this post was submitted on 16 Aug 2024
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Latency is accounted for in the sync process
The watches/clocks they are talking about listened to WWV, a set of radio stations transmitting from Fort Collins, Colorado. The system long predates the Network Time Protocol you're referring to. Radio controlled clocks/watches had no means for accounting for latency.
Ahh OK my bad. I've only worked with NTP for a long time and wasn't aware of the earlier stuff.
If you're interested in prehistory, listen to this for a couple minutes.
Sync process? The other comment was talking about the old receivers for the atomic clocks on SW/MW frequencies. It was a one way thing.
Now in theory if a receiver also had GPS they could account for the distance. But, then they'd get far more accurate time from the GPS receiver so..