Is 24/7 a common idiom throughout the world? - eviltoast

Normally idioms are language specific, but number of hours and days are the same.

  • zlatiah@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I have actually never heard anyone say it this way specifically where I grew up… so technically the answer is “no”?

    I tried to dug around and found a Reddit post saying this:

    “The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines the term as “twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week; constantly”. It lists its first reference to 24/7 to be from a 1983 story in the US magazine Sports Illustrated in which Louisiana State University player Jerry Reynolds describes his jump shot in just such a way: 24-7-365.”

    So this might be a fairly new idiom? Which would explain why it’s not really a thing in a lot of cultures… but I assume they have their ways of referring to this.

    number of hours and days are the same

    Ok akktually Japan has a rather interesting 30-hour day thing in the context of businesses… but jokes aside, the 24-hour, 7-day week system is indeed quite universal

      • zlatiah@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        East Asia; again, never heard anyone refer to “24/7” specifically (ok maybe at more hipster places that try to imitate American businesses?)… There might be a similar idiom for it but I genuinely couldn’t think of any off the top of my head