If Bitcoins catch on, will people get used to having so few? - page 2.

hazek

legendary

Activity: 1078

Merit: 1003

Quote from: spenvo on March 07, 2011, 03:36:26 AM

Are 22mil bitcoins enough for a mainstream currency? I know that they're divisible to eight decimal places, etc., but most people are used to adding numbers to the left of the decimal place, not the right. I wonder how real this psychological barrier is. (I realize that the ceiling for new minting can not be changed.)

The answer is it doesn't matter. As long as people have the trust that their BitCoins will retain their value that's all that's important, everything else is just semantics..

Ricochet

sr. member

Activity: 373

Merit: 250

I'll just chime in here and say I too have worried about this issue. Part of the issue is simply conventional notation, where digits left of the decimal point tend to be separated every 3 digits (whether it's by a comma or period or whatever the local convention is), while for digits right of the decimal point, all you've really got is scientific notation to give you a quick feel for how far out the number extends.

db

sr. member

Activity: 279

Merit: 261

Quote from: grondilu on March 07, 2011, 04:49:36 PM

I confess however that we miss a name for the "thing" that bitcoin measures. "second" is a unit of time, "meter" is a unit of length, Octet is a unit of information data. So, what "bitcoin" is the unit of?

A "bitcoin" is the unit of Bitcoin (Satoshi Nakamoto's cryptocurrency). Often we can just say "money".

grondilu

legendary

Activity: 1288

Merit: 1080

Quote from: db on March 07, 2011, 04:43:40 PM

Calling a megagram a "tonne" is fine but calling it a "gram" is confusing. So is calling a millibitcoin or microbitcoin a "bitcoin".

Who on Earth has been silly enough to suggest that?

A bitcoin is a bitcoin, it's 21 000 times less than the total amount of the quantity that the sofware called bitcoin deals with.

I confess however that we miss a name for the "thing" that bitcoin measures. "second" is a unit of time, "meter" is a unit of length, Octet is a unit of information data. So, what "bitcoin" is the unit of?

I guess it's the unit of "Satoshi Nakamoto's crytocurrency".

db

sr. member

Activity: 279

Merit: 261

Quote from: Dobry Den on March 07, 2011, 03:49:05 PM

Convenient values usually displace formal values. Another example: "Calorie" vs "calorie" vs "kcal". Nutritional data chops off three orders of magnitude and still arbitrarily calls it a "calorie".

Now we have a golden opportunity to avoid such horrors (say "kcal" if you mean kcal but even if you do, always use kJ and MJ) by doing it right from the start. Calling a megagram a "tonne" is fine but calling it a "gram" is confusing. So is calling a millibitcoin or microbitcoin a "bitcoin".

Dobry Den

newbie

Activity: 41

Merit: 0

What happens in this sort of thing (in science, for example) is that the colloquial reference to the currency will be normalized so that trivial amounts can be expressed as though there were numbers to the left of the decimal.

For instance, .000001 BTC = 1 uBTC (microBTC). And often, the most common-use case can even replace the generic meaning of BTC. Lowercase "btc" could mean uBTC while "BTC" means formal .000001 BTC. Or alternative names are used altogether (as already discussed).

Convenient values usually displace formal values. Another example: "Calorie" vs "calorie" vs "kcal". Nutritional data chops off three orders of magnitude and still arbitrarily calls it a "calorie".

spenvo

member

Activity: 81

Merit: 10

I like "bitchange," it's got a nice ring to it. | If bitchange becomes the world's currency in 100 years, each coin will represent 1/22,500,000 of the world's entire circulation. Not likely, but still a crazy thought.

Neereus

newbie

Activity: 28

Merit: 0

I'm so use to Engineering Notation, when I first started and got my .05 BTC from the faucet, I thought, "Woohoo, 50 mBits!"

foo

sr. member

Activity: 409

Merit: 250

Quote from: kiba on March 07, 2011, 10:36:55 AM

Hmm. Informal names.

Bitcents, and Satoshis.

Heh, I like that naming idea. Let's name the millibitcoin the Satoshi, and there's no need to move the decimal point. 1 Bitcoin would just be equal to 1000 Satoshis.

error

hero member

Activity: 588

Merit: 500

Quote from: ?? on ??

Quote from: error on March 07, 2011, 04:34:27 AM

As I've said before, the decimal place is too far to the left and should be moved.

As far as future proofing goes... Any change in the decimal representation would need to place it even farther left.

Your OTHER left!

barbarousrelic

hero member

Activity: 675

Merit: 502

Quote from: grondilu on March 07, 2011, 12:48:36 PM

Ask Zimbabwean people if there are happy with huge numbers on their bills.

Their problem is that the number of zeroes keeps increasing, not that there are many to begin with.

And there's surely a happy medium between having $100,000,000,000,000 notes, and dealing with units of .00000001

grondilu

legendary

Activity: 1288

Merit: 1080

Ask Zimbabwean people if there are happy with huge numbers on their bills.

barbarousrelic

hero member

Activity: 675

Merit: 502

Quote from: matonis on March 07, 2011, 11:59:05 AM

Quote from: barbarousrelic on March 07, 2011, 11:48:39 AM

Quote from: matonis on March 07, 2011, 11:03:11 AM

The Japanese ¥en currently trades at $0.012190 to the dollar and people still use ¥ quite a bit.

In fact, when the ¥en was trading at 130 to the dollar in the good ol' days, it was 1¥ = $0.007692 (traders would just drop the first two zeros and trade it as 7692/7694).

That's the opposite situation. People have to deal in tens or hundreds of thousands of yen, not figures like .00006831

Not true. It's only the opposite situation if looking at it from the ¥en-to-Dollar perspective. When you look at it from Dollar-to-¥en (or future BTC-to-Dollar) perspective, then one Dollar would equal .0070 BTC in future. Exchange rates are always different sides of the same 'coin'. Just inverted.

I don't think the awkwardness of the exchange rate to the USD is an issue. The issue is the awkwardness of prices people will be using when buying and selling goods and services.

curator

newbie

Activity: 21

Merit: 0

Quote from: jon_smark on March 07, 2011, 12:15:46 PM

"Bitties" is a nice name, though I would rather that 1 bitty = 1 milliBitcoin, and that the whole concept of "bitcent" be put to rest.

Nice! I totally dig that.

jon_smark

member

Activity: 90

Merit: 10

Quote from: curator on March 07, 2011, 11:22:15 AM

I propose "bitties" over "bitcents". This way I can say "Fitty bitties to join my committees".

"Bitties" is a nice name, though I would rather that 1 bitty = 1 milliBitcoin, and that the whole concept of "bitcent" be put to rest.

matonis

sr. member

Activity: 303

Merit: 251

Quote from: barbarousrelic on March 07, 2011, 11:48:39 AM

Quote from: matonis on March 07, 2011, 11:03:11 AM

The Japanese ¥en currently trades at $0.012190 to the dollar and people still use ¥ quite a bit.

In fact, when the ¥en was trading at 130 to the dollar in the good ol' days, it was 1¥ = $0.007692 (traders would just drop the first two zeros and trade it as 7692/7694).

That's the opposite situation. People have to deal in tens or hundreds of thousands of yen, not figures like .00006831

Not true. It's only the opposite situation if looking at it from the ¥en-to-Dollar perspective. When you look at it from Dollar-to-¥en (or future BTC-to-Dollar) perspective, then one Dollar would equal .0070 BTC in future. Exchange rates are always different sides of the same 'coin'. Just inverted.

barbarousrelic

hero member

Activity: 675

Merit: 502

Quote from: matonis on March 07, 2011, 11:03:11 AM

The Japanese ¥en currently trades at $0.012190 to the dollar and people still use ¥ quite a bit.

In fact, when the ¥en was trading at 130 to the dollar in the good ol' days, it was 1¥ = $0.007692 (traders would just drop the first two zeros and trade it as 7692/7694).

That's the opposite situation. People have to deal in tens or hundreds of thousands of yen, not figures like .00006831

I suspect one of the reasons it's easier to deal with really large numbers than really small numbers is that we use commas (or periods for you Europeans) to make it easier to visually recognize the units.

$1,800,000 is easier to read than .0000018

edit: To further illustrate, it's far easier to tell the difference between $1,800,000 and $18,000,000 than it is to tell the difference between .0000018 and .000018

MoonShadow

legendary

Activity: 1708

Merit: 1010

Quote from: no to the gold cult on March 07, 2011, 08:22:23 AM

Can 'we' really do this, just start yanking about with the numbers like maniac Bernanke's that have lost all sense of decorum?

If 'we' can suddenly decide to just shift the decimal point around, then I will sell what small amount of bitcoins I have and use the money to purchase a bottle of Żubrówka, then to lament long into the night for what might have been.

Shifting the decimal point does not create new coins, it only alters the representation of the coins in the client. Every bitcoin is already divisible to 8 decimal places, shifting the decimal point over two places simply resulting is a trade unit that is accurate to 6 decimal places. Everyone still has exactly the same measurement of value as they possessed before the shift. The only effect is that it might be easier for people to understand.

curator

newbie

Activity: 21

Merit: 0

I propose "bitties" over "bitcents". This way I can say "Fitty bitties to join my committees".

matonis

sr. member

Activity: 303

Merit: 251

The Japanese ¥en currently trades at $0.012190 to the dollar and people still use ¥ quite a bit.

In fact, when the ¥en was trading at 130 to the dollar in the good ol' days, it was 1¥ = $0.007692 (traders would just drop the first two zeros and trade it as 7692/7694).

Topic: If Bitcoins catch on, will people get used to having so few? - page 2. (Read 8454 times)