A personal file, and a personal note:
Considering the idea that time is circular, the hard time currently felt by the folks here at WorldCom calls to mind experiences a few years back, when we were still known as CompuServe. The following is from my days working upstairs in what is now referred to as the NOC (Network Operations Center). At the time, it was the NCC (Network Control Center):

From CompuServe’s NCC Underground
01/05/97

Top 10 SS Titanic / NCC Comparisons!

10. All those rats!
9. Captain insists, "Nothing is wrong ... And what about those FGB* reports?"
8. No ... It's a new building and the bow is just settling.
7. Why are there no red flares?
6. Well ... There's that 30 foot gash in the starboard bow ...
5. Where's everybody going?
4. How many lifeboats?!
3. The iceberg we struck (WOW!**) appears to have left us a calling-card (SOLAR***), which could prove equally devastating.
2. Both appear to be the result of linear, 2 dimensional thinking.

And, finally...

1. Y'know ... When I boarded this company everyone insisted she was unsinkable ...

Cheers,
Dan
--notes--
* FGB (Feature Group B) is a telco term applied to a comparatively low-cost solution to regular (AKA “local”) rotory dialup connects. FGB is a trunk-side connection, offering data customers (folks at home dialing in on the internet) the advantage of a single, nationwide phone number.
** WOW! was a software application for internet access that -- well -- royally flopped for CompuServe. (as an aside here, I’ve still got about 30 WOW! mouse pads somewhere)
*** SOLAR is a ticketing system used for noting and troubleshooting network outages. It was in its infancy in 1997, and continues to be “improved” to this day.