MN.14.Jan.1999 - Swatch Attempting to Digitize Time

Flashback to a news show in January 1999 when the capture of Chris Carey in New Zealand were the radio headlines and Lou Josephs explained how Command Audio was planning to bring Internet radio to the home. We explain the difference between UTC and GMT and the leap second. It seems that some of the Millennium countdown clocks are running too slow. We also talked to Swatch who had a strange idea to make the time metric with the Swatch Beat! We review the World Radio TV Handbook for 1999. Deutsche Welle's monitoring station has collected and published a CD of interval signals, including a number from Southern Africa. Brian Clarke talks about the rescue of the BBC World Service on mediumwave in Auckland. The station had an ingenious system of delaying the feed from London and speeding it up slightly, so as to squeeze in some commercials each hour. And the station with a strange name from Azerbaijan. Harald Kuhl reports about a new Peace Station in Ecuador. Jonathan also reported on a short revival of Kootwijk Radio on the ham bands as part of bit of fun following the closure of facility for maritime communications.