http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-06/leap-second-to-make-2015-longer-year/6002002

This year may be the last time we add a leap second.

…
June 30’s leap second may be the last in history.

The Radiocommunication Assembly and the World Radiocommunication Conference was due to vote later in the year on whether the leap second should be abolished.

A vote was supposed to take place in 2012, but was deferred.

The matter was controversial. Supporters of the leap second argued corrections were needed to maintain accurate time for some branches of science.

Those opposed said it was not worth the energy to change the clocks infrequently, and said it would be beneficial for computing to have a timescale that never needed changing.

A time that never changes would eventually be noticeable by humans, but not by much.

Without leap seconds there would be a slip of two to three minutes by 2100 and about half an hour by 2700.

A time that never changes would eventually be noticeable by humans, but not by much.

*chuckle

>Without leap seconds there would be a slip of two to three minutes by 2100 and about half an hour by 2700.

So a “time that never changes” would actually be a time that um, changes.

There would be a gradual drift, so that midday would eventually happen at dusk, but not for hundreds/thousands of years

it’s advancing at a rate of one second per second, except for this year where for a second it’ll be two seconds per second..

it would be beneficial for computing to have a timescale that never needed changing

—————

Computers will eventually catch the drift shirley.

John Finlissom: (Eric Idle) Hesitantly, reluctantly, Helen slipped out of a sling, tight-waisted waspy and stood naked in the moonlight before me. Somewhere a clock chimed three. An owl hooted in the nearby copse.
No wind stirred the casement window. She stood in the pale, translucent light on the Persian carpet.

A minute passed. Then another. Then, another minute. Then… another minute passed. Then another minute passed. And another. A further minute passed quickly, followed by another minute, when suddenly, a different minute passed, followed by another different minute. And another. And yet another further different minute.

A minute passed. I glanced at my watch. It was a minute past. This was it. A minute passed. After a moment, another minute passed. I waited a minute while a minute passed quickly past. And then, a minute which seemed to last an hour but was only a minute… passed.

Announcer: (Graham Chapman)That was ‘A Minute Passed’, by John Finlissom. You can hear Episode Nine of ‘A Minute Passsed’ tomorrow night at a minute past.

And Pi should = 3 to make things easier.

Dropbear said:

Without leap seconds there would be a slip of two to three minutes by 2100 and about half an hour by 2700.

Why not replace the leap second with the leap minute?

That way it’s 60 times less of a hassle, but we still need to do it occasionally, so we don’t forget how to.

The Rev Dodgson said:

Why not replace the leap second with the leap minute?

That way it’s 60 times less of a hassle, but we still need to do it occasionally, so we don’t forget how to.

That might have been ok in years gone by, but i think that these days it’d have ‘implications’ for GPS things and high-speed comms., especially if it was getting close to the 60th year or so.

It might also be easier to adjust things by one single good and reasonably accurate second than to try and get 60 such seconds in a row.