[LEAPSECS] Google, Amazon, now Microsoft

[Tom Van Baak]

> You'll need a faster car. Or a plane. Maybe we could get the guys on the space station to try it?

Hi Brooks,

On the equator, timezones fly by about 1000 mph (earth diameter is ~25000 miles, day is ~24 hours). So that excludes cars and commercial planes.

Even up here at 45 degrees latitude, timezones fly by about 700 mph (approximately the speed of sound). Still too fast for cars and private jets.

Your best bet is to contact someone in the arctic or antarctic and have them experience all 24 Azure leap seconds during the day of June 30, 2015. You perhaps have seen cool timezone photos from Amundsen-Scott.

I say this only partly in jest. It would make a fine blog entry for someone to pull this off. Not only would it be another dramatic refutation of ancient flat earth theories but it would also nicely demonstrate the increasing disparity between the needs of medieval astronomy, interstate railroads, and modern computing and timekeeping.

The guys at Google, Amazon, and Microsoft are only trying to solve real problems and best serve their customers. They are not stupid. The official ITU or the glossy DHS guidelines for leap seconds don't help them. So when they decide to smear or jump time in 2015 instead of implementing a 1960's solution you need to sit up and listen.

/tvb