[LEAPSECS] Saint Crispin's Day

[Michael Sokolov]

Zefram <zefram at fysh.org> wrote:


> Time scales are not easily killed off.  The general concept of a time

> scale that uses leap seconds to coordinate TAI and UT obviously has

> its advantages, and some users would presumably find it convenient to

> continue to have such a time scale, even if they're no longer allowed

> to call it "UTC".


Suppose Alice R. Parks operates her own time scale with leap seconds in
direct defiance to the ITU, aka civil disobedience.  The ITU sends her
threatening letters demanding that she not call it UTC, but she does
call it UTC anyway.  Are you saying you are going to vote for a sheriff
who would storm her house with guns to force her to stop using the term
UTC for her own time scale with her own leap seconds?


> Would IERS be willing to continue as the canonical

> arbiter of leap seconds?  Or would some other de facto authority emerge?


If Monsieur Gambis ceases to be employed by IERS, or if IERS reassigns
him to a different job and prohibits him from using work computers to
issue leap seconds, would he be willing to issue leap seconds from his
home PC on his own personal time?  It's only a few minutes of work two
times a year, can't be that much of a burden.

Monsieur Gambis, are you on this mailing list?  Can you answer this
question for us?  Would you be willing to issue leap seconds on your
own without any official authority employing you to do so?

Oh, and our own beloved TVB whose time lab can keep UTC no worse than
NIST or whoever owns the leapseconds.com domain.  Once IERS ceases to
allow the use of their IT resources to distribute leap second
announcements, a new mailing list will need to be set up.
Leapsecond.com is clearly a good place to host it - TVB, would you be
willing?

MS,
who is ready to fight for mean solar time like a true revolutionary