10:15 on a Saturday night

[venta]

An important survey:

[Poll #1060840]

Yes, I know 12pm isn't a meaningful time. But people use it, so I want to know what is generally understood by it. If you want a box for "I wouldn't understand anything by it, because it's a stupid thing to say", then you can't have one; just imagine that the something happening is important and you're forced to take a guess.

Comments

[venta.livejournal.com]

Presumably your case there is that 12:01pm is noonish, thus 12pm is close to it, and thus must also be noonish ? I wasn't unduly worried about the time at which there's any doubt. All I want to know is if someone says 12pm which 12 o'clock do they mean.

You see, if you look at it like that, you're correct that it doesn't really matter if it's meaningful. However, not everyone does - though it seems the split is less even than I expected, and I'm on the wrong side of it.

[phlebas.livejournal.com]

The thing is it's not just 12:01 that's pm - it's 12:00:00.0000001 and so on - by the time you've seen that it's 12, it's pm.