Faced with Mr Kathrein, companies have tended to change tack and provide the remedy free. Claude Stern, of Fenwick & West in California, who represents Intuit, complains that its legal problems began when it voluntarily provided information on its web site about which of its products were compliant and which were not. "I'm now being contacted by manycompanies who tell me, why should I get sued for doing what Intuit did?" But this is only initial jousting. As the millennium bug becomes more of a problem, Mr Stern expects an explosion of cases about warranty law. What standards are implied in the purchase of an item of software? "Every software program has hundreds of bugs in it at the time of release," he argues. "The courts have recognised this. But, where the Year 2000 problem causes losses, the courts may ask whether the law should be more forgiving of software than of a toaster." At the Information Technology Association of America, Mr Miller argues that software has emerged in the past five years as a critical infrastructure,as essential to society as electricity or transport. But that achievement imposes new responsibility. "We need to deliver more reliable products. Our industry says, if you write an article with our software and it vanishes, that's too bad. You wouldn't buy a car on that basis. We've got to change." Even though the mere loss ofdata from a computer does not count as damage, software and hardware companies may be vulnerable in other ways. If a product was compliant several years ago-indicating that the company that sold it knew there was a problem-should all its other, non-compliant products not have been labelled accordingly? Maurice Newman, chairman of Australia's Year 2000 national steering committee, notices that non-compliant equipment is still being sold, and is surprised that consumer groups are not taking more interest in the problem. "The advent of the automobile changed the law in several ways," says Mr Stern. "For instance, it changed the law of jurisdiction, so that a person who lived in one state could be sued in another. Technology changes the law." So it may be with the millennium bug. For the moment, though, the law and the threat of suits are having a different effect. Companies are nervous of disclosing whether their products are millennium-safe, or how far they have travelled along the road to compliance. MrKathrein is unabashed. "Early disclosure will greatly reduce the possibility of damage," he insists. "The argument that the fear of lawsuits is keeping people from disclosing is baloney."

--The Economist