ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, January 5, 1996 TAG: 9601050023
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: NANCY GLEINER
Revelers who pop their corks on New Year's Eve, 2000, to usher in the new millennium, may be too late.
Historians believe that Christ's birth, on which we have based our dating system, really occurred in what we now call 6 B.C. So, this is not 1996 at all, but 2001. If you were waiting for that magical first millennial moment of Jan. 1, 2001, you just missed it, historically speaking.
However, if you refuse to subscribe to that theory, you've got another four years to get your turn-of-the-giant-hourglass shopping done. Consider the following items, which will be available soon, or at least before the next millennium:
Millennium tires (good for 1,000 miles?). Millennium wheelchairs (ditto?). Millennium wood flooring (for baby's first 1,000 steps?), Millennium fabrics (available only in 1,000-yard measurements?), Millennium computers (comes with 1,000 megabytes?). And the Millenia car from Mazda (gets 1,000 miles per gallon?).
Computer technicians have only a few years to eradicate a computer bug lurking in many of the world's corporate main-frames. Most computer programs identify the year by its last two digits. To the computer, 00 means 1900. Four years from now, computers using uncorrected software may freeze in their tracks or begin spewing more gibberish than usual.
One software developer calculates that a $15 credit card charge made on Dec. 15, 1999, could lead to a bill, early in January, for 99 years at 21 percent compound interest - more than $1 billion.
Interested in lasting for many millennia? For a mere $35, Third Millennium Research in Seattle will bottle a small sample of your DNA for posterity.
``I'm not promising resurrection,'' said James Bicknell of Third Mill. ``It's a good memento.''
Just don't charge it to your credit card.
LENGTH: Short : 41 linesby CNB