[LEAPSECS] Caveat emptor!

[Gerard Ashton]

On 4/11/2011 2:50 PM, Tony Finch wrote:

> Rob Seaman<seaman at noao.edu>  wrote:

>> No.  The words "Universal Time" will be ambiguous.  Under any given

>> circumstances listeners will ask whether their usage in a document

>> refers to the redefined UTC, or to the original UTC (documents are

>> forever), or to some other variation such as GMT or UT1 or UT2, or just

>> to the general concept of a timescale stationary with respect to the

>> synodic day.

> I see no big difference from the current ambiguity of the terms UT and GMT

> and UTC. You seem to be complaining that people who don't care about

> precision will use imprecise terms ambiguously.

>

> Tony.

At present, if a British person were to participate in a US E-Bay 
auction, any difference between the
time kept by the British person and the US E-Bay servers could easily be 
attributed to internet
transmission delays, the time required to press keyboard keys, and the 
error inherent in manually
setting a wrist watch. If leap seconds are abolished, and Britain 
decides to maintain an approximation
to mean time 0 degrees longitude, +/- a fraction of a second (modulo 
time zones, as currently defined),
over time the difference in timekeeping systems will become clearly 
perceptible and clearly
distinguishable to people with no special equipment beyond a carefully 
set wrist watch.

Gerry