Title text:
In 1899, people were walking around shouting '23' at each other and laughing, and confused reporters were writing articles trying to figure out what it meant.
Transcript:
Transcript will show once it’s been added to explainxkcd.com
Source: https://xkcd.com/3184/
Y2K
I remember it well.
The newspapers were apoplectic about the coming millennium bug Armageddon (hospital equipment was all going to crash because programmers encoded a date as two digits to save what was then rather sparse memory and storage space, and everyone was going to accidentally become of negative age and all timers would temporarily give very wrong answers.
COBOL programmers: there's a serious issue with banking and other business systems and we need to concentrate on this above above other issues to resolve it
Managers and newspapers: ARMAGEDDON!
COBOL programmers: we've got this.
Newspapers: nobody is doing anything about it! Armageddon!
COBOL programmers: It's a lot of work but we're cracking on, we've been working at it a while and it's going to be tight and we're going to need to put in some overtime, but really, we've got this.
Newspapers: OH FUCK LITERALLY EVERYTHING IS GOING TO CRASH
Millienium dawns. Some slight issues remain. Most important systems already patched and fine. Society does not crash.
Newspapers: There was no millennium bug after all!
COBOL programmers: no, there was, but we fixed it like we said we needed to and then we did. Boy, that was hard work.
Newspapers: It was ALL A HOAX.
COBOL programmers: no, it was a problem and we fixed it.
Newpapers: CELEBRITY WOMAN WEARS DRESS.
COBOL programmers: we just see the world differently, I guess. Can I retire early with all this emergency business critical overtime money?
Ahahah I experienced only the media narrative, and it did play out exactly as you described it.
Of course now it comes to reason that many people were actively working to fix the problem, but they never really explained that part on TV.