Yeah, nixie tubes are the perfect blend of Soviet-era impracticality and elegance. Now that I think of it, it's pretty impressive that there's circuitry to get up to 120V or whatever it is to drive those tubes right on his watch.

It's all explained here: http://www.cathodecorner.com/nixiewatch/theory/theory.html

Battery life: approximately 4-6 months at 50 viewings per day.

They've also GPL'ed the PIC firmware.

Soviet Era? Nixies were produced all over, it's just that the Soviet Union continued to produce them longer than the rest.

In this context, "Soviet-era excess" is a jab at the culture of the USA around the time of the cold war. Some of the time periods in US history are named for the war we were fighting around that time. Revolution era, Civil War era, WWI and WWII era, cold-war/Soviet era, Vietnam era.

It's not nearly as much power (watts) to drive, but many of the EL backlight panels in cheapo digital watches require 60-100vac to drive them.