Coordinated Universal Time

October 25th, 2131, 17:56 UTC

Coordinated Universal Time is pretty simple to understand. If you are moving fairly slow and in space, then time dilation is not really a problem for you. However, keeping track of time in space is really difficult because of the lack of a reference point. If you were actually on a world where time is dilated, you could use that as a reference point, but if you were in orbit around a star, you would need a specific location to determine the passage of time (besides a clock on your own ship, of course). That's without mentioning the fact that time dilation due to interstellar travel can be wildly unpredictable, so colony ships that arrive in uninhabited systems often reset their clocks to 12 PM, January 1st of whatever year they left in. The only way for them to catch up on whatever year it is back on Earth is to use the estimates given to them by arriving trade ships. Therefore, the further away from Earth you go, the more inaccurate the time measurement will be.   There is usually a single settlement that is used as a point of reference for time in a single system. For example, the agreement in the Sol system is that the biggest city on Earth at the time decides the current time. The biggest city is chosen by the criteria of population, area coverage, and financial stability. In 2131, that city would be Tokyo, Japan. A day is referred to as a Sol, with Sol-weeks and Sol-months being the same as on Earth, hence the nomenclature of Sol. However, these terms are mostly still regarded as weeks, months, and years for the sake of brevity. It's good to have a standard time measurement system for the purposes of keeping your biological clock at least semi-functional. You still need to eat, drink, and sleep as though you were on Earth, though people who come from other worlds often adjust to sleeping for different amounts of time than the typical 6-8 hours.   The Company you work for likely tracks salary and pay based on the time passed according to the atomic clock on board your own ship. If you are found tampering with the clock to change your pay, you will almost surely be fired immediately.