Everyone knows you are a hip, ahead-of-the-curve type of person - why, it's obvious from the way you set hair, clothes general style trends! But what is that on your wrist? Isn't that a watch, using exactly the same method of measuring time as boring people? Is it not true that the dreary old 24 hours in each day system is even used by fossils such as your parents? How uncool!

Well now you can say goodbye forever to hours and minutes, because those whacky Swiss have come up with a new, trendy way of measuring time. With a Swatch Beat on your wrist, each day consists of 1,000 "beats" - but not the way it was when your parents were being educated by the Christian Brothers! Each of the new beats is the equivalent of 1 minute 26.4 seconds; if you want to meet someone at noon, just tell them to be there at 500 beats.

And the new system is great for the Internet, because it has eliminated time zones! Every new day starts at midnight at the Swatch headquarters in Biel, Switzerland - and the beat time is displayed on the facade of the building on Jakob-Staempfli Street.

The Swatch Beat, around £55 (€70), is available from most jewellers and watch stores.