Topic: Simplifying Bitcoin denominations? (Read 539 times)

Well, as I said, 10K bitcoins will forever be known (at least so long as Laszlo is remembered) as a pizza. 

Bits is probably the most established unit. It has already been adopted by lots of merchants and exchanges.

Perhaps the community should start adopting some english slangs for units too, something around the 10k bits and 100k bits level.

It's an open system and there are no "authorities" that can force you to call it any one thing vs. another.  Unfortunately, that means that there isn't any "authority" that can force everyone else to switch to whatever idea you (or anyone else) comes up with for a naming convention.

As such, any denomination names are likely to grow organically as nicknames just like "quid" is a common nickname for "pound sterling", or "greenback" is a common nickname for "dollar".

Use nicknames that you and your friends/community like.  If you're lucky, your favorite nicknames will go viral and the whole world will start using them.  If you're unlucky, someone else's favorite nicknames will go viral and you'll end up needing to switch to whatever the rest of the world is using.  Quite likely common nicknames will be very regional.

Personally, I like the following:

"nans" = 0.000 000 001 BTC (1 nanobitcoin)
"satoshi" = 0.000 000 01 BTC = 10 "nans" (currently smallest spendable unit)
"mikes" = 0.000 001 BTC (1 microbitcoin) = 1,000 "nans" (or 100 "satoshi")
"millies" = 0.001 BTC (1 millibitcoin) = 1,000 "mikes" = 1,000,000 "nans"
"bitcoins" = 1.0 BTC = 1,000 "millies" = 1,000,000 "mikes" = 1,000,000,000 "nans"

(as you can see, other than the odd "satoshi" denomination, they are each a factor of 1000 apart. This works well with the grand, million, billion, etc separations that most people are accustomed to)

According to wikipedia English slang for large denominations include:

1 "ton" = £100
1 "bill" = £100
1 "monkey" = £500
1 "bag" = £1000
1 "bag of sand" = £1000
1 "grand" = £1000

So, tell them that "bitcoin" is actually a very common nickname for a LOT of spendable units, much like a "grand" is a nickname for a LOT of "pence".

Then explain that it's currently spent mostly in multiples or divisions of "millies" (not bitcoins), just like their own currency is mostly spent in multiples or divisions of "quid" (not grand), only instead of dividing into 100 pieces (100 pence = 1 quid), it is divided into 1,000 pieces (1,000 mikes = 1 millie).

So, to answer their question about cost.  As of the time I'm posting this, they can get 1 millie for about 36.7 pence.  If something costs 100 millies, that's equivalent to about 36.70 quid.  If it costs 1 BTC (1,000 millies), then it would cost them 367 quid.

If they (or you) don't like using "millie", then just get them to think in terms of "bitcoin" is a nickname for 1000 units in the same way as "grand".  So you could get a half bitcoin, much like a half grand (except it wouldn't cost half grand, it would only cost 183.63 quid), or you could get a tenth of a bitcoin much like you could get a tenth of a grand (except it wouldn't cost a tenth of a  grand, it would only cost 36.73 quid).

Bitcoin is a name for the type of currency, but it isn't the name of the typical spendable unit (any more than the Iran Rial or the South Korea Won would be a typical spendable unit with their exchange rates of 44,126.49 and 1,723.31 per GBP respectively).

Somebody who paid 10K bitcoins for a pizza might have second thoughts about it these days.

who doesn't like pizza

Short answer: 

No. 

Nobody wants the kind of chaos that would result from using the same names to refer to different denominations before and after some date. 

The floor's open for new names for other units though. 

Like, instead of a kilobitcoin, you could call it a "slice", or instead of 10K bitcoins you could call it a "pizza." 

I guess you could come up with names for smaller units too, but nothing has happened yet to give names for the smaller units much meaning.

lol too long? my bad i guess, basically what im saying is people (mainstream, general public) don't like the idea of converting large amounts of fiat for small "Sounding" denominations of bitcoin, regardless of value

 after exchanging your fiat, saying i have 2 million bitcoins (BTC2.0) sounds better to the ear than saying i have 2 bitcoins (2.0BTC) especially considering if BTC goes mainstream the majority of people would hold less than 1.0 btc (at its increased mainstream market value)

i probably made understanding this worse, but its almost 1 am, so if anyone could translate my jargon i would appreciate it lol

Am I the only one who couldn't make it past the first sentence of the OP?  Too wordy.  Too long, did not read.  And usually I wouldn't even bother replying, but you are asking very specific questions which you then drowned in a bunch of logorrhea.

Ok, been a good while since i last made a post on these forums (minus the one i made 5 mins ago) but i was going through some life issue so couldn't focus on the things i loved doing as much, this included my focus on bitcoin online, anyway, long story short, over the last week or two, i have been back to my regular "Talk about bitcoin with as many people i can" self, and the main hurdle is trying to get people that have never heard of bitcoin to understand its denominations, the first questions i usually get is, "How do i get bitcoin" then "How much are they" i always give the same answers, continuing to explain that bitcoin is a digital currency, its money, you don't "Buy" bitcoins, you exchange your local currency (£ in my case) for the amount you want in bitcoins, this question then moves on to "Ok, so how much is 1 Bitcoin" then after giving them what ever the market value is at the time ($528 at the time of this post) i get looked at like im crazy, then i have to go into explaining that bitcoins can be broken down to up to 8 decimal places & blah blah blah & even if the price was $1million per bitcoin you can still use it as normal currency because of the decimal values & blah blah blah... once i start talking about x amount of satoshi and x amount of mBits in 1 bitcoin etc im borderline getting laughed at, one person told me they couldn't ever imagine walking into a shop, picking up an item and saying to the shop keeper "How much satoshi is this" even explaining why its called a satoshi in the first place is a long process, the general public if bitcoin becomes mainstream are not going to care 1 bit (pun) about the name [The Legend] Satoshi Nakamoto the same way the general public do not care much about Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn.

is it impossible to refer to bitcoin as:

0.000001 = 1 bitcoin (lowest denomination)
0.400000 = 400,000 bitcoin
1.000000 = 1m bitcoins / BTCitcoin

or Bitcoin > Bits

0.000001 = 1bit (lowest denomination)
0.400000 = 400,000 bits
1.000000 = 1 Bitcoin

(maybe not necessarily the examples above, but just something simpler, and before you say its already simple, i found it easier to teach my 4 year old nephew £Pounds & Pence, $Dollars & Cents than Bitcoins - MilliBitcoins - MicroBitcoins - Satoshis)

I cant remember the stats now (so could be wrong), but im sure its hundreds of thousands if not a few million people currently using bitcoin but only less than 5% (could be way off) or something have more than 1BTC

i know allot of people (admittedly including myself) got into bitcoin for the "Quick cash gain" especially after 2013, but greed aside, bitcoin really stands a chance at being a real mainstream currency, if this is the case, as we all know, the price of bitcoin will for sure increase, but with the price increase, what's the likelihood of the average member of the general public owning 1 bitcoin at that point? especially if the price per bitcoin is in the high thousands.
People will most likely be dealing with the "Bits" of a bitcoin http://bitcoinchaser.com/bitcoin-units-and-denominations



Just read this quote on another post from today, though it might fit well: