FlyerTalk Forums - Do we really need timezones ?

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- - Do we really need timezones ? (https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travelbuzz/1799075-do-we-really-need-timezones.html)

I'm pretty sure OP didn't mean to suggest that the whole world should get up at the same time. OP's suggestion is that the whole world should use UTC time to name the hours. Here in western Ohio, we'd start work at somewhere around 1300 hours UTC. Someone who wanted to call me from Tel Aviv at 1500 would just have to guess whether I'd be awake or not. It's a silly idea.

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Originally Posted by flibbly (Post 27420706)

Ask again once the whole world is using the metric system.

OK, that is already the case for 95% of the world population.

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Can we have the entire world on one timezone? Only if we want the incredible cultural shift of redefining some basic concepts such as "morning," "evening," and "night" for a large chunk of the world's population. How would anyone here like to be in the part of the world where, because of sun position, it's considered normal to get up at 10 pm? (I've traveled in China. It's bad enough there, especially in the western part of the country, but at least morning is still morning and so on.)

The terms "morning" "evening," and "night" depict the period between sunrise and noon, resp. around sunset, resp. when it is dark. Regardless what figures the clock points to, so that won't change.
Get up at 10pm ? You mean 22 hrs ? Simple, maybe China, Indonesia or Singapore. But it is just morning.

But, let's first make a simplified 24 full hour timezone model as I stated earlier.

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Originally Posted by airsurfer (Post 27422235)

Get up at 10pm ? You mean 22 hrs ? Simple, maybe China, Indonesia or Singapore. But it is just morning.

You missed the point. With one single time zone we would end up guessing whether it is currently morning, noon or night.

Currently, if you don't know the time in Singapore, you look it up and will immediately know if you can still call someone, if the office is open or if you'll disrupt someone at home, etc... .

With the proposed single time zone, you'll only know that it's 12:00 in Singapore as well. But that information doesn't help you figure out if it's still ok to call someone and you would look up office hours, etc... .

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Originally Posted by WorldLux (Post 27422429)

Which effectively means time zones would be gone in name only you would now have to keep track of what business hours are in counties and possibly individual cities. You would be left with non standardized time zones that are not identifiable. The number of people who would benefit are an ultra minority.

Not only would a single time zone be confusing for people, it would be a disaster from an IT system point of view.

Most systems run based on local time, at least in my experience. Everything from complex job scheduling systems to your calendar program would have to be modified and tested - the costs for business and industry would be astronomical.

I'm with you on DST though, let's get rid of that...

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Originally Posted by ROCAT (Post 27423785)

The number of people who would benefit are an ultra minority.

Yes. And I'm not even sure if the change would benefit that minority...

Thanks for putting your arguments in words airsurfer. I 100% agree with you.

Timezones can cause such headaches.

In UTC, who gets to live where 00:00 is midnight, 07:00 is breakfast, 12:00 is lunch and The Walking Dead starts at 21:00?
I want that to be where I live.
Who gets midnight at 07:00, breakfast at 15:00, lunch at 20:00, and who the heck knows when TWD is on?
That can be you.😉