I think the author might be referring to clocks not counting in binary, rather than clocks not counting off power cycles. Full text:
> (6) "I figured it was actually 512 seconds (2^9)," one informant speculated. "Or maybe, since the clock is counting (typically) the power cycles from the wall socket, it's because nine minutes is 32,400 cycles, very close to 2^15 (32,768)." Engineer's comment: Nice try, bub, but clocks don't count that way.
> (6) "I figured it was actually 512 seconds (2^9)," one informant speculated. "Or maybe, since the clock is counting (typically) the power cycles from the wall socket, it's because nine minutes is 32,400 cycles, very close to 2^15 (32,768)." Engineer's comment: Nice try, bub, but clocks don't count that way.