Junghans Millennium Countdown watch
This watch was manufactured by Junghans in 1997. It was released in 1999 for the official Millennium Countdown Challenge. It is water resistant to 3atm and contains a quartz movement. The watch has a new battery and is in full working condition, with the Countdown function counting down to a now undefined date (possibly the year 3000)? It is also individually numbered (990 157225) This watch was donated to the organisation I volunteer for and is available to buy via their website for €12,50 plus postage from the Netherlands. If anybody here would like to add this watch to their collection please feel free to message me and I will send you the link to the website. Please note that the website is only set up to ship to Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.
My interest in watches began when i started watching restoration videos on youtube. I then began watching reviers like Ben, from Bens Watch Club. The first watch that I bought myself was a vintage Lor...
That’s very silly and very cool. I’m surprised anyone bought those, everyone was convinced that all the electronics were going to freeze up in 2000.
That’s very silly and very cool. I’m surprised anyone bought those, everyone was convinced that all the electronics were going to freeze up in 2000.
Absolutely. I do find it an interesting piece though especially given the historical context.
According to Junghans the countdown should be programmable.
Yea, we thought the year 2000 would be disastrous... and even more crazily we thought the Rolling Stones would ever stop touring!
According to Junghans the countdown should be programmable.
Yea, we thought the year 2000 would be disastrous... and even more crazily we thought the Rolling Stones would ever stop touring!
What a great find! Thanks for the info.
That would have looked great along-side the emergency radio, 50 gallon plastic water barrel, and dehydrated food storage I bought to survive the end of civilization as we knew it…and thrive as a new age of tribalism and off-grid existence became the norm.
That would have looked great along-side the emergency radio, 50 gallon plastic water barrel, and dehydrated food storage I bought to survive the end of civilization as we knew it…and thrive as a new age of tribalism and off-grid existence became the norm.
Almost exactly how i choose to live my life these days!
Millennium NYE....
I was inside a hazmat suit, in case the chemical plant I worked in at the time suffered catastrophic failure....
Midnight came and went without so much as a blip.
If I buy the watch perhaps to finish it off in style @twostitchstraps would make me a strap from a hazmat suit?🤣🤣🤣
If you send me the link I'll have it.
If you send me the link I'll have it.
Perfect, thank you! Do you live outside of the EU? If you do, there may be import charges for you to consider. I will message you the link in a second.
I'm in Ireland 😊
I'm in Ireland 😊
Great news! I have sent a message to your inbox. You are a star!
That’s very silly and very cool. I’m surprised anyone bought those, everyone was convinced that all the electronics were going to freeze up in 2000.
I think your memory has failed you. There was great, justified concern that there would be massive failures of computer software (not electronic equipment, like this watch) that used 2 digit year formats, dd/mm/yy instead of 4. At that time, programs using this format would have treated these dates as, for example, 1901 instead of 2001, which would have been a disaster for the financial sector in particular, and many, many others. By a concerted effort by these institutions to go back and rewrite literally millions of lines of code, the disaster was averted. When it didn't, many assumed it was a "fake" disaster and like to use it as an example of a false projection by the experts. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is a great example, and maybe one of the last, of a united, concerted effort by multiple industries to save us all from a catastrophe.
My memory does not fail me. I very much remember being told to remove some cash from the bank in case all the ATMs stopped working. I remember the fear that basic computers associated with infrastructure would fail robbing us of water and such.
I excluded this watch from the list of items expected to fail on the assumption that electronics manufactured in 1999 would have been made in a way so as to avoid the problem. If that is not the case, then shame on the engineers responsible for it, and shame on any consumers who would buy it.
So while you may be correct that this was the last example of many people and organizations coming together to fend off a common problem, that does not negate the fact the problem largely failed to materialize. It also, more importantly, doesn’t negate the fact that a lot of allegedly smart people made and sold a lot of machines they should have known had this vulnerability. If I treat Y2K as a joke it is simply because humanity made, sold, and deployed millions of devices they could clearly see might fail in a completely preventable way. They then spent several years running around frantically crying about the problem as if there was no way they could have know. And finally, they largely failed to simply turn the clocks forward to see what would actually happen, preferring to speculate.
I hope you are able to see how I view this as less a heart warming tale of human striving and more a tale of collective human stupidity.
If you send me the link I'll have it.
Thank you so much for your offer. I am sorry that it didn't work out. If anybody else has interest in this watch they need to know that they need to live in Germany, Belgium or the Netherlands to purchase through the website.
Millennium NYE....
I was inside a hazmat suit, in case the chemical plant I worked in at the time suffered catastrophic failure....
Midnight came and went without so much as a blip.
If I buy the watch perhaps to finish it off in style @twostitchstraps would make me a strap from a hazmat suit?🤣🤣🤣
We'll try our best! 😁
My memory does not fail me. I very much remember being told to remove some cash from the bank in case all the ATMs stopped working. I remember the fear that basic computers associated with infrastructure would fail robbing us of water and such.
I excluded this watch from the list of items expected to fail on the assumption that electronics manufactured in 1999 would have been made in a way so as to avoid the problem. If that is not the case, then shame on the engineers responsible for it, and shame on any consumers who would buy it.
So while you may be correct that this was the last example of many people and organizations coming together to fend off a common problem, that does not negate the fact the problem largely failed to materialize. It also, more importantly, doesn’t negate the fact that a lot of allegedly smart people made and sold a lot of machines they should have known had this vulnerability. If I treat Y2K as a joke it is simply because humanity made, sold, and deployed millions of devices they could clearly see might fail in a completely preventable way. They then spent several years running around frantically crying about the problem as if there was no way they could have know. And finally, they largely failed to simply turn the clocks forward to see what would actually happen, preferring to speculate.
I hope you are able to see how I view this as less a heart warming tale of human striving and more a tale of collective human stupidity.
"So while you may be correct that this was the last example of many people and organizations coming together to fend off a common problem, that does not negate the fact the problem largely failed to materialize."
So, you're upset that the problem that was solved didn't happen? Really?
"I hope you are able to see how I view this as less a heartwarming tale of human striving and more a tale of collective human stupidity." I do get this. No matter what happened, even a catastrophe avoided, you're unhappy. I think there is a fundamental difference in how we choose to see the world. Of course, you're entitled to your choice.