Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Swatch Internet Time

en.wikipedia.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 103 posts

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#81

Post by kybernetikos »

jamestomasino wrote: post #3

There's a great collection if decimal time ideas, many of which are linked at the bottom of that wikipedia page. I personally always liked the idea of making 1 day into the base unit. Then 0.5 would give you noon, 0.75 is 6pm. It seemed less arbitrary than making a unit into a 10th of a day, since that has no value except in reference to a day.

This is basically Julian Day, which astronomers use.

But yes, any humane 'decimal' time system is just optionally giving names to different places in the fractions of a day decimal (I say 'humane' because days have varying lengths, and so should not be used as the basis for a unit used for scientific measures).

I still think naming the fractions might be useful (like 'satoshi').

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#82

Post by kybernetikos »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #58
julioademar wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not arbitrary. Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal

base 12 (or 24) and base 60 are actually much nicer to work with mentally than 10. 10 divides by 1 5 and 10 so you can easily figure out halves and tenths thats about it. 12 divides by 1 2 3 4 6 and 12 so you can easily figure out halves, thirds, quarters, sixths, and twelths without much of an issue, less non terminating decimal nastyness. 60 is even better, as it divides by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30 and…

I need to add a time period to a time point far far far more often than I need to divide a time period into thirds, quarters, sixths and twelths. And dividing into quarters is not difficult in base 10 either, so you're basically down to chosing between pleasant time arithmetic for our current world or being able to easily divide thirds, sixths and twelths. I'd rather have the nice time arithmetic.

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#83

Post by DanBC »

VLM wrote: post #65
DanBC wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eastern time means nothing to me. How many hours do I go forward or back? How do I know if you're in daylight savings? What if I'm in saylight savings? Sensible time for wod wode use is still a problem for casual users.

That's kind of the point. NASDAQ trading hours are 0930 to 1600 eastern. At a former job thats what mattered, although we were not in the eastern zone and had sites spread across 5 or 6 timezones. Live where you want but production hours on the production boxes were 0930-1600 eastern. A large chunk of financial world workers live in eastern standard time. They might live anywhere in the world, but that doesn't matter…

Sure, professionals use real time. We're not talking about anything where time is critical.

We're talking about kids wanting to meet each other on a Minecraft server, or a band releasing a video, or simar casual online meetings.

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#84

Post by [deleted] »

bluedevil2k wrote: post #6
bluedevil2k wrote: post #2

I've always loved this idea. It just makes sense. People argue against the "circular notation" of a clock face and how it relates to 60 minutes/seconds, but all that analog stuff is dead.

And as long as we're discussing "out there" time notations, I'll throw out my support for a calendar system that makes more sense. 12 30-day months with a 5 (or 6) day "Holiday Month" at the end. Adjusting the "week" to be 10 days instead of 7. 3 weeks a month, 9 weeks a quarter, 36 weeks a year. Work 7 of the 10 days in a week would be the same as a 5-day work week (2 more days off a year actually).

[deleted]

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#85

Post by aaron695 »

mmahemoff wrote: post #35

When people say Bitcoin is a money standard for the internet, it reminds me of this. A time standard for the internet, similar to UTC but human-friendly. A few things worked against its adoption. First, it was too proprietary. A modern initiative based on open standards would have a much better chance of gaining a foothold in niche communities, much like Bitcoin. Second, it was before its time (no pun intended). The…

Personally the arrogance of making it based on Swatch's headquarters in Biel ruined it for me.

Plus why would any other watch company now support a time system based on another companies 'headquarters'

It's a shame since it was a good idea.

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#86

Post by pstack »

mmahemoff wrote: post #35

When people say Bitcoin is a money standard for the internet, it reminds me of this. A time standard for the internet, similar to UTC but human-friendly. A few things worked against its adoption. First, it was too proprietary. A modern initiative based on open standards would have a much better chance of gaining a foothold in niche communities, much like Bitcoin. Second, it was before its time (no pun intended). The…

After sixteen years, it remains a silly novelty and nothing more (I'm surprised to discover it is still even a thing). People aren't going to keep track of two separate times - especially one that is so different from the normal time they keep. All people really need is for us to adopt one universal time, do away with timezones, and deal with the "horrible" fact that some of us will be 9-5ers and some will be 12-8ers and so on.

It seems it would be a far simpler adjustment to make than inventing a new "time".

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#88

Post by fsiefken »

ValentineC wrote: post #18
lampe3 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"but all that analog stuff is dead." I still wear a analog Watch

Just curious — aesthetics aside, what other advantages do you think an analog watch provides?

- you can locate the north with it

- if you are using a 24h sovjet analog clock or a pocket sundial (as i do), you are more in tune with the cosmos on which our time, day and night schedule is based

- it associates time more with quality then with quantity

- can be purely mechanical, no electricity or batteries

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#89

Post by fsiefken »

willholloway wrote: post #29

I think the biggest problem with time keeping systems is that they counts up, but our lives are not infinite. For us, time is really counting down. After trying to reconcile the solar year with decimal time in a way that made sense, I abandoned my effort and created a time keeping system with 1095 units of time of time per year (1098 in leap years). The units are 8 hours long, because no progress on hard problems is…

Very nice, I thought i was the only one creating my own personal time system! I really like the counting down part, haven't thought about that. The 8 hour block is nice, but I thought it better to carve up the day in 12 parts, locked to midday, but perhaps local sunset is a better option. If you like a modern fairytale about time go see the movie 'Momo' (in german, but subtitled) or read the book.

Re: Swatch Internet Time

#90

Post by Freaky »

gumby wrote: post #45
ValentineC wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious — aesthetics aside, what other advantages do you think an analog watch provides?

> Just curious — aesthetics aside what other > advantages do you think an analog watch provides? Think of an analogue watch as a 2d graph where one of the dimensions is t. If you have a table of numbers you can compare them by looking at all the cells or you can graph each row one a cartesian (or polar or...) plot. Both contain the same info, and the table probably has higher resolution, but which tells a more illumi…

> The digital watch has too much precision and requires too much parsing

Funny, my stance on analogue clocks is they have too little precision and require too much parsing. If I'm tired or stressed it can take me seconds to read one, while digits practically beam the numbers into my head simply through the act of glancing at them.

I do have to admit, though, most digital watches are monstrous things, with tiny displays to leave room for all the trademarks and other nonsense they feel the need to plaster everywhere. I seriously don't understand why they're almost universally awful.

Post reply on HN