DEATH WATCH counts down seconds to wearer's demise

A self-described group of "designers, free-thinkers, lovers and life-aficionados" has launched a Kickstarter project for a new digital wristwatch that keeps time by counting down the moments until the wearer's death.

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"Imagine someone told you that you only had 1 year left to live," the project's official website explains. "How would that change your life?"

Tikker, the watch that the group is seeking $25,000 to produce, simulates that experience by keeping an estimated countdown of the seconds remaining before the wearer's inevitable demise.

Just how Tikker arrives at its starting figure isn't entirely clear yet, but the idea is that it asks the wearer a series of questions designed to produce a good guess of how many years he or she has left. The wearer then subtracts his or her current age from the total, and Tikker takes over from there.

The gadget is the brainchild of Fredrik Colting, who came up with the idea after the death of his grandfather, but it isn't meant to be depressing – rather the contrary. Colting envisions the watch as a way to remind the wearer that that life is finite and each moment should be spent living life to its fullest, rather than squandering what time we have left on negativity and aimless pursuits.

"Everything started with the realization that time would one day end," the project's website says. "After the initial shock it dawned on us that instead of feeling dread over it, we should use it to our advantage, and create the lives we really wanted."

Each such "happiness watch" will come with a copy of a book called About Time!, which the Kickstarter page claims is "your instruction manual to both Tikker, and time itself."

So how much will it set you back to be able to pinpoint the exact second of your own death? The Tikker order page suggests a list price of $59, but Kickstarter contributors will be able to get one for the discounted rate of $39. What's more, 100 people who pledge $1,000 or more will receive a one-of-a-kind Tikker in the Pantone color of their choice.

That's when the watches are ready to ship, of course. For the time being, the design still has some "slight remaining tweaks to be ironed out," but the final versions are expected to wing their way out to doomed consumers worldwide by April 2014. ®