Clock towers are way older than the industrial revolution and also occurred in quite a few different societies, so probably not as a general rule. There are a couple in England and France (Salisbury and Beauvais cathedrals) that are 700 years old, and if you include non-mechanical-clock timekeeping devices like sundials and water clocks then you can go back even further. I could imagine that it's quite possible that there was at least one instance where this was caught and people arranged for some kind of separate public clock, though

[–] jacksilver@lemmy.world 3 points 4 months ago

To add, I believe that town clocks probably also played a continuation of the church bells used to communicate the time to the village/town.

One of the main reasons Church bells and clock bells were so loud was to communicate to the area the current time.

[–] potatoguy@potato-guy.space 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Control.

Cool youtube video describing capitalists controlling clocks to make laborers work for longer hours.

[–] some_random_nick@lemmy.world 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I've finally came around to watching it and, oh boy, it is not good :-/ From the beginnig that are loaded statements about stone age people and their working habbits. I suggest reading Lars Svenden's "Work". I don't think it mentions clocks, but goes into the details of how work and worker rights have evolved from anciemt times. A short, 100-ish page book that gives you all the neccessary basics.

[–] potatoguy@potato-guy.space 2 points 4 months ago

Thanks for the recommendation, just downloaded it and I'm going to read it at work hahahaha.