It is about time

Through the ages clocks have become more and more detailed. At first, day and night were the clock. A simple, slow rhythm, with enough detail for most tasks, even today. Then we invented things like sundials. They made it possible to add more detail to timekeeping. I guess this is when hours were invented. Here on the northern hemisphere daytime hours were longer in summer, and shorter in winter. I’m not sure why, but later on it was decided that all hours should be equal. Thanks to this idea people could start building mechanical clocks. Or maybe it was the other way around: the invention of mechanical clocks demanded standardised hours.

Whatever it was, the first mechanical clocks had only one hand, the hour hand, which was more than precise enough. It is somewhere between eleven and twelve is fine in daily life. But somehow people wanted more detail, and so the minute hand, and later even the second hand were invented. Ever smaller fractions of time can be measured by atom clocks and certain computers. In daily life this kind of detail is almost never needed. Even minutes are overkill most of the time. Only middle managers and economists think they need this kind of precision, humans don’t when they take a minute to think about it.

It is about time

While I know that precise time has its use cases, I really like imprecise time better. With imprecision, time becomes a flow instead of something static, a period instead of a moment, something that can be experienced instead of something that can only be described, something that changes, instead of a fixed point.

I have created quite some clocks that don’t tell the exact time. For example The Greek Time Clock (and its variants) which shows the exact time, give or take an hour. Another example is the Literary About Time Clock: a variant of the brilliant Literary Clock, but this one only uses literary quotes that don’t tell the time to the minute. Here’s a working version with Dutch and English quotes:

It is about time

Recently I created another inexact clock. For this about clock I collected all kinds of ways to say that it is about half past eleven, or coming up to a quarter to twelve, and I printed them in this very specific order onto a screen:

It is was not almost a little coming up to just right well about a few minutes around between by way before after a quarter to half past one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven and twelve o’clock anymore yet or thereabouts.

Now by highlighting only certain words, you get sentences like It is well before twelve o’clock, or it is a quarter to twelve or thereabouts. This clock is precise enough, who needs more detail than It is a little after a quarter to eight?

This clock uses the wonderful Very Bauble font by Erik van Blokland. The font is not very bauble when the minutes are still low, but it gets baubler and baubler as the minutes grow through the hour. And they are most bauble a few minutes before. It is a nice subtle effect, which gives the clock this small, extra layer of, well, maybe some sort of controlled randomness. Only when the hour changes the switch from very bauble to non bauble is rather dramatic.

It is about time

One of the things I like most about the web is the idea that all web pages can, in principle, be used by everyone. Which means web pages can also be used by people who use a screen reader. Usually I find it hard to make my artistic web clocks truly accessible. I sometimes try to describe the image, but I find this textual description in no way an equivalent experience to the visual effect of these clocks. This about clock is different though, this clock can be read out loud. It should work with your screenreader. Unfortunately there is no way to make screen reader voices more bauble through the hour. This extra variable layer is missing when you listen to this clock with your own screenreader. So I made a bauble screen reader for this clock.

It is about time

When I was working on this clock, and looking for different ways to tell the time imprecisely in English, Léonie Watson sent me a reply: I need to get one for [my partner] who is incapable of giving an accurate answer when asked what time it is. The answer 9:15AM could mean anything from 9:05AM to 9:25AM.

Léonie came over to the Netherlands a while ago to speak at one of the events I organised (she gave an excellent talk about agentic AI and the promise of the web). And so I decided to make a physical about clock for her, as a thank you present. Now, Léonie cannot see, so I had to make sure that not only her partner, but also Léonie herself could use the clock. Adding a simple screenreader to this clock wasn’t good enough, I wanted her to get a more bauble experience as well. So I use SSML to record all possible word combinations throughout the day. The pitch of the used voice is low in the lower minutes, and it gets higher and higher as the minutes grow through the hour. It is not the exact same thing as the Very Bauble font, but it is in a way a comparable experience. Léonie has a physical version of this about clock at home. Assuming that your computer produces sound, and assuming that you can hear sound, you can try it online via this link, or you can click on this live version right here: