Tech Eye: Time is money

TechEye has always had a bit of a thing for a good bit of guff.

Over-wordy explanations and meandering tales that lead nowhere have always stood us in good stead during our writing career. As an ankle-biter, many the happy day was spent in the public gallery of the local courts listening to Father's verbose and lengthy explanations for why he was caught on the communal village cabbage patch in the dead of night with the fishwife. Usually this posturing led to him leaving the court a free man, as the judge often slipped into a peaceful slumber allowing Father, and occasionally the fishwife, to slip unnoticed from the dock and once again avoid the slimy tentacles of law and order. 

Even more entertaining were his long-winded diatribes to the local taxman and his many missives to the fishwife's husband. Although Father could never have been accused of having a silver tongue, though he did once steal several gold teeth and a metal false leg, usually what he lacked in elegance he more than made up for in swearing, which is always handy in any argument.

However, even our benevolence is sometimes tested by the great unwashed that make up the world of PR, and this week is no exception. This is the new Seiko Spring Drive. On first appearances, we took it for a watch, but - foolish us - it is in fact much more: according to Seiko it is the only timepiece to "represent the true motion of time." (TechEye has already tried to use this defense in several pending court cases where the age of the 'witnesses' is apparently an issue. The judge, oddly, was not convinced.)

The good people at Seiko gave us 660 words, of which we understood about seven, but our favorite line is this one: "To realize the Spring Drive dream, all Seiko's skills in the mechatronics of timekeeping have been utilized in both the traditional and electronic arenas." We're not sure what this means, but if you want to find out be prepared to pay around zł.12,705.

LM