Once I was assured that everything was still working I was able to relax and enjoy myself. I had done the right thing in helping people allay their own fears. The real issue of Y2K was not about technology at all, but instead the conflict of interest that arose within the media companies covering the story. Too often today, newspapers and television news programs report stories in such a way as to instill fear, not understanding. The reason is simple.
Fear sells more papers and more advertising than understanding.
Good news is not as compelling as bad. We have fallen victim to our own willful ignorance about technology. We should never be content again to merely believe what the media has told us. We need to be able to counteract the hype in the future to prevent the almost universal sense of fear that Y2K engendered. It is time we all learned more about technology.