Time’s Up for POPCORN
As someone who grew up in Northern California, I learned that in order to find out what the current time was, I needed to dial 767-2676 (which spells POPCORN). In fact, to this day, I still dial 408-767-2676 when I want to know what time it is. I was also irritated that such a service didn't exist anywhere else.
Turns out there's a reason for it. Telecoms in every other state have discontinued their time service. AT&T in California and Nevada were the lone holdouts in providing that service. However, on September 19th, AT&T will be decommissioning the POPCORN machine. The current incarnation of the machine was designed in the 1960s and has certainly lived a long, useful life. The machine looked something like this Audichron pictured, I'm sure.
I feel sorry for the poor person who ends up getting POPCORN as their 7-digit number when they start reassigning the 767 prefix. There's no reason AT&T couldn't keep that number around for old time sake and put a different machine there. Meanwhile, if you still need a speaking clock, check out the speaking clock entry in Wikipedia.
(Picture courtesy of Telephone Collectors International)
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By kristen, September 24, 2007 @ 11:17 pm
Dude, I just called POPCORN and found out about it being decommissioned. I AM SO HEARTBROKEN. What am I going to call on New Years Day for the time?! I swear the days of our youth (i’m 25) are slowly being lost.
Thanks for the post. Right there when I googled POPCORN.
By Dameon Welch-Abernathy, September 26, 2007 @ 8:50 pm
As I said in the article, check the Speaking Clock entry in Wikipedia. It provides a number of alternatives operated by the US Government.