Sunday, October 29, 2006

Making Sense of Day Light Savings Time

Folks in US would have gotten an extra hour of sleep today as the country rolled back the clock by an hour 2:00 AM last night ending the daylight savings time. I have heard many explanations for this bi-annual ritual, but none really made sense.

To add to the mystery, US congress has decided to extend the Daylight Savings by a month from next year, by commencing early and ending in November, past the Halloween weekend. So, in 2007 Daylight Savings Times will begin on March 11 and end November 4 (as compared to April 2 and October 29 in 2006)

Till I was in US, this change never really affected me, but now that I am in India, I am feeling the impact of this switch. Actually, I will start feeling the impact of this switch from tomorrow as I start taking my regular conference calls with my colleagues in US, which will stretch one more hour in to the night.

Generally, most of my calls with US colleagues are done between 8:00 AM - 11:00 AM ET which was 5:30 PM - 8:30 PM till Friday and now it is 6:30 PM - 9:30 PM. Now here is another challenge we run in to.. trying to find a suitable time zone for conference calls with folks in India, China, Australia, Germany & US. I hear you saying.. Welcome to the flat world..!!!!

When do you take your International Calls? Which time zone do you guys go by?

5 comments:

  1. Get a Life.
    Quit your job.
    Get a job that is 9 to 5.
    Enjoy the family.
    Leave the "flat whatever" rhetoric
    to IT pimps.
    You are a smart man, you can do it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ram,

    Started enjoying the Time change from today. It was so comfy to sleep for another one hour in the bed this morning especially when it was cold outside. We need to think about the time when we call India.

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  3. Enjoyed the extra one hour..oops..no..got up early to watch India being beaten by Australia.!

    Its good to get up when it is not so dark..but it gets dark at 5.00 here.!

    ==

    Flat world - I went for a Seminar on Saturday organized by sipa.org in Santa Clara. Came back with a lot of energy.! What a World..how flat it is today.!! Unbelievable.

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  4. >>When do you take your International Calls? Which time zone do you guys go by?

    6.30PM to 7PM.

    and its weird if u sit jobless all day long but u have this stupid call to attend. u can't go home early even when u r free...

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  5. Anonymous
    Thanks for the suggestion..

    Balaji & Rajan
    I used to enjoy it too.. when I was in US.. as it didn't really impact me.. but now, the extra hour at work.. is a sore pt..
    Most of our work seems to revolved around US EST.. It is a flat world.. but EST centric..

    Raman
    Thanks for the extensive explanation..

    PK
    I do take calls from home and stuff. but would rather spend time with the family...

    ReplyDelete