Was the Y2K bug a hoax?

So, Y2K didn’t happen, and many department and hardware stores are charging “restocking” fees for those people who are trying to return generators and other survival gear they bought for the sole purpose of surviving the firestorm that wasn’t. Cynical hardware store clerks aren’t the only ones gloating.

David-Robert Loblaw, an Edmonton computer-systems analyst and Internet trainer, was an early Y2K cynic. Last week, he had his day, writing in the Globe and Mail.

“Ever since the fall of 1997, when I first launched my year 2000 Web site, I’ve been obnoxiously preaching that Y2K would become the biggest money-making hoax in the 20th century,” Loblaw writes. Well, uh, he may be right.

Loblaw says he built his website, the aptly named www.justanumber.com, as his way of “congratulating the computer consultants and bandwagon jumpers involved in this elaborate scam.”

The site received a lot of attention, and more than 4,000 emails, from people who were mainly furious that he would take the stand he did in pointing out what he says was the over-reaction to the Y2K bug.

Whatever your take on Y2K, it is over, it’s safe to say. For those still curious about the aermath, a visit to Loblaw’s site can be entertaining and instructive.