Re: [Bitcoin-development] "bits": Unit of account

[Christophe Biocca <christophe.biocca@gmail.com>]

Context as a disambiguator works fine when the interlocutors
understand the topics they're talking about.
Not a day goes by without me seeing "neurotypical people" get horribly
confused between RAM and Hard Drive sizes, because they share the same
units (not that that can be helped, as the units are supposed to be
the same, base 1000 vs 1024 notwithstanding).

Bit (as a unit) is already really confusing for anyone who doesn't
deal with it on a regular basis. I think people who don't see an issue
are making an assumption based on their own lack of confusion. We
understand computer science AND Bitcoin. Most people have zero
understanding of either.

Bitcoin already has a ton of issues with terrible names for things:

- Mining (for transaction validation).
- Addresses (which are meant to be one-time use, and don't even really
exist at the network level).
- Wallets (which don't hold your bitcoins, can be copied, and all
backups can be stolen from equally).

I end up having to make the distinctions obvious every time I explain
Bitcoin to someone new to it. There's an acceptable tradeoff here,
because there were arguably no better words to assign to these
concepts (although I'd argue mining is a really awful metaphor, and is
the one that prompts the most questions from people). Then add to the
pile a bunch of third parties naming themselves after parts of the
protocol (Coinbase,Blockchain.info). Not blaming them for it, but I've
definitiely seen average people get confused between "the blockchain"
and "blockchain.info" (not so much Coinbase, because that name doesn't
come up in beginner explanations).

It seems downright masochistic to add
yet-another-word-that-doesn't-mean-what-you-think-it-means to the pile
for no reason other than aesthetics. Are we actively trying to confuse
people?

On Sat, May 3, 2014 at 1:41 AM, Aaron Voisine <voisine@gmail.com> wrote:
> I have to agree with Mike. Human language is surprisingly tolerant of
> overloading and inference from context. Neurotypical people have no
> problem with it and perceive a software engineer's aversion to it as
> being pedantic and strange. Note that "bits" was a term for a unit of
> money long before the invention of digital computers.
>
> Aaron
>
> There's no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole
> government working for you -- Will Rodgers
>
>
> On Fri, May 2, 2014 at 7:06 PM, Gordon Mohr <gojomo@gmail.com> wrote:
>> [resend - apologies if duplicate]
>>
>> Microbitcoin is a good-sized unit, workable for everyday transaction
>> values, with room-to-grow, and a nice relationship to satoshis as 'cents'.
>>
>> But "bits" has problems as a unit name.
>>
>> "Bits" will be especially problematic whenever people try to graduate
>> from informal use to understanding the system internals - that is, when
>> the real "bits" of key sizes, hash sizes, and storage/bandwidth needs
>> become important. The "bit" as "binary digit" was important enough that
>> Satoshi named the system after it; that homage gets lost if the word is
>> muddied with a new retconned meaning that's quite different.
>>
>> Some examples of possible problems:
>>
>> * If "bit" equals "100 satoshis", then the natural-language unpacking of
>> "bit-coin" is "100 satoshi coin", which runs against all prior usage.
>>
>> * If people are informed that a "256-bit private key" is what ultimately
>> controls their balances, it could prompt confusion like, "if each key
>> has 256-bits, will I need 40 keys to hold 10,000.00 bits?"
>>
>> * When people learn that there are 8 bits to a byte, they may think,
>> "OK, my wallet holding my 80,000.00 bits will then take up 10 kilobytes".
>>
>> * When people naturally extend "bit" into "kilobits" to mean "1000
>> bits", then the new coinage "kilobits" will mean the exact same amount
>> (100,000 satoshi) as many have already been calling "millibits".
>>
>> I believe it'd be best to pick a new made-up single-syllable word as a
>> synonym for "microbitcoin", and I've laid out the case for "zib" as that
>> word at <http://zibcoin.org>.
>>
>> 'Zib' also lends itself to an expressive unicode symbol, 'Ƶ'
>> (Z-with-stroke), that remains distinctive even if it loses its stroke or
>> gets case-reversed. (Comparatively, all 'b'-derived symbols for
>> data-bits, bitcoins, or '100 satoshi bits' risk collision in contexts
>> where subtleties of casing/stroking are lost.)
>>
>> (There's summary of more problems with "bit" in the zibcoin.org FAQ  at:
>> <http://zibcoin.org/faq#why-not-bits-to-mean-microbitcoins>.)
>>
>> - Gordon
>>
>> On 5/1/14, 3:35 PM, Aaron Voisine wrote:
>>> I'm also a big fan of standardizing on microBTC as the standard unit.
>>> I didn't like the name "bits" at first, but the more I think about it,
>>> the more I like it. The main thing going for it is the fact that it's
>>> part of the name bitcoin. If Bitcoin is the protocol and network, bits
>>> are an obvious choice for the currency unit.
>>>
>>> I would like to propose using Unicode character U+0180, lowercase b
>>> with stroke, as the symbol to represent the microBTC denomination,
>>> whether we call bits or something else:
>>>   http://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/0180/index.htm
>>>
>>> Another candidate is Unicode character U+2422, the blank symbol, but I
>>> prefer stroke b.
>>> http://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/2422/index.htm
>>>
>>> Aaron
>>>
>>> There's no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole
>>> government working for you -- Will Rodgers
>>>
>>>> On Apr 21, 2014 5:41 AM, "Pieter Wuille" <pieter.wuille@gm...> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Apr 21, 2014 3:37 AM, "Un Ix" <slashdevnull@...> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Something tells me this would be reduced to a single syllable in common
>>>>> usage I.e. bit.
>>>>
>>>> What units will be called colloquially is not something developers will
>>>> determine. It will vary, depend on language and culture, and is not
>>>> relevant to this discussion in my opinion.
>>>>
>>>> It may well be that people in some geographic or language area will end up
>>>> (or for a while) calling 1e-06 BTC "bits". That's fine, but using that as
>>>> "official" name in software would be very strange and potentially confusing
>>>> in my opinion. As mentioned by others, that would seem to me like calling
>>>> dollars "bucks" in bank software. Nobody seems to have a problem with
>>>> having colloquial names, but "US dollar" or "euro" are far less ambiguous
>>>> than "bit". I think we need a more distinctive name.
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Pieter
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> "Accelerate Dev Cycles with Automated Cross-Browser Testing - For FREE
>>> Instantly run your Selenium tests across 300+ browser/OS combos.  Get
>>> unparalleled scalability from the best Selenium testing platform available.
>>> Simple to use. Nothing to install. Get started now for free."
>>> http://p.sf.net/sfu/SauceLabs
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Bitcoin-development mailing list
>>> Bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bitcoin-development
>>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> "Accelerate Dev Cycles with Automated Cross-Browser Testing - For FREE
>> Instantly run your Selenium tests across 300+ browser/OS combos.  Get
>> unparalleled scalability from the best Selenium testing platform available.
>> Simple to use. Nothing to install. Get started now for free."
>> http://p.sf.net/sfu/SauceLabs
>> _______________________________________________
>> Bitcoin-development mailing list
>> Bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bitcoin-development
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> "Accelerate Dev Cycles with Automated Cross-Browser Testing - For FREE
> Instantly run your Selenium tests across 300+ browser/OS combos.  Get
> unparalleled scalability from the best Selenium testing platform available.
> Simple to use. Nothing to install. Get started now for free."
> http://p.sf.net/sfu/SauceLabs
> _______________________________________________
> Bitcoin-development mailing list
> Bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bitcoin-development