The digital clock is causing the imminent fall of civilisation

 

It's life, but not as we know it Jim!

I knew the fall of civilisation was imminent back in 1995 when I was working as one of the 27 launch managers for the new, at the time, Vauxhall Vectra (or as the Director of Marketing insisted, "The new Vectra from Vauxhall". Bridge or borough he never did clarify). Driving one of the only 50 or so in existence to my designated 25 dealers one by one across the North East of England during the September of that year was a better buzz than if I'd been driving a Rolls Royce.

And then it was all shattered. Vauxhall gave Jeremy Clarkson a Vectra to road test. And the only thing he saw fit to mention was the "atomic" clock. The small, green four-figure display clock built into the car's dashboard that synced via, I think it was, General Motors' OnStar system, to the nearest available atomic clock, meaning that it was more accurate than something that was really accurate. And not only that, but for those willing to, they could sit in their car and watch the clock magically and automatically go back/forward itself on the dot of the GMT change at 2am in the morning twice a year.

However, the non-peasants were revolting. Rolls-Royce, not known for making rustbucket rattlers, had the gentrified classes swallowing their monocles from shock when they introduced a digital clock into their Phantom. So loud was the rattling of bottles of Bollinger in the ice bucket and the crash of falling shooting sticks as their customers fell over from shock and sheer weight of laundered money in their pockets, that Bayerische Motoren Werke AG relented and went back to an analogue version (driven by the car's electrics, so just digital without the digitalness).

Ironically, current battery analogue watches don't really differ from one another apart from name. Opening a wristwatch from one of the "high" fashion brands (not mentioning any names, but you know the type) to change the battery reveals almost the same Chinese innards as you find in a cheap thriftshop watch, alright, perhaps a little more refined (a nicely-honed battery compartment as opposed to one with a plastic nipple affair that snaps off when you replace the battery. But the electronics - the wound copper "thingy", the circuit board, well they're all the same. Maybe a bit more gold-plating in the more expensive watch, but that's about it. So whether you pay £550 or £4, you'll need a scientist to find the difference between the innards.

Despite all the digitisation and precise atomic timing, these fantastic timepieces still do not facilitate, for example, a family get together timed for 11am on a Sunday. Someone one arrives at 10:45 while the daughter inevitably arrives at 11:20. And a straggler at 11:45. Yes, all that digital power and prescience to the second, yet people, humans, cannot keep to the time on the readout.

Meanwhile, your dog trots along at 5pm each evening without prompting, fail or the ability to read the time, knowing it's their dinner time.