Back Alley Internet is a recurring column in which we explore some of the weirder corners of the Internet and see what we can drudge up for your amusement and education. This week: Eric travels back to 1999 to explore Swatch's attempt to restructure time itself with its insane "Swatch .beat" time.
It's 1999. Popular search engines include Yahoo! Lycos, and AOL. Cable and DSL are peeking their heads out into a world of dial-up. Netscape Navigator is on the decline, and Internet Explorer 5 is the new hotness. People are using terms like "World Wide Web" and "Information Superhighway." And meanwhile, in the background, Swatch is undergoing a wildly hubristic attempt to reinvent the very nature of time to reflect a new, interconnected world; everyone will soon be telling time with ".beats." What? You don't remember that part? Allow me to refresh your memory.
Read on...
