The New York ball doesn’t work precisely the same, but it was clearly inspired by an ancient method of indicating the time. Apparently, even the ancient Greeks used ball dropping to indicate time.

We often use descriptions such as 'quarter past' and 'half past' to tell the time, but it's also good to be able to say exactly how many minutes past the hour or how many minutes to the hour it is.

[drj113] posts his cool word clock. After seeing a similar clock on an industrial design website, he set out to make his own version. He made custom pcbs with the toner-etch method. The front is ...

We often use descriptions such as 'quarter past' and 'half past' to tell the time, but it's also good to be able to say exactly how many minutes past the hour or how many minutes to the hour it is.