5 ms·
A tangent, but: how long until “turn of the century” is assumed to mean the time around the year 2000?
by mikeash 9y ago
A tangent, but: how long until “turn of the century” is assumed to mean the time around the year 2000?
- dingo_bat 9y agoI did assume exactly that.
- matte_black 9y agoAround 2040s. We’re just recently making progress in getting people to stop saying the current year as two thousand whatever.
- egeozcan 9y agoMaybe, saying "twenty" isn't enough of an improvement over "two-thousand" to make it worth the complexity. Compare that to "one-thousand-nine-hundred" vs "nineteen". Also, years less than 10 years ago which are still referenced a lot then require a switch to a different reading convention. This, I guess, wasn't a big deal from 1999 to 2000 because, "twenty-oh-oh" was too awkward and, hey, it's two-damn-thousand!
- BurningFrog 9y agoI'm starting to think never. It's too ingrained. And 2000 was a millenium shift. So I expect a new phrase to emerge.
- vaughanb 9y agoNo, 2001 was the millennium shift. The year 2000 was the last year of the decade, century and millennium. 1999 was when the party started, of course.
- folli 9y agoWhen people that actively remember anything before the year 2000, are in the minority. So I guess this applies to people born in the 80s (and before), so I assume this will be in the 2030s/40s.