Let’s say people can’t agree on the time to go to bed, and each timezone declared war on every other timezone. Who would win in this conflict? What alliances would form, and will there be betrayal? What would the new world order look like with a standard time for everyone?
GMT+8 looks good with the entire population of China on its side. GMT+1 and +2 have large chunks of Europe and Africa and could be quite strong too. The timezones in the east and west coast of the U.S. might also stand a good chance.

73 Comments
Geobloke@aussie.zone · 80 pts · 330d
Definitely +8, they have like a third of the world's population.
The first to lose world be +8.25 they're at the bottom of Western Australia. There's roughly 12 people there unless Bruce is passing through. A fuck ton of emu war veterans though. From the side that won
zlatiah@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 330d
Not to mention that the entirety of China, a singular political and military entity (a fairly strong one nonetheless), is somehow all +8 due to a technicality
Now all of China knows you're here!
Fleur_@aussie.zone · 41 pts · 330d
The one with the entire country of china obviously
INHALE_VEGETABLES@aussie.zone · 3 pts · 330d
Yeah I'm regretting migrating from West Australia to East....
Enjoy the new hegemony, you dirty ass sand gropers!
Fleur_@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 329d
Brother are we the same person?
I don't regret moving over though lol
INHALE_VEGETABLES@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 328d
Only a few of us are skilled enough to escape that hot mess.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world · 29 pts · 330d
Probably China. It’s one nation, full of industry and under a single leadership. They could produce whatever they needed. China is one time zone.
Next competitor is the slice encompassing a large number of countries in Africa as well as most of western Europe. Huge number of people and industries contained in that slice, but they lack common leadership.
Zagorath@aussie.zone · 20 pts · 330d
Greenwich Mean Time.
Because it's mean.
niktemadur@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 329d
China's cheating, it's all crammed forcefully into one timezone, Beijing's!
In far western China in winter, it could be noon and the sun is barely rising over the horizon. Then in summer the sunset might be at around 1am.
TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz · 8 pts · 329d
I never noticed that China only has one time zone. Must be terrible for the people on the west end
niktemadur@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 329d
Banking and government office hours!
captainlezbian@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 329d
Oh and +1 isn't. Look at it, they put Spain in Berlin's time zone to appease an angry loser 90 years ago and just left it there
Mediocre_Bard@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 329d
stinky@redlemmy.com · 12 pts · 330d
There should be no time zones. We don't need them. It's 8pm, everywhere on Earth at the same time. Darkness is falling at 8pm in Dublin, but it's still sunny and bright at 8pm in New York. It would take some adjusting but would remove all of the logic and cost associated with timing a particular place.
nandeEbisu@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 330d
Ask people in western China how that's working for them. And that's only the width of one country, not a continent or hemisphere.
stinky@redlemmy.com · 5 pts · 329d
If your friend is of China's majority Han ethnicity, you can assume that by 3 o'clock he's referring to Beijing Standard Time. But if your friend is a Uighur, the largest ethnic minority group in Xinjiang, he might be referring to “local time,” which is two hours behind.
^ this is a problem because of the existence of time zones.
In the summer, for instance, it isn’t uncommon in Urumqi, Xinjiang's capital, to see people enjoying a beautiful sunset ... at midnight
^ this is NOT a problem. there is no inherent issue with the sun being up at midnight.
Time Zones cause more trouble than they're worth, as you pointed out. I'm recommending removing them.
mapu@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 329d
I think we can arrive to a best-of-both-worlds solution if we just up the tolerance for when solar noon can be to 12:00±2 h. If China just had +7 instead of +8 as their timezone then 99 % of the population would have solar noon in between 10:30 and 13:30. Same applies to the entire EU (excluding Outermost Regions) if it had +1. The entirety of South America and most of the Caribbean would fit in +4. The US could definitely get away with 3 timezones instead of its current 5 (-6, -8, -10).
yakko@feddit.uk · 11 pts · 330d
Any war with this many aggressors who were all opposed to each other absolutely would just look like everyone killing each other at random. Even without nukes, it would be madness on a scale never before seen, resulting in a quieter, nay sleepier world.
foggy@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 330d
China.
Not even a question.
They have 1 time zone.
ThrowawayPermanente@sh.itjust.works · 10 pts · 330d
Wow is that map ever a trainwreck
But -5 stronk like bull
hungryphrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 330d
Where's -5? The map's way too grainy for me to see.
ThrowawayPermanente@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 329d
East coast of North America / West coast of South America
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works · 8 pts · 330d
Kiribati wins!
They can just go back in time, DUH!
tetris11@lemmy.ml · 8 pts · 330d
US and Russia would tear themselves apart internally. That leaves China with the largest functioning army, vs the EU if they can mobilize fast enough
TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip · 7 pts · 330d
It would result in the total collapse of the entire time zone system. Every location would switch to local solar time and the war would be over.
When those areas need to communicate with each other, they would develop a new global time system that simply counts seconds from a particular moment in time. Sort of like unix time, but with the epoch set to the moment the new system was launched.
Pumafred9@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 330d
Develop a new time global system? We Brits can't even agree on what to call a bread roll!
OccamsTeapot@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 330d
It's breadcake. Problem solved. No further discussion necessary
Corporal_Punishment@feddit.uk · 5 pts · 330d
You shut your filthy whore mouth.
Its a cob.
OccamsTeapot@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 330d
I will also accept bap.
Corporal_Punishment@feddit.uk · 2 pts · 330d
Love some nice baps
TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 330d
The rest of the world can use the new standard, and ignore the Brits. They can keep their Brexit while the rest of the world can move on. Everybody wins!
porous_grey_matter@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 330d
Except the Brits, haha
stupidcasey@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 329d
Whatever the China Time zone is obviously.
wieson@feddit.org · 6 pts · 330d
+8 or +1 (don't forget Nigeria)
peoplebeproblems@midwest.social · 6 pts · 330d
UTC obviously.
BlueEther@no.lastname.nz · 6 pts · 330d
+12 would just ignore you all
piwakawakas@lemmy.nz · 2 pts · 330d
MapswithNZ? Wtf?
Munkisquisher@lemmy.nz · 1 pts · 330d
Yeah we would, stay away
captainlezbian@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 329d
Either +1 or +8
That said all 4 in America could end life on earth
pyre@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 329d
they could but wouldn't. not for moral reasons but because if you end all life companies that own you wouldn't make any money.
bryndos@fedia.io · 4 pts · 330d
Every TZ has a similar amount of tactical nuclear penguins. The only way to win is not to play.
=> the moon.
burntbacon@discuss.tchncs.de · 4 pts · 329d
I think there's going to be a multi-way tie as the nukes get launched...
morphballganon@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 329d
The one with Hawaii could just pretend they've already been wiped out and wait for everyone else to destroy each other
Objection@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 330d
GMT-11 wins because nobody remembers to nuke them.
brisk@aussie.zone · 3 pts · 329d
+9 appears to be currently shivving +10, so my money is with them
I may have misunderstood the assignment
menas@lemmy.wtf · 3 pts · 329d
I think it's depend of which kind of war. If it's obvious for everyone that "they is no way we can agree" from the beginning, so it's a nuclear preemptive strike from the first timezone aware of the rules. So Europe, China, India and Pakistan are close competitors. US have and Canada shall destroy itself, their nuclear capacities are spread across several "timezone interests". Funny enough, what may make the difference between Europe, China, India and Pakistan may be the hour when the situation declare itself. If the ruling class is asleep, officer may need to wait to wake them up, as it was during the 1983 false nuclear alarm
If it's not obvious that their is no way to make agreement, we may see an escalation of conflict, starting with soft and hard power. This scenario may be very close of the current relationships, and the winner may be the main imperialists power : Europe or the US In this scenario, it seems obvious that the US adopt one timezone, and make it adopt for every countries in the North and South America. It's next move would be to sabotage other negotiations. I didn't exclude Europe from the competitions, because the neo-colonial relationships may help the expand their timezone in their former colonies. What may make the differences is the attitude of UK and Russa. Depending if they adopt the European timezone or not.
I don't think the number of people involve in one timezone make a change; this is short term scenarios, and economic and diplomatic power seems unrelated with the population size
sbeak@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 329d
wait, Canada has nukes?
menas@lemmy.wtf · 4 pts · 329d
I thought they where still hosting US one, but it seems that they ended it in 1984 : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction
sbeak@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 329d
*they *were
I’m sorry, but it really bothered me
rbesfe@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 330d
Poor Newfoundland
phonics@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 330d
Australians, because they live in the future. Theyll fuck you up yesterday.
bitcrafter@programming.dev · 3 pts · 329d
They would all lose because they stretch all the way down into Antarctica which means that the penguins would be involved...
morphballganon@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 329d
Hmm how do time zones work at the south pole? Can you run in a small circle and hit most if not all of them?
bitcrafter@programming.dev · 1 pts · 328d
Apparently not quite! It looks like you would mostly be stepping back and forth between UTC and its opposite.
Given that time zones are essentially set by the local research stations, I conclude that Chile and Argentina would win the war because their time zone has the most coastland and so they would have the most penguins on their side.
rmuk@feddit.uk · 3 pts · 328d
Every military in the world uses UTC so I'm gonna say that.
Otherwise, I'd go for UTC-1 because... well, look at it. There's no way they could lose because there's nothing there to lose. Nuke away, boyos, it's all ocean.
sbeak@sopuli.xyz · 1 pts · 328d
Don’t underestimate the might of Cape/Capo Verde and the Canary Islands!
kayzeekayzee@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 330d
My money's on Greenland
Small_Quasar@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 330d
Sounds like something a tax dodger would say...
rumschlumpel@feddit.org · 2 pts · 330d
Nah, Europe ain't shit. I bet the US east coast timezone could beat all of GMT+1 alone even without using nukes.
Nukes kind of create a conundrum, though, because they're pretty much the reason why the big powers stopped direct warfare between each other. If China, Europe and the US had an outright war, those nukes would probably start dropping, and then everybody loses, but also, it's kind of difficult to truly know how good a country is at nuclear warfare. GMT+1 is certainly going to lose this, though, each of the 4 US timezone could probably nuke it into oblivion, especially since e.g. Germany already has US army bases that are equipped with nuked on its own ground. But how many nukes China actually has and how good the US's missile interception systems are? Who knows, maybe they're just that much better. Though even if the US were theoretically stronger, they're divided into 4 timezones, and it's not a given that they'll automatically ally with each other, which again gives China a huge advantage.
macros@feddit.org · 25 pts · 330d
Hey, not country war, timezone war! Those bases? They belong to team GMT+1 now!
rumschlumpel@feddit.org · 2 pts · 330d
I suppose that would help, but I'd assume that most nukes are still in the continental US.
elvith@feddit.org · 5 pts · 330d
GMT+3 would like a word
Ceruleum@lemmy.wtf · 1 pts · 329d
My time zone of course!
sbeak@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 328d
What-or when-is that?
Ceruleum@lemmy.wtf · 1 pts · 328d
It's now!
sbeak@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 328d
how could I have guessed that
Ceruleum@lemmy.wtf · 1 pts · 328d
The proof is in rhe chocolate pudding.
HailHydra@infosec.pub · 1 pts · 330d
UTC+08:45 obviously has the biggest military presence and would steamroll every other timezone.
/s
Apepollo11@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 330d
GMT
We've done it before and we'll do it again.
/s obv
DirigibleProtein@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 330d
UTC
MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip · 0 pts · 330d
You can travel from Ucraine to Japan (half the world) and only go through 4 time zones?
Little8Lost@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 330d
How it would work later you can see in china because the point they took for their time zone is an end.
People would simply say something like: which retards came to the idea that 4:20 should in the middle of the suntime??
gazter@aussie.zone · 4 pts · 330d
...what?
circledot@feddit.org · 4 pts · 330d
Too much 420 probably.