FASHION BRAIN • Watches & Timepieces

Well, Swatch introduces the first digital watch of the Cybernetic Age, by reviving an idea from the 1700s: Metric Time.

The popular concepts of time have not changed very much this past thousand years, progressing from the hourglass to the sundial, to mechanical timekeepers of a thousand types.

During the age of exploration, globe-trotters needed a convenient way to reference their points in time, because as we all know, in order to not be lost you've got to know not only where you are, but when you are. So the clock keepers in England invented GMT, the zero point on the dial.

But as we all know, mechanical devices can be slightly unreliable, so the French invented The Atomic Clock, which keeps all the satellites, Ocean Cruisers, Military machines and Prague Trams running like, well, clockwork.

And if you're a jet-setter today, any hotel's CNN will tell you how many minutes past the hour it is, but what hour is it in Tokyo, if you're in Uzbekistan?

Now Swatch solves the problem, by splitting the day up into 1000 beats of 1 minute and 26.4 seconds each, so it's the same time everywhere, in Prague, in China, New York and yes, even on Mars.

So if you want to co-ordinate with others on the globe, just tell them you'll be on-line "@746" and they'll know when and where to find you.

This nifty watch also tells regular time, plus has an alarm, a chronometer, as well as some crazy animations for when you get bored of waiting for time to catch up with us here.