The Y2K bug fizzles

January 1, 2000

Programmers and governments had spent billions bracing for digital catastrophe as clocks rolled into a year ending in two zeros, fearing that banking systems, power grids, and air traffic control would fail. Planes stayed aloft, power grids hummed, ATMs dispensed cash. The non-event became a parable about either competent prevention or millennial hysteria, depending on the teller.