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Remember When You Could Call the Time?
An article on The Atlantic this week takes a stroll down the memory lane. It talks about phone services that people could call for knowing the time. The service, according to the article, was quite popular in 1980s. But many of them don't exist now. For instance, Verizon discontinued the line -- as well as its telephone weather service -- in 2011. But what's fascinating is that some of these services still exist, and are getting more traction than many of us would've imagined. From the article:"We get 3 million calls per year!" said Demetrios Matsakis, the chief scientist for time services at the Naval Observatory. "And there's an interesting sociology to it. They don't call as much on the weekend, and the absolute minimum time they call is Christmas. On big holidays, people don't care about the time. But we get a big flood of calls when we switch to Daylight [saving] time and back." As it turns out, people have been telephoning the time for generations. In the beginning, a telephone-based time service must have seemed like a natural extension of telegraph-based timekeeping -- but it would have been radical in its own way, too, because it represented a key shift to an on-demand service. In the 19th century, big railroad companies had used the telegraph to transmit the time to major railway stations. By the early 20th century, people could simply pick up the telephone and ask a human operator for the time.
8636888118 (used to be just 118, until General Telephone because Verizon decades ago).
Can you still call for a proper "A" note in Austria?
Dialing the time was popular long before the 80's, and in fact by the 80's I recall it being much less used, even if it still existed. I remember dialing the time as being more of a 1960's and 70's thing.
I suppose next you're going to tell me that people nowadays don't understand why it's called "dialing" a number. Or why it was faster to dial a number with lots of low digits than lots of high digits.
...it's run by the local bank. It gives a quick advertisement for the bank, then time and temperature. Many organizations in town use it as the "official" temperature in town - "sportsball practice is cancelled if the temp is below X degrees, call time and temp for the temperature". It's number is 320-587-4700...not sure how many concurrent calls it can handle :-)
Still around in the UK. Number is 123.
On the third stroke, the time, sponsored by Accurist, will be five - forty - exactly. Bip, bip, beep.
Do we really need it anymore now that we have NTP running on most of our smartphones, computers, etc.?
I do miss the "time lady" though. Or "popcorn" - (767-2676, or 767-1111). "At the tone, the time will be, 9:38am. *BEEP*"
I was just thinking yesterday about an automated telephone game system I used to call when I was growing up in the 80's. 573-3400. I forget what it was called, but there were 3 games you could play all by 'choose your own adventure' touch-tone style choices. One was a cowboy type game, one was a vampire, and I forget what the third one was. It was all free to play for us latch-key kids. Heh. Now get off my lawn!
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
2.5, 5, 10, and 15mhz on a shortwave radio. You can also tune your guitar with the tones.
I do remember. It was USSR, and you could dial 01 for militia, 02 for ambulance or 005 for time service. :D
It had been a few years since I called our local one but I just checked and it's still up.
Back when I was a kid in the late 80's/early 90's that was the go-to source for making sure you had your clocks set correctly. Later on they added current temperature too. It was used enough that it wasn't uncommon to call it and get a busy signal and you'd have to try back again in a few minutes.
When I just called it gave the date, time, temperature, and a decently detailed daily weather forecast as well.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
When I worked in radio in the 1960s, there was a huge clock that was synchronized on-the-hour by a pulse through the telephone lines. At a television station, they had a huge pendulum clock that synchronized all studio clocks electrically. We would reset the master clock occasionally from the network time signals.
Now get the fuck off my lawn you kids and your damn apps!
I just listen to WWVB on HF. Once in a while, you can hear WWVH coming in on top.
And I always forgot the number, this was mid-90s.
The one I used when I was a kid, (714) 853-1212 has been hijacked by a religious extremist organization.
We used to call it popcorn. In our area you could dial 767-any4digits and get the time.
http://articles.latimes.com/20...
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Is the phone number slashdotted?
Still running. 513-721-1700. I've been calling that number since elementary school - I'm 40 now.
You can also dial up the audio from WWV (the time and frequency broadcast from the NIST) at 303-499-7111
To avoid seeing this message again, always shut down your computer properly by selecting Shut Down from the Start Menu.
There is guaranteed to be one "Time and Temp" service that still exists in each area code -- and in most likelihood, one in each tariff zone. They are great to check call completions across the US because you know that (a) they will always answer and (b) you won't be bothering some random person, even in the middle of the night.
You'll never take that away from me.
There must be a modern equivalent (I can't even be bothered to Google it) where you can just "ring" Google or Siri or Cortana.
I'd be hard-pushed to imagine that isn't already out there, especially given Google Voice.
That function could easily do time-telling or weather forecast or data searches for you without anything more than a computer doing an "OK Google" at the other end and reading back the response like their smartphones do.
Are these rotodial phone users or something?
Every cellphone I've ever had came with a time display, and furthermore the time is obtained from the phone service so its always accurate.
What would even be the point of phoning if the time is already displayed on the phone?
Is there even such a thing as modern phones that don't have a clock?
I'm so old I remember when there was a number you could call that would tell you the date, and it would give it to you in Julian and Gregorian.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I still call my local Time & Temp. I use it to check my VoIP/SIP connections, both on mobile and my "landline" (which is really VoIP/SIP).
Yes, most VoIP/SIP providers have their own test number, but that's internal to their system. I want to call a number I know is not on their system.
The Canadian National Research Council's "telephone talking clock" is still active,
English: 613-745-1576
French: 613-745-9426
They also run an NTP server, shortwave time broadcasts, web-based clock, modem-based "simple time service", and daily time broadcasts on CBC radio.
We used it all the time when younger, and sometimes i'll check once in a while to see if it still works. Our mom used it to teach us how to use the phone.
To check if a phone was working, there used to be a number you could call and hang-up. Then the phone would be called back.
(It's also available via AM SW broadcast on 2.5, 5, 10, 15, and 20 megahertz.)
What is the point to dial a number to find out the time when you can just look at the screen first and see the time? They need an app for that. "Hey Siri, what time is it?" "U.S. Naval Observatory Master Clock. At the tone, the Eastern daylight time - 14 hours, 20 minutes exactly."
I worked for the company that used to provide this service (and a lot fo other 800, 866 and 900 numbers) for the NJ and NYC areas.
It was fascinating equipment. Ancient but robust. It was a constantly turning magnetic drum that had the recording on it about 6 inches tall with a little oil reservoir on top that had to be filled every few months.
It synced against the radio signal from the Navel Observatory, which was perfect but also perfectly useless. You see, there was a short delay induce by the phone lines, so if we let it set itself we'd get irate calls as people listened to it and the radio and they weren't synced. Yes, there are those people and out of the millions of population there are enough of them. So every time the time changed for daylight savings we'd set it, and then manually speed it up by a fraction of a second until it sounded right. Mind you it still wasn't perfect - the phone line induced delay varied by distance and number of trunks, but it was close enough.
Remarkable gear. Never lost time after we set it.
LITTLE GIRL: But which cookie will you eat FIRST? C. MONSTER: Me think you have misconception of cookie-eating process.
I remember it's one of the first things I tried when we got our first phone in the early 90's.
Reminds me of the first time I tried the Internet, at a stand in a mall; they suggested people to visit the site for (then upcoming) Independence Day, but it was slow as all hell. Didn't know what else to do so I left.
As a family without the money to replace the TV, I think the service to call the time was used much longer in our household. In the early 80's people started getting TVs with teletext https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and from our national broadcasting service, the time in the teletext status line were accurate enough to use for adjustment of any clock.
The way GSM works is that each phone takes turns using the radio frequency. Your timeslot is half a millisecond long. Therefore the phone's timing has to be synchronized with the tower with microsecond accuracy.
...but it costs 1.90 euro for each call . My smartphone has of course an app for the clock, but curiosly the time transmitted by the telecom provider is often out of sync with the ntp server I access through the same provider, using their data service.
My old wristwatch is however my preferred source for time information, followed by a few sundials I come across during my commuting...living in rural Italy has some benefits, isn't it ?!?
Years ago, in Pittsburgh, the number for the Time (and Temperature) was 391-9500 and reached the local power company, Duquesne Light. It still is, but you need to add the 412 area code now. It is still my "go to" number for testing a phone line when I don't want to bother a friend.
I had a small business and we added a private unlisted line. The installer wasn't even out the door yet when we got our first wrong number call on it. Wrong numbers continued throughout the afternoon and evening. People wouldn't say anything, they would just hang up. Finally I managed to get someone to talk to me, and they told me what number they were calling. It was 391-9500. Our new number was 931-9500. It hit me. We were getting an incredible number of wrong numbers where people transposed the first two digits trying to call for the time.
After I understood what the issue was the line became a lot of fun. If you answered the phone with "Hi. What time is it?" people usually knew what time it was and would tell you. If you answered with "Time and Temperature. Time speaking" you could often strike up a long conversation. I often told the story of how I screwed up and put my lunch on the tape reels of the time announcing machine and now my boss was making me answer all of the calls and give the time until the machine was fixed.
The power company would start each call with a little promo message such as "Electricity is your biggest bargain. Electric time is ..". I enjoyed answering in my best announcer voice "We can raise your rates whenever we want and there is nothing that you can do about it. Electric time is ...". I fondly remember one caller saying to someone else after that message "Boy, they are getting rude".
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
At the time of old state monopoly on telephony, it was "1200" everywhere for the Dutch-speaking version, and "1300" for the French-speaking version.
After competitors entered the market-place, some sued because the "easy 4-digit service numbers" were unfair competition and one now needs to dial
+32 78 05 1200
or
+32 78 05 1300
I use the former regularly, whenever I'm working on a new LAN, and I want to reality-check NTP functions in a few seconds. If it sounds about right, I have learned nothing, but if it's audibly off I know I have a problem to fix. ... Also, with NTP clients I have no admin access to (some VoIP phones, etc..).
-SilverMonk
In my childhood in Miami, 1950's, you called "the Coca-Cola Lady"...she delivered a short pitch for Coke, then gave the time.
I remember way back before the internet if you needed to know what time the movies were at, you called the theaters movie hotline. If you didn't catch the weather on last nights news, you could call your local tv stations weather hotline for a recording of the forecast. At the store they use to manually imprint your credit card with out knowing if the card was even valid, turn that slip into their bank in the next 3-5 days, the bank would process the transaction.
1-613 745-1576 English National Research Council time signal. 1-613-745-9426 in French.
That is the funniest thing I have read today. Thank you.
Time makes more converts than reason
I remember Indian telephone service used to have alarm service. Call, them book the time, and the phone would ring at the appointed time. I remember time service, we used to use it often. My dad worked for the P&T and we had an unmetered line.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
"Whenever it's too dark to see the clock, you can just call any random number. Whoever answers always says 'Are you crazy? It's 3:45 in the morning!'" - A comedian I can't recall
Friend from CA: you know, in CA, the number for time is 1 800 POPCORN
so I dial, in Boston, 1 800 POPCORN
you get what an answering machine, tape based, with what is obviously a very worn tape,all crackly like old tapes get, with the following message:
you are not in CA anymore
and the recording
if you want to know what the Goon Show was
Protoplasm. Quiet Protoplasm. I like quiet protoplasm.
None of us either to get the VCR to flash 1:00 because that's not the desired behavior, nor to keep the VCR from flashing 1:00, that's who.
I wrote:
Both you and the other respondent have poor memories as VCRs did not blink 1:00 after daylight savings time. They kept the time they were keeping before daylight savings time.
But then I saw what you actually wrote, so:
The desired behavior is not to get it to flash 1:00 or flash any time but to keep daylight savings time. This means holding the same digits for a whole minute, and I'd hardly call that a flash. I grew up in Indiana and they weren't on DST at the time so I didn't have to do that, though power outages did happen. I never seemed to need a manual, but I WAS a kid then, so no problem.
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, on their album Dazzle Ships, had this wonderful mashup. They called "time" from many time zones and synced them together. Give it a listen - it's short and sweet, and leaves you wanting more.
On the one hand you take life too seriously, and on the other, you do not take playful existence seriously enough. Seth
We would dial the letters "popcorn" in So. California on the General Telephone network to get the time recording.
Nobody else remembers Ford Prefect doing this to somebody in one of the HHGG books?
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Canada is part of North America, so technically dummy you are American as well!
Thrilled to see so many people remember this, plus so many that know about WWV and shortwave. Fantastic group here!
it will be ten fifty two and twenty seconds, beep, beep, beep.
NIST time: 303-499-7111
In the 60's I'd be scanning the shortwave frequencies and run across WWVand it always made me pause. A station that just tick-tocked and then some dude would say the time and start tick-tocking again. I knew what it was but it always made me stop for a moment. It was just sort of surreal.
Peace is easy to achieve, just surrender. Liberty is much harder get/keep.
*60 takes you to the speaking clock.
As a VoIP engineer, I keep a list of time/temp numbers from around the world for testing audio path and dialplan routing. There are still quite a few out there in working order.
I think Cincy's # was 513 721 1700...called it all the time, for some reason.
In the late 90's we called the number for late night party line calls. Not phreaking, or anything crazy. When your friends would call at a pre-determined time the line would beep for 'call waiting' while you were listening to the time. That way our parents didn't hear the phone ring.
Everyone has a cellphone on them now, and the time on it is always correct...