Poll: One Billion

[maninahat]

You think that's crazy? Go to China or India, and you'll find they do big numbers in groups of four, producing numbesr that look like this: 1,00,00,000 etc, as opposed to 10,000,000). Look up the Indian "Crore".

I like a million millions being a billion, but the change to the American sytem is sensible. If you think 1000 million=1 billion is wrong, then why are you okay with 10 hundreds making 1000? Shouldn't you want it to be 100 hundreds?

it should be 1,0000,0000. It is just 4 digits in a group instead of 3. How is that crazy?

Because you end up with big numbers like "Lakh" (100,000), "Crore" (10,000,000) Kharab (100 billion) etc. None of these numbers have an equivalent big name in western culture. They are just "one hundred thousand", or "ten million" etc. In other words, it is an extreme example of the original question about how to name large numbers.

 

[crudus]

Um... no?
1 Billion = 1,000,000,000
1,000 x 1,000,000 = 1,000,000,000
1,000,000 x 1,000,000 = 1,000,000,000,000

So... A better question is, why is UK bad at math?

10^9 is the "short scale" whereas 10^12 is the "long scale". The short scale meaning is more common. The archaic word for 10^9 is "milliard" and probably why the UK is most known for calling 10^12 a billion.

 

[Voodoomancer]

Hehe, in Iceland we call a billion a Milliard

 

[Deadlock Radium]

In Norway:
1,000,000 - 1 Million
1,000,000,000 - 1 Milliard
1,000,000,000,000 - 1 Billion
1,000,000,000,000,000 - 1 Billiard

You get it.

 

[kuyo]

million=1,000,000
billion=1,000,000,000
trillion=1,000,000,000
quadrillion=1,000,000,000,000
I think someone's fucking with you. A million squared is a quadrillion.

Or at least that's what I thought before consulting wikipedia. It said that the million squared thing is some arcane long form.

 

[BlueberryMUNCH]

I'm a Sixteen year old kid from London and I've always known it as 1000 Million o.o.

I mean, a population of 7 Billion being 7 Million Million?
...yeaaaaaaaah.

 

[Anchupom]

...engineer's notation is what I go by. Kilo, Mega, Giga, Tera... screw this million-billion nonsense. I'll take a GigaDollar, please!

If forums had a like button...

 

[Aurora219]

Um... no?
1 Billion = 1,000,000,000
1,000 x 1,000,000 = 1,000,000,000
1,000,000 x 1,000,000 = 1,000,000,000,000

So... A better question is, why is UK bad at math?

Yeah, no sorry OP. I'm English. A billion doesn't change by a factor of three zeros between countries. It's a thousand million.

 

[PoliceBox63]

I never realised there was a difference and now that I think about it I was never entirely sure what a billion exactly was in terms of multiplicatives.
(although I remember often thinking it a million X million)

I'm a physicist though so I just work in powers of 10 all the time.

 

[Jack Macaque]

1000 x Million is 1 000 000 000 which is 1 Billion last time I checked lol...

Million x Million is 1 000 000 000 000 which is 1 Trillion last time I also randomly checked the status of numbers...

Or maybe I'm wrong.

 

[Brandon237]

12 zeroes for a billion? that's messed up.
1000 x million is the right way, of course.

It is messed up, my friend and I had an interesting conversation... until we realised we were working with 2 different numbers
And isn't 12 zeros a trillion?

You mean a billion billion? Not if you are english. The Trillion has 18 zeros.

I'm not from England ^^
So for us here, a trillion is = 1 000 000 000 000. If that were not the case then the financial news would make NO sense sometimes.

 

[vamp rocks]

I grew up in the states but spent the last 4 years in the UK and I just always think of a Billion as 1000 x 1 million

 

[Sulgoth]

And we wonder why the world get so confusing, maybe we should get around to being more uniform in this regard, while we're at it maybe we should get the word 'fag' back to its proper roots.

 

[GeorgW]

We have the 1'000'000'000'000 version of billion here in Sweden. 1'000'000'000 is a milliard (roughly translated) and it works the same throughout (1'000'000'000'000'000 is a billiard, yes that one is annoying). That way we have to remember half the names ^^
But as a mathematician, I prefer 10[sup]n[/sup].

 

[dragonslayer32]

I honestly didn't know there was a difference. I'm English and always believed a billion to be 1000 million. Are you sure there is a difference?

 

[Ironic]

I'm pretty sure the standardised version of a billion in both countries is now 1000 x million.

So recently I have learnt that the UK and the US have diffrent defintions of 1 Billion.

In the UK, one billion is one million x million

In the US, one billion is 1000 x Million

I like in England and ive always thought of it as 1000 x M because it made sense to me.
Just wondering whats your view on one billion and did you know there were variations?

um dunno where ur getting this from but my old tai kwon doe instructor was also a banker (i live in uk) and in his bank a billion was 100x 1000 000

100 x 1,000,000 is 100 million.

Also I would like to point out that as finances tend to be a global thing, 1000 million is used as a billion because it is a standard.
Naming numbers doesn't follow a really GREAT logic anyway;
10 x 10 = 100 a hundred
10 x 100 = 1000 a thousand
10 x 1000 = 10,000 ten thousand

That's where the number individuality breaks down, but I guess it makes it a lot easier than having to remember a separate name for each extra 0.

 

[BlueAnubis]

here is how i learned it
One thousand : 1,000
One Million : 1,000,000
One Billion : 1,000,000,000
One Trillion : 1,000,000,000,000
One Quadrillion : 1,000,000,000,000,000
One Quintillion : 1,000,000,000,000,000,000

I don't know if they have named it after that point. Hooray big numbers