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(Journal Times) Interesting Why is the snooze button set for nine minutes? Let us take you back to 1956, when the first........ zzzzzzzzzz   (journaltimes.com) divider line 96
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tukatz [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 11:58:19 AM  
I always thought mine was 7 minutes.... but I'm usually not in the mood to verify it in the morning


/not a morning person

 
PainInTheASP [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:11:32 PM  
The blog headlines to the right remind me of a Fark thread.

 
Ed Finnerty 2008-07-12 12:14:52 PM  
Interesting.

 
cameroncrazy1984 [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:17:11 PM  
Mine allows me to choose between a couple of different snooze lengths. Right now it's at 15 minutes.

 
melopene [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:18:42 PM  
Interesting... though these days I've been using my cell phone, which only has a 5-min snooze, and makes me drag my ass up a little more quickly than the 9-min snooze does.

 
itazurakko [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:26:55 PM  
I use an old boombox set to a radio station I hate, and so I have to actually reset the alarm to put off waking up. I've gotten good at it and can do it while not waking up too much to make it pointless (possibly NOT a good thing).

But anyway, I usually set it to 15 minutes later.

 
tukatz [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:35:06 PM  
I've thought about getting this:

Clocky Robotic Alarm (new window)

but I'd probably beat the crap out of it the first morning and be out $60.

 
Crosshair [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:51:29 PM  
Why don't they let you set the snooze button to whatever length of time you want.

 
Manic_Repressive [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 12:54:50 PM  
Crosshair:Why don't they let you set the snooze button to whatever length of time you want.

I can set mine for anything from 1 minute to 2 hours. I still usually leave it set for nine minutes, though.

 
strangeguitar 2008-07-12 01:05:00 PM  
Crosshair:Why don't they let you set the snooze button to whatever length of time you want.

My cell phone alarm does have a setting for that.

 
Kyosuke [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 01:06:19 PM  
Snooze buttons are for wimps.

 
kibblesnbits [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 01:12:56 PM  
TFA:
The interval was originally intended to be 10 minutes. Precision was unimportant, and actually impossible to attain.

Alarm clocks in 1956 had standardized gears. The snooze gear needed to mesh with the teeth of the other gears. Due to the configuration of the gears, a 10-minute snooze cycle was out of the question, so the engineers had to choose between nine minutes or 10-plus minutes.


"Out of the question" isn't really much of an answer. Electromechanical technology at the time was very advanced, but they just couldn't get a single gear right?

/hates alarm clocks with a passion
//don't need one anymore being on swing shift!

 
Marcus Aurelius [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 01:38:41 PM  
Every alarm clock radio I ever owned had only a 7 minute snooze cycle.

I think I've been robbed.

 
itazurakko [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 02:10:20 PM  
kibblesnbits:"Out of the question" isn't really much of an answer. Electromechanical technology at the time was very advanced, but they just couldn't get a single gear right?

Probably more like "out of the question without changing more pieces of the clock, which due to existing supply chains and whatnot would just be too pricey, so fark it. Nine minutes it is."

 
Diogenes [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 02:36:43 PM  
I need that bed that inclines until you fall out of it.

 
Diogenes [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 02:39:40 PM  
kibblesnbits:TFA:
The interval was originally intended to be 10 minutes. Precision was unimportant, and actually impossible to attain.

Alarm clocks in 1956 had standardized gears. The snooze gear needed to mesh with the teeth of the other gears. Due to the configuration of the gears, a 10-minute snooze cycle was out of the question, so the engineers had to choose between nine minutes or 10-plus minutes.

"Out of the question" isn't really much of an answer. Electromechanical technology at the time was very advanced, but they just couldn't get a single gear right?

/hates alarm clocks with a passion
//don't need one anymore being on swing shift!


I still can't figure out why my lawn's irrigation control box - a proverbial Rube Goldberg advice - has a main gear with only six slots for pegs. You slip a peg into each slot when you want it to water. But watering restrictions are on a seven day cycle. I can't use the timer. I have to turn it on and set the timer on my microwave.

 
Aevum 2008-07-12 03:00:05 PM  
I still don't understand why the "snooze" hasn't gone away.
The idea of the snooze is that you set your alarm x minutes early so that you can hit the button to shut it off for x minutes and then it goes off again.

I love the Zen clock.
15 minutes before "get up time" it starts with a tiny, quiet, little chime. 10 minutes before, it's a louder chime. Then at 5 minutes and 4 and 3 and 2 and 1 and then over and over once it hits time.

No button required.
When the alarm goes off, it's time to get up.

 
siva 2008-07-12 03:01:41 PM  
My alarm clock is 7 minutes. I wish I had 9 minutes, though that'd probably add up since I hit the snooze like 4 times everyday.

 
Ed Finnerty 2008-07-12 03:02:36 PM  
I just set the coffee maker for 5:00 am.

 
jennyz 2008-07-12 03:03:44 PM  
tukatz:I've thought about getting this:

Clocky Robotic Alarm (new window)

but I'd probably beat the crap out of it the first morning and be out $60.


Holy crap that's awesome... I would love to have one just to see the shiat-fit my dogs would throw when it started moving and making noises.

 
ElLoco 2008-07-12 03:14:04 PM  
I didn't know that. I guess it would have been too costly to hob a new gear due to needing to invest in a dedicated hob and to create a new set of cutters when mass-produced gears were readily available.

 
geekbikerskum 2008-07-12 03:14:58 PM  
If only cats came with a snooze button.

 
paygun 2008-07-12 03:17:52 PM  
I've wondered for a long time why it was 9 minutes. Really. Yes, I'm pathetic.

 
alacrity 2008-07-12 03:22:08 PM  
I don't own an alarm clock, so I am enjoying the slave mentality exhibited in this thread.

 
GrizzlyAdamsRox 2008-07-12 03:22:38 PM  
Back in my single days I had this configuration for getting up to be at work at 5:30 a.m.

-one green LED clock with 2 alarms set 4 minutes apart set up across the room
-one blue LED clock set up next to the bed with 2 alarms also set 4 minutes apart so that there were alarms going off every 2 minutes
-one red LED clock set to a station I didn't like, not exactly tuned in and turned up loud, so I not only had to listen to the station, but blaring static as well. This was the next to last resort
-the last resort was the get-your-ass-up-now alarm...a large wind-up clock that I swear could be heard two houses away.

/either all of that or I could have gone to bed earlier
//DAMN YOU FARK!!!

 
Roger Arseways 2008-07-12 03:25:02 PM  
I've had the same alarm clock since middle school. The thing is a tank. Two alarms, cassette deck, AM/FM radio, big as a bread box. They don't make 'em like that any more. I think the snooze is 9 minutes on it too.

 
RubberFootMan 2008-07-12 03:26:29 PM  
Diogenes:I need that bed that inclines until you fall out of it.

Sounds like a good idea, but you know you'd eventually learn how to sleep at 45 degrees.

 
KeatingFive 2008-07-12 03:26:31 PM  
Kyosuke:Snooze buttons are for wimps retards.

Set it for the time you have to get up, and get up. Waking up once, falling back asleep and waking up again does you no good. You would do better off just sleeping the extra 9 minutes uninterrupted, and then getting up.

 
RubberFootMan 2008-07-12 03:28:29 PM  
geekbikerskum:If only cats came with a snooze button.

and children.

 
ABQGOD 2008-07-12 03:30:36 PM  
Aevum:The idea of the snooze is that you set your alarm x minutes early so that you can hit the button to shut it off for x minutes and then it goes off again.

Wha? I don't set the alarm for 6:21, thats too much math at bedtime. Snooze is for people who are too lazy to get up when they should. I know full well that getting up at 6:30 will give me enough time to arrive at work when expected, but I'm lazy.

So even though it goes off at 6:30, I hit snooze a few times to get a few more 9-minute naps before forcing myself to get up and barely arrive on time.

 
specialkae 2008-07-12 03:32:43 PM  
Our alarm clock (RadioShack circa 1988, digital) has a snooze of 7 minutes. Really messed me up when we first started using it as I was used to the 9 minutes on every other alarm clock I'd owned during my life.

/not a morning person
//7 minute snooze goofs up the fuzzy math I had relied on for so long

 
Roger Arseways 2008-07-12 03:32:50 PM  
ABQGOD:So even though it goes off at 6:30, I hit snooze a few times to get a few more 9-minute naps before forcing myself to get up and barely arrive on time.

On the real important days just set the cell phone to the "drop-dead" get up time and you'll be fine. fart around all you want until your phone starts playing Camptown Ladies, then it's go time.

 
TheNick 2008-07-12 03:33:12 PM  
I use my Cell Phone Alarm and have the snooze set at 11 minutes to get back the 1 minutes I have lost throughout my life

 
blueviking 2008-07-12 03:35:28 PM  
Jah, nein. Nein alarm!

 
ChicagoKev 2008-07-12 03:36:28 PM  
geekbikerskum:If only cats came with a snooze button.
They make a mug for you people...
edgecastcdn.net
Same place also sells a cheaper Clocky

 
love-m'-beer [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 03:46:25 PM  
FTA: "Hop in the GYA Wayback Machine for a minute (we stole that name from some old cartoon.)"

www.timetravelreviews.com

...would like a word with you.

 
AppleDane 2008-07-12 03:48:47 PM  
From TFA:
Hop in the GYA Wayback Machine for a minute (we stole that name from some old cartoon).

"My Fair Lady" opened on Broadway. The first airborne explosion of a hydrogen bomb obliterates Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.


Gotta love articles that are wrong in the third sentence. That really bodes well for credability of the rest, doesn't it?

Bikini wasn't "hydrogen" bombs. That was at the Enewetak Atoll. And yeah, both places are still standing. But I suppose "enewetak" isn't as sexy as "bikini".
An ISLAND was obliterated:

This is before:
upload.wikimedia.org

This is after:
upload.wikimedia.org

Yeah, I got this from Wikipedia. The guy writing this didn't even bother.

 
Cup_O_Jo 2008-07-12 03:55:56 PM  
Ok I read the article and I say this:
We live in a digital age where I should be able to put the EXACT minutes I want to snooze into the alarm clock. Without spending 100 bucks on it.

 
Yoda's Pen Is 2008-07-12 04:04:14 PM  
what are these "alarm clocks" of which you speak?

 
ground.zero.guy 2008-07-12 04:07:40 PM  
I hate waking up so much that I never use the snooze. Waking up once each morning is bad enough, why do it more?

 
Killer Miller 2008-07-12 04:10:43 PM  
I set my alarm clock to one of the Spanish radio stations and leave it out of reach of my bed so I have to get up to turn that shiat off.

 
desert pyrate 2008-07-12 04:12:15 PM  
Roger Arseways:ABQGOD:So even though it goes off at 6:30, I hit snooze a few times to get a few more 9-minute naps before forcing myself to get up and barely arrive on time.

On the real important days just set the cell phone to the "drop-dead" get up time and you'll be fine. fart around all you want until your phone starts playing Camptown Ladies, then it's go time.


i298.photobucket.com

 
morbo 2008-07-12 04:20:55 PM  
Cup_O_Jo:Ok I read the article and I say this:
We live in a digital age where I should be able to put the EXACT minutes I want to snooze into the alarm clock. Without spending 100 bucks on it.


I have a GE alarm clock I bought for $15 or whatever about 4-5 years ago that you can set whatever snooze you want on it. I keep it set to 17 minutes, 'cause I'm a rebel.


/And I like to sleep in

 
magtec 2008-07-12 04:24:02 PM  
whoever invented the snooze button deserves to be nailed to a coffee table. get your ass out of bed when the alarm goes off the first time, you lazy fark. don't let it go off every 9 minutes for two hours while your sleep-deprived roommate contemplates the best torture methods.

/uses a cellphone alarm
//without snooze

 
CruJones 2008-07-12 04:24:36 PM  
Mine is 8 minutes, and I've had that alarm clock radio for almost twenty years now.

Though I don't even use it any more. I weak up at 6:30 on the freaking dot every single morning. And if I need to get up earlier, I just tell myself that the night before and somehow always wake up on time. Not sure how exactly that works, but it does. I can take fixed interval naps too.

 
joness0154 2008-07-12 04:30:00 PM  
I have my snooze set to 26 minutes.

/get up, and off to the gym

 
Mobkey [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 04:35:54 PM  
tukatz:I've thought about getting this:

Clocky Robotic Alarm (new window)

but I'd probably beat the crap out of it the first morning and be out $60.


I bought one of these for my sister actually. She says she now uses it, along with clock-radio alarm and cell phone alarm. Still doesn't help.

I can't imagine chasing your clock across the room, turning off your cell phone alarm and bedside alarm and still not wake up.

 
Spez [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 04:42:01 PM  
I've been using this program as an alarm clock for the last couple years, works great.

College Alarm Clock (new window)

/not in college
//no snooze

 
Spez [TotalFark] 2008-07-12 04:42:49 PM  
http://www.geocities.com/vinodtandon/cac/

evil html

 
Wodan11 2008-07-12 04:56:40 PM  
Use the snooze: train your body to not wake up on time, and train your body to make it difficult for you to wake up for the rest of your life.

Don't use the snooze: train your body to awake promptly, be more alert when you do get up, and to allow yourself to get more actual restful sleep.

Professional atheletes very carefully train their bodies to go through exactly the same motions, and that's how they excel.

 
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