Yeah, they have an agenda. Isn't that the nature of capitalism?

Cosmetics and clothing companies advertise their products using bulimic models, creating a culture where teen-age girls feel pressure to be skinny, whether it's healthy for them of not.

Fast food companies advertise products that look nothing like what you get in the strofoam package.

Shoe companies hire overpaid athletes to represent their brands in an effort to get inner city kids to buy their overpriced products. Some of those kids will sell drugs or even kill to get the money to buy those products.

Network news outlets spend days covering the tragedy of a family losing one of its own, and the ratings go through the roof. Advertisers scramble for airtime during all of this.

Tobacco companies create cartoon characters in order appeal to "a younger demographic," and when the laws in this country make that illegal, they focus their efforts on other countries, "untapped markets," where the laws are laxer (and their political influence can be purchased cheaper).

Just the tip of the iceberg. Point is, in order to get attention for an issue, or a product in this culture, you have to compete in "the marketplace of ideas." Gotta bang 'em over the head. Fear is one the greatest motivators, and Y2K is rife with fear. It's up to the individual to decide for themselves whether or not an issue is relevant to them, (or if a product is worth buying) and what to do about it. When enough people complain about a certain aspect of capitalism, they can do something about it (as in tobacco advertising). You can't complain about Y2K sites without applying that to the nature of capitalism. One has the opportunity to decide for themselves if Y2K is hype, or serious.

I think it's serious...

-- pshannon (pshannon@inch.com), August 23, 1999.

My first experience being a vendor at a y2k preparedness show, I sat and stood there quiet, offering my publication (a resource guide to self-reliance - that I spent 1,400 or research hours on and $8,000 personal money). While other booths were selling like crazy, my sales were slow. I then started getting livlier (sp?) talking about the research I had done and gave facts and info about y2k and my sales picked up. This was NOT how I thought I would have to sell, but having invested my hard-earned money, borrowed money and all my time (spring and summer of last year) I beefed up my approach and this picked up sales.

Here in 1999, I have done the same thing. I have sacraficed both the spring and summer (inside a room, instead of outside having fun) to produce a publication on wood stoves, generators and solar. I COULD NOT DO ANYTHING ELSE. My heart and sould would not allow me to publish anything that did not help others get ready.

A friend of mine told me a year and a half ago, "WHy don't you just move to an island and live the way you want?" I said "What about the children, the families, the people who need guidance?!!"

I may be considered a y2k whore, but I know of no-better job then to help others find "the way" to safety. No one in my town, city or state is doing anything on a public level.

Like every hurricane and snowstorm to date, people will put off what is necessary until the date of the event. We have warning on this event and a few are doing something about it - even a few cold-hearted capitalists.

It blows my mind that the crap keeps on selling and fools keep on buying useless junk! I could have taken my friends advice and gone to that "island", but I would have been guilty as the rest who are doing nothing.

-- dw (y2k@outhere.com), August 23, 1999.

PS: sould = soul

Gates is going to an island and his tax-free donations to his own .org is going to what? At this time, in this world/country, governments and the better-off should be focusing on helping others get through this mess! Yes, trillons are being spent on the 00-0000 problem, but this will be a localized event worldwide. It discusts me to think of the money that is being funelled into safe-havens or that will be lost in the possible/proable crash, that could be used to build a more self- sufficent community (on local levels).

The topic was the navy spin, sorry for wasting bandwith.

-- dw (y2k@outhere.com), August 23, 1999.

The Navy's spin is pitiful compared to the outright deception in Jim Lord's newsletter concerning the Master Utility List. Both the current August 19th version of the spreadsheet AND the August 3 version of the spreadsheet (the last version ONLINE before the Navy pulled it, and BEFORE Jim Lord sent out his newsletter) have a legend at the bottom clearly showing that this "assessment" was performed by query to the utilities. The LEGEND demonstrates that this was certainly no serious "study", and the "likelihood of failure" predictions were based only on industry responses (or lack of responses). This might be fine for contingency planning (which the Navy says is the case, and for this purpose the explanation sounds plausible), but for a solid assessment of utility readiness, I expect a bit more than some phone calls and query letters! FYI, the August 3 version of the spreadsheet had been updated with more information received from the utilities since Lord's version and contained only 0's and 1's (not likely to occur, occurrence is improbable) for the worst case of TOTAL failures, and much fewer 2's and 3's for partial failure. All of these updates or "clean ups" occurred BEFORE Lord's piece of "work" was sent out.

The question I have is did Jim Lord intentionally deceive, or was he himself deceived by being sent only portions of this spreadsheet?

Jim Lord ....did the data you received have the LEGEND with it? See FactFinder@bzn.com), August 23, 1999.