Time lords prepare to kick leap seconds into the next millennium

The prospect of a negative leap second – combined with decades of irritation over leap seconds generally – looks set to inspire a bit of global procrastination among international timekeepers. Next month, the General Conference on Weights and Measures is set to vote on effectively calling time on leap seconds. A draft resolution [PDF] would make Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) continuous from May 20, 2027, and allow the difference between UTC and UT1, a measure of time based on Eart