"Are you losing hope because you don't know enough about the Mayan Calendar?"

This is the question asked on the newest addition to a growing collection of websites hyping access to "ancient" knowledge about the upcoming "Spiritual Y2K" of the Maya calendar end date on December 12, 2012.

[www.mayan-calendar-code.com]

There is no question but that the dotcom bubble of the 1990s was a direct result of concerns about Y2K. Many fortunes were made and lost in speculation related to the rapid expansion of the Web that followed the introduction of Netscape, Windows 95, and massive investment by Microsoft, Oracle, and other software companies in getting their clients ready for the flipping of digits into zeros at the end of the millennium.

Savvy New Age salesmen are gearing up for the spread of the "2012" meme through a globalized population. As Michael Moore cogently pointed out in "9/11", fear can be a powerful tool. Even if the ending of the Maya "Great Cycle" on a winter solstice is a coincidence and supernatural forces are not conditioning our fates, anticipation of 2012 may, like Y2K, turn out to be a kind of self-fulfilling prophesy.

If you haven't been tracking on the 2012 issue, here are a few other websites to get you up to speed:

[alignment2012.com] - John Major Jenkins, the leading 2012 aficionado

[www.13moon.com] - José Arguelles, founder of the 13 Moon calendar movement

[www.calleman.com] - Carl Johan Calleman, whose views inspired "The Mayan Calendar Code"

[www.diagnosis2012.co.uk] - Geoff Stray's growing, comprehensive resource

Just as "The Da Vinci Code" helped to inspire a flood of historical and pseudohistorical speculation, Mel Gibson's upcoming film "Apocalpyto" will probably bring the 2012 issue to the attention of a worldwide audience:

[apocalypto.movies.go.com]

There are both legitimate and fantastic aspects to 2012 research. What remains to be seen is whether the hype results in a greater interest in and appreciation for the significant discoveries that scholars have made about the ancient Maya, or whether it promotes a whole new wave of pseudoscientific nonsense.

"The trouble with most folks ain't so much their ignorance as knowing so many things that ain't so." -- Josh Billings