[time-nuts] A Time-Nut's Worst Nightmare

[Didier]

Thank you Bill for the background. I understand the cult value now.

I still believe the irregular noise would drive me absolutely nuts, which was probably Lord  Vetinari's intention in the first place.

Didier KO4BB 

"Randy D. Hunt" <randy_hunt960 at yahoo.com> wrote:

>On 5/11/2013 9:48 AM, Bill Hawkins wrote:
>> It appears that this was exactly the wrong group in which to
>> discuss Lord Vetinari's clock. People keep asking why. Here's
>> a brief answer, but first some background.
>>
>> Lord Vetinari, aka The Patrician, is a fictional character in
>> a series of books by Terry Pratchett (q.v.) that stretch the
>> imagination with fantastic characters who highlight the foibles
>> of human behavior. There are very few fantasies that I enjoy,
>> but I've read every one of his books, learning something new
>> from each.
>>
>> Imagine that you are the undisputed ruler of a large city.
>> Remaining in that position is a tricky balancing act against the
>> many that think they could do a better job. Vetinari keeps people
>> off balance in various ways, such as knowing what they are going
>> to say before they say it and making them wait in a room that has
>> a clock whose second hand appears to move in random increments.
>> So, Sara White defined its purpose quite well.
>>
>> No two people are alike. I intend to buy the kit. I'm not one of
>> those people who like to play tricks on their friends (if indeed
>> they have any friends). A recent encounter with cancer has
>> convinced me that my time is limited, so I rather like the idea
>> of an element of randomness in the wall clock, masking the
>> inexorable passage of real time.
>>
>> Bill Hawkins
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Didier Juges
>> Sent: Saturday, May 11, 2013 7:55 AM
>> To: Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement
>> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] A Time-Nut's Worst Nightmare
>>
>> I checked the web site. As far as I am concerned, the novelty factor
>> died after about 5 seconds.
>> I can barely understand why would someone actually spent the time to
>> write code doing that for himself for fun, but making it into a
>> commercial product?
>> How many do you think will be in a landfill before the battery dies?
>>
>>
>> On Sat, May 11, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Sarah White <kuzetsa at gmail.com>
>wrote:
>>
>>> On 5/10/2013 9:52 PM, Ed Palmer wrote:
>>>> Part of me thinks it's cute, part of me wants to kill it.  :-)
>>>>
>>>> https://www.tindie.com/products/akafugu/vetinari-clock
>>>>
>>>> Ed
>>> Agreed...
>>>
>>> I'm just thinking: "Ahhhhh noooooo. Oww oww oww oww ma brainz!!!"
>>>
>>> Just the thought of being off by 250ms is upsetting for me...
>>>
>>> I can't imagine anyone wanting a clock which will be inaccurate by
>>> something like a second or two or perhaps more than that.
>>>
>>> WTF!? Why?!
>>> --Sarah
>>>
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>I can appreciate that.  I too am a cancer survivor. . .
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-- 
Sent from my Nexus 7 tablet.