This term is often used specifically to refer to the French Republican calendar time system used in France from 1794 to 1800, during the French Revolution, which divided the day into 10 decimal hours, each decimal hour into 100 decimal minutes and each decimal minute into 100 decimal seconds (100,000 decimal seconds per day), as opposed to the more familiar standard time, which divides the day into 24 hours, each hour into 60 minutes and each minute into 60 seconds (86,400 SI seconds per day).
Wait a (metric) minute, my source says this was introduced by « The Hives » in April, 2000?!
https://open.spotify.com/track/14Ty0jCO95pEzCmDCEfr21