About
A registry of minutes
MinuteStamp enters one minute of one date at a time, with a certificate for each entry. What follows is what it records, what it does not, and what every minute costs.
One minute, once
Each of a day's 1440 minutes can be claimed once, on any date from 1 January 1950 to 31 December of next year, and another year opens each 1 January. Once a minute is claimed, the grid lights it and the registry refuses it to anyone else.
A date and a clock time
An entry is the minute as it was lived where it happened: 09:41 in Montreal is entered as 09:41. The registry keeps no time zone, so one entry means the same minute to everyone who reads it.
A record, not a right
An entry records a moment, and a name if its registrant chose to show one. It is a novelty, and confers no legal right, to the minute or to anything else.
Prices
The price of a minute never falls.
A minute's base price and its date's multiplier never change, and a date's step only rises. So no minute ever costs less than it did, and waiting never makes one cheaper.
Three things set a minute's price: the minute itself, the step its date has reached, and the date's place in the calendar. The greater of the first two is multiplied by the third, and rounded to the nearest dollar.
price = max(minute, step) × date
The step
Every date climbs the same steps as it comes closer, and stays on the last once it has passed. A step is a floor under the minute's base price: a minute already above it keeps its price.
| Step | When | Floor |
|---|---|---|
| Open | More than 180 days away | $6 |
| Approaching | 180 to 31 days away | $8 |
| Imminent | The final 30 days | $10 |
| Archive | Once the date has passed | $12 |
The date
The same in every year, before a date and after it: 14 February is a marquee date in 1987 as in 2027.
| Date | Which | Multiplier |
|---|---|---|
| Standard date | Every other date | ×1 |
| Notable date | The days of the solstices and equinoxes in UTC | ×1.25 |
| Marquee date | 1 January, 14 February, 4 July, 31 October, 25 December and 31 December | ×1.5 |
Worked examples
| Minute | Date | Step | Sum | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 09:41 | A standard date, 306 days away | Open | max($6, $6) × 1 | $6 |
| 14:20 | A standard date, 21 days away | Imminent | max($6, $10) × 1 | $10 |
| 23:15 | 31 December, 110 days away | Approaching | max($6, $8) × 1.5 | $12 |
| 11:11 | 14 February, 155 days away | Approaching | max($6, $8) × 1.5 | $12 |
| 09:41 | 3 June 1987 | Archive | max($6, $12) × 1 | $12 |
| 00:00 | 31 December 1999 | Archive | max($6, $12) × 1.5 | $18 |
Steps change once a day, at 00:00 Anywhere on Earth.
That is 00:00 at UTC−12, or 12:00 UTC, when a date has ended everywhere. One clock prices every visitor, so a minute has one price at any moment, wherever it is seen from.
A price is held while you pay.
It is fixed the moment a claim begins and held for 15 minutes, the time checkout allows. Nothing recalculates it in that time.
A claim is priced once.
What a claim costs when it is made is final. A later step changes what the date's other minutes cost, never what was paid.
Questions
What do I receive?
An entry in the registry: the date, the minute and its number within the day, on a public page, with the name you chose if you choose to show it. With it comes a certificate in English, Arabic, French, Spanish, Chinese or Japanese, to download, print or share.
Can the same minute be claimed twice?
No. Each minute of each date is entered exactly once. Once it is claimed, the grid shows it lit and nobody else can claim it.
How far ahead can I claim?
To 31 December of next year. Every date from 1 January 1950 up to then is open, and each 1 January another year opens, so there are always between twelve and twenty-four months ahead to choose from. A date that has just opened starts on the lowest step of the price schedule, and like every date, it never gets cheaper.
Which time zone is a minute in?
None. A minute is entered as the clock read where it happened: if it was 09:41 in Montreal, the entry is 09:41. The registry keeps no time zone, so an entry means the same minute to everyone who reads it, wherever they are.
Why does a date cost more as it comes closer?
Every date climbs the same published steps as it approaches and passes. The price of a minute never falls, so waiting never makes it cheaper.
Can I claim a minute for someone else?
Yes. Put their name on the entry, add a line of message if you like, and send them its page or the certificate. Names and messages are reviewed before they appear.
Does an entry give any right to the time itself?
No. MinuteStamp is a novelty registry. An entry records a moment and the name attached to it, and confers no legal right.
What happens to a name on an entry is on the Privacy page. Prices for anything else the registry offers will be published here before it is offered.