:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::
"Everything is being compressed into tiny tablets. You take a little pill of news every day - 23 minutes - and that's supposed to be enough." -Walter Cronkite, RE TV news. The Web has changed that for many, however, and here is an extra dose for your daily news cocktail. This prescription tends to include surveillance and now war-related links, along with the occasional pop culture junk and whatever else seizes my attention as I scan online news sites.:: 12.31.2008 ::
:: 61-Second Minute Takes World into 2009 ::
Daily Tech
Kristy Erdodi
A leap second will be added to clocks worldwide just before 2009 begins.
Not ready to let go of 2008? Tonight official timekeepers will give you one more second to hold onto, just before midnight.
Immediately before 2009 officially arrives, timekeepers will be adding a leap second – the first for three years – to atomic clocks worldwide.
According to Peter Whibley, a senior research scientist at Britain’s National Physical Laboratory, digital clocks with the ability to pick up definite leap second information will countdown to the new year as “57, 58, 59, 60, 00,” with “60” representing the leap second.
Whirbley explained why the earth’s erratic rotation has resulted in this need for an additional second: “The difference between atomic time and Earth time has now built up to the point where it needs to be corrected, so this New Year’s Eve we will experience a rare 61-second minute at the very end of 2008 and revelers…will have an extra second to celebrate.”
Determining time based off of the sun’s movement across the sky is not only a concept from the past, as astronomers still use the approach; inevitably, it has been modernized, but the sun currently stands as a tracking source for both stars and spacecrafts.
In general, the Earth is not completely reliable on keeping time. Disruptions to its core, extreme weather, volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes, along with its inconstant speed and ability to wobble, can all act as factors in affecting the length of one day. As a result, in order to align atomic time with astronomical time, leap seconds must be added every so often. This extra time helps in keeping the sun overhead at noon.
posted by me
:: 4:51:00 PM [+] ::
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