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Why Denmark used to be .04 seconds behind the world

Tom Scott | January 16, 2026



Measuring time is a complicated thing. Computers, banks, and stock markets in Denmark all use UTC, the international standard: but according to the law, they shouldn’t. UPDATE, March 2023: The law has now been changed! https://www.ft.dk/samling/20222/lovforslag/l19/20222_l19_som_vedtaget.htm

Edited by Michelle Martin https://www.youtube.com/@OnTheCrux
Thanks to Thor Nielsen for the suggestion!

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Written by Tom Scott

Comments

This post currently has 35 comments.

  1. @Nico_M.

    January 16, 2026 at 2:58 am

    This is one of those "brown m&m's" situations where following the law (or not) actually doesn't kinda matter, but then what similar situations are out there that are kinda trivial but we don't realise their importance.

  2. @jheldal

    January 16, 2026 at 2:58 am

    So the earth wobbles, but obviously only in Denmark? Are we living on wobbly ground here? I live not far from that line and I don't feel the wobbling…

  3. @TransVoiceCoach

    January 16, 2026 at 2:58 am

    its always seemed strange to me that the answer people came to was to split stuff into time zones instead of just having one universal time scale that sticks in one place

    and then for each place to do stuff at different times according to where the sun is for them at some given time

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