Hello everyone and welcome to ZD Tech, ZDNet’s daily editorial podcast. I am Pierre Benhamou and today I will explain to you why Orange finally decided to say stop to its speaking clockmore than 30 years after launching it.
The news will only make the nostalgic grumble. Never mind, know all the same that Orange has indeed decided to sound the death knell for its speaking clock service…
Last “top” on 1er July
For listeners who didn’t know, here you are informed: yes, the incumbent still markets a speaking clock service today available at 3699. was launched in 1991 in its current form by the operator, then known as France Telecom.
For the modest sum of 1.50 euros per call, the service has until now given you access to the time given by the Paris Observatory, with the guarantee of an accuracy of around 10 milliseconds thanks to the of the observatory’s atomic clocks.
Alas, for us lovers of well-established toquantes, this will not last forever. A few weeks ago, Orange told its customers that its speaking clock would stop running from 1er next July.
A pioneering service…
If the information does not upset you, know all the same that with the cessation of the service, it is a page that turns for the history of French sciences. Indeed, the Paris Observatory clock was the first speaking clock service to be automated in the world.
Better than that, its inventor is himself French. This is Ernest Esclangon, director of the Paris Observatory in the 1930s. To allow as many people as possible to have access to a precise time, the latter had the idea, in 1933, of automating the service, then only available via an overloaded switchboard.
It was not until the early 1990s that the Esclangon system was first connected to an ultra-precise atomic clock through an infrastructure based on MT20 switches, which are now on the way out.
…became anachronistic
Alas, every story has an end. And the advent of smartphones, which allowed the democratization of access to a precise time, finally took the skin of the speaking clock of Orange.
The operator also made no secret of it, citing the “regular and significant drop” in calls to 3699 and the “scheduled end of life” of its infrastructure to justify stopping the service.
Be aware all the same that the Paris observatory continues to provide a time that could not be more precise via its various portals to be found on the web.