{"id":26772,"date":"2013-08-29T09:00:21","date_gmt":"2013-08-29T13:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.uncommongoods.pro\/?p=26772"},"modified":"2013-08-22T14:34:02","modified_gmt":"2013-08-22T18:34:02","slug":"uncommon-knowledge-invented-countdown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/2013\/uncommon-knowledge-invented-countdown\/","title":{"rendered":"Uncommon Knowledge: Who invented the countdown?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/product\/cube-led-alarm-clock?source=blog\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1.jpg\" alt=\"Cube LED Alarm Clock | UncommonGoods\" width=\"550\" height=\"550\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-26773\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1.jpg 550w, https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1-125x125.jpg 125w, https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1-45x45.jpg 45w, https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/21447_zoom1-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/a>\u201c3\u2026 2\u2026 1\u2026 Blastoff!\u201d It seems like the only way to prepare for a launch, right? But, no. At the time it was first used, the convention was simply to count up in the usual way: \u201c1\u2026 2\u2026 3\u2026 Go!\u201d When the countdown was first used in 1929, its purpose was not to precisely synchronize a team working together to create a complex event. Its purpose was the create suspense. And its originator was not a scientist, but the brilliant Austrian filmmaker Fritz Lang. Lang, best known for his movies <em>Metropolis<\/em> and <em>M<\/em>, was working on a science fiction film called <em>Woman in the Moon<\/em> that featured a dramatic rocket launch, preceded by a countdown of the final ten seconds before launch. Rocket scientist Wernher von Braun was a fan of the movie, and brought the countdown to zero with him when he came to America.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/product\/cube-led-alarm-clock?source=blog\" target=\"_blank\">Cube LED Alarm Clock, $32<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When the countdown was first used in 1929, its purpose was not to precisely synchronize a team working together to create a complex event. Its purpose was the create suspense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":26774,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1208],"tags":[813],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26772"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26772"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26772\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uncommongoods.pro\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}