We pay our governments to solve tragedy of the commons problems. So: 1) Default times are required to be randomly dispersed over a 15 minute interval. This s

We pay our governments to solve tragedy of the commons problems. So: 1) Default times are required to be randomly dispersed over a 15 minute interval. This should be entirely non-controversial: If you don't override the default then you really don't care. 2) Selected times are required to be offered as randomly dispersed over a 15 minute interval, with an option to say "no, dammit, do what I said". This is not too controversial: If the dialog box says "Picking this time instead helps keep your hydro bill low", then a lot of people will say "ok". Uptake doesn't need to be 100%. Controversy will likely be for the device providers, who will have to implement the UI. Option would be to allow "shift by 5 minutes" (or some such) that still preserves some randomness. It's a bit eerie that my phone alarm at 0600 is completely synchronized with "This is the World at Six" news intro. I'd hate to be the power utility facing a 20% demand bump over a period of 5 seconds.