Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin is known by many but owned by few.

Most of my friends know about Bitcoin. There are few exceptions. News coverage recently has been phenomenal.

But I can't say the same about their opinion of Bitcoin. One pointed out, "who would spend hundreds of dollars on that thing?". Another replied, "yeah, the price is way too high".

For perfectly rational human beings, the price is not an important factor. After all, a single bitcoin can be divided into 100000000 units—this is so large a number that the satoshi, worth 0.00000001 BTC, is worth a third that of the lowest physical denomination of currency: the Uzbekistani tiyin.

But rational and human together form an oxymoron. Whereas my friends were easily corrected on the ability to purchase fewer than one bitcoin, the psychological barrier cannot be ignored. People do not consider using something unless they have at least one of them. Nobody buys half a car, or 0.25 houses. We can't eat 0.03 apples, and we would reject a gift of 0.007 trees.

These comparisons obviously do not apply to bitcoins, as they are effectively divisible anywhere. But because Bitcoin is abstract, we tend to compare a bitcoin to something physical. As a result, we balk at not being able to own a single bitcoin.

This also hurts the economy. Most are so accustomed to spending dollars, quarters, etc. that the thought of spending 0.007 BTC is awkward. Even worse, some merchants reject Bitcoin because they feel that 0.05 BTC is unfair compensation for the products they offer.

What if we used mBTC by default? Then merchants would get payed 50 mBTC. The "dollar" store would offer products for 1 mBTC. Et cetera.

For those living in countries with a currency valued at or higher than the US dollar, also recall that most countries have lower-valued currencies. The mBTC, among currencies, would be right in the middle of the pack.

For all these reasons, I will begin to use mBTC. It just makes sense. And I hope we could demonstrate the power of the decentralized system of governance, and band together to do so. I aspire to transact with others only in mBTC by the end of May. And I hope you will too.

I fully agree on this.

I will add it to my sig.
Let's all do that and try if we can change something!

I agree. Switching to mɃ from now on. I suggest we just call these "millibits," which is easier to say than "millibitcoin".

(I finally figured out how to type the "B with bar" character in OS X Mountain Lion--need to go to System Preferences/Language & Text/Input Sources. Then scroll down and select "Unicode Hex Input" and select "show input menu in menu bar."  Then go to the input menu selector icon in the menu bar, choose Unicode, and hold down the Option/Alt key while typing "0243".)

Millies have been agreed upon for millibitcoins and Mickeys for microbitcoins.

Interesting read, I totally agree with the statements made.
Most of my friends are the same.

I could get used to "millies" and "mickeys". . . although they sound a bit like street names for illicit substances.

I don't understand what's wrong with "millibitcoin".

Are USians so afraid of the metric system?  :D

Mickeys sound like we are promoting Mickey Mouse.

- and here I was just thinking it was a racial slur. "Legend has it, their country was so poor, the famine ended once the EU sent them one Mickey, quintupling their GDP." ... I'm not very good with jokes, sometimes.

how do I get the bitcoin symbol for my keypad? 

I believe the one used in the OP is a custom font-type that only works in this forum. You can display the Baht symbol, ฿, by inputting unicode 0x0E3F.

Good post. I hope it has legs.

I actually believe this is a pretty big problem in the marketing aspect of this thing, and that it's not really a good idea to have the base-unit that everyone uses be 1/21million of the total units ever.

What's funny is that when I explain Bitcoin to people, the first question they have is "So what actually IS a bitcoin", and I have to explain that there's no such thing, that it's just a ledger with entries, and that the base-unit is actually a Satoshi which makes 1 BTC be 100million base-units. Then the reaction to that is usually "Oh so it's like futuristic "credits" from the sci-fi movies", which isn't all that inaccurate really. And people grew up watching all these sci-fi movies where in the future you just have ambiguous "credits", and that's how they relate to it.

If the base-unit was 1-credit (which is just 1 satoshi), then it would solve all these problems. You'd just buy 1million credits for like a dollar, and there would never be a need to adjust any of this stuff. Even if we start calling it mXBT, at some point that's going to become "too expensive" as well. Why not just use the actual base-unit and call the whole thing by its real name?

There are only 2.1 quadrillion "base units" that will exist, ever. This is clearly not enough in a growth situation as you suggest, so the base unit will have to be changed anyways. Better deal with fixed-value units than volatile-value ones.

100 years ago a quarter would get you a gallon of milk.

100 years ago things were sold in pennies.

The psychology of this goes both ways. People are various surprised, impressed, proud and/or pleased that the value of our unit is bigger than governments' units. Many units and phrasings will be used in different contexts.

Seals chips are now mBTC, as they always have been.

Like this:

http://www.meetup.com/Dallas-Bitcoin-User-Meetup/events/117641062/ (http://www.meetup.com/Dallas-Bitcoin-User-Meetup/events/117641062/)

This is what Bitcoin needs IMO.

Most people do not want to buy less than 1. A lot of people would get on board if they felt like they were able to purchase a lot more. It also gets rid of the psychological factor of the previous crash.

It really is funny how bad the human brain can function.

Like how terrible altcoin users try to say that their altcoin of choice is better than BTC because it has 4x more coins meaning the coins are cheaper!  It doesn't technically matter because is something costs 100USD it'll cost 100usd worth of BTC or whatever coin.

But yes, it'll help in the long run the sooner we can switch to mBTC/mXBT

Agreed. I've heard people say they love the idea but can't afford one.

Those same people would have gladly said "I'm gonna but 50mBTC

I agree. I've just switched my client to mBTC too.

My concern with enabling it by default in the client is that it will confuse users; after all, all exchanges and merchants still use 'whole BTCs'.

So, keep up the good work of convincing people :) (maybe to list both BTC and mBTC prices, so it gets exposure)

I'm pro.

I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment, but would rather not use BTC for mainstream usage, it's too nerdy. No one has a BTC key and they aren't going to learn alt codes.

I would love to see Clark Moody or others switch to mBTC as default. Or is that already available somewhere?

in edit - I've posted to Clarks page.

Are you saying that 2.1 quadrillion credits/satoshis aren't enough? By all accounts there are only several trillions of dollars in existence, maybe in the tens of trillions, but that's it. Say that we want to measure in cents, so that it compares to one of Bitcoin's base-unit, then we're still talking about some hundred trillion cents, or maybe a quadrillion. And that's after massive inflation. I would think that 2.1 quadrillion credits is more than enough.

Even if that's true, that's a problem with Bitcoin itself, not its nominal denomination. I still think that referring to it by its base-unit will make it easier for everyone who's new into it understand, and allow them to get in at any price-point, rather than having to buy 0.5BTC or 0.1BTC. They could get in with 1 dollar if they wanted to. All without the mental barrier that the single unit is actually 1BTC=100million

I fully agree with this post!

but note we are in the process of psuedo banning 54uBit transactions

thus 1mBit = new, then nothing less than 54/1000 of this can be spent.

so by comparison, my 5 cents are worthless/unusable in my 100$ notes

so the sell will be you can but you can spend this portion of it "wat?"

although I accept some shops stop accepting low denomination coins as well in real life

3 years ago in the UK 20p could still get you a pint of Milk :p

I also prefer Millibits!

This!

Or bitmills? I think it's very easy to pronounce.

+1

We can't aim to go down into the decimal places like we used to.

When BTC price climbs to reality, "worldwide adoption", soon the $5 notes in your wallet are useless too.

By the time that is true, the limit will be lowered. Going even further there will need to be a hardfork to make smaller subdivisions than a Satoshi possible. But that's not the point of this thread. Baby steps first.

guys - what happens in 20 years when the mB is too expensive again?

I see no reason not to move down to the Satoshi - we will actually see prices fall down. Think of the psychological effect:
"You TOO can be a Satoshi Millionaire!". Add to that Satoshi's story as hook, and the transition from BTC to SC is simple, adding pseudo wealth all around.

+1 millibits

when they introduced the 1$ coin in canada, people began calling them loonies because there is a picture of a loon (marine bird) on the reverse of each coin. many people thought this was silly/irreverent/unacceptable, but the nickname persists to this day. micky is ok imo cuz people will remember it and feel a sort of affinity for it as it is already associated with a common nmonic. basically whatever people start calling it = its name, but since we can steer this, millies and mickies are ok with me. it anthromorphosises it a bit, which makes it human in people's minds, which can only be good. and yes, more transactions should be in mBTC, if the exchanges would adopt this we'd be all set.

I suppose you are quite young. Believe me, in 20 years you'll have other worries than BTC decimals.

I fully support this. My Bitcoin-Qt balance is in mBTC already.

what about MiB  :D

This, I have used and will use this :)  But I usually leave the plural and only use "bitmill"... like "That wooden chair is 200 bitmill" :)

I could see myself getting used to this.

What's wrong with using "Bitcents (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cent_(currency))"? There's not really anything of value purchasable for less than 0.01 BTC right now, and I don't think disguising the fact that bitcoin is divisible will have the psychological effect people think it will. It's much more likely that people will be amazed that they can afford to buy something of value with only 10 bitcents.

The issue right now, as I see it, is wallet support. Which wallets support a mBTC balance? Bitcoin-Qt does, but which others? Personally I think that implementing the option to show a mBTC balance is a top priority.

In a few decades they'll say: "Mickey Mouse, that sure sounds like they are promoting Bitcoin!"

I do not fully agree, we should be careful with making changes to Bitcoin. Entrepreneurs are still hesitant about accepting Bitcoin, but they are doing it. Why change a good thing? Maybe if we keep the exchange rate around 100 USD for a couple of months, we can try something. I can imagine the headlines, it will look like a trick Bitcoiners are playing to give new victims of our 'scheme' the ability to buy more.

The more I read about this topic, the more I get the feeling this initiative is less about making things simpler (it actually makes it much more complicated), and more about trying to influence the market rates in the favor of those holding bitcoins. This might be just an attempted Bear Toss (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=197892) in disguise.  :)

I won't value pennies until I can easily have 1 whole dollar.  That's what this debate boils down to.  Let's just get it over with and convert to the Satoshi.  How much is the combo #4?  8.85 million Satoshis.

I agree with you. Let us use mBTC.

Count me out. We're all used to the super inflated fiat regime. I'm holding out for them to adapt to us. 0.03 BTC for a gallon of gasoline seems high.

I agree.  Let's start using millies.  I'm going to look into how to mod Armory so we will have a choice of how to display Bitcoins.

either people will mass adapt to working in fractions or they will name it different.

if we are coming from an efficient way of thinking that does not relate to human psychology and ability to use fractions.
i think working in fractions would have made sense if the middle unit had a name and you would use it as a measure.
meaning 0.0001 bitcoins should have been called satoshi  [and now can be called a 'bit' for example] and one would need less digits to describe sums.

right now the market is 10000bits are worth ~110$ and 1000bits are a dollar and change, but in the future if bitcoin is mass adopted and every bit is worth 100$ then we would have prices in 0.01bits and 100bits not having to use as many digits as 0.000001BTC or 10000 satoshi

So after reading all these comments, I'm missing the point on why you would want to change it.  Can someone exxxxxpplllllaiiinnn. (Doc Who)

Basically, because it would fasten the progress of Bitcoin's success due to psychological effects.

What "success"? A rise in price? Increased adoption (something emails and IP addresses didn't need any help with)?

150 years ago things were sold in half cents.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_cent_(United_States_coin) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_cent_(United_States_coin))

Increased adoption.

For those who doubt the importance of this change, just look at XRP (Ripple).

If I'm interpreting https://ripplecharts.com/markets correctly, the current price is 152,884.58 XRP for $1

Right there that sounds cheap right?  Sure I'll buy a million XRP for six and a half dollars.  Except that that means that the market cap is 654088.20, which is about two-thirds the market cap of bitcoin.  Should ripple's market cap be anywhere near the market cap of bitcoin?  No way.  Bitcoin has four years and hundreds of thousands of people behind it.  Ripple is new and untested.

So why is Ripple beating bitcoin? Because it looks affordable.  In order for bitcoin to keep growing we need to be able to recruit regular people.  Regular people can't handle numbers.

Sticking with a bitcoin as the unit is out of the question.  The debate is entirely over what unit to go to.  There are three strong contenders:

Bitcent (strong contender due to name, gives us dollar parity which is good)

Bitmill (horrible name, but good through the next boomtime.  Gavin's change made this less desirable though, making the minimum transaction size 6 bitmillcents)

Satoshi (we're going there eventually, do it now?  Plus then exchanges can express prices in a more appealing way: X satoshis per dollar)

Exchanges should dynamically show the unit that makes the most sense on a monthly moving average. Right now it would be the Bitcent.

Bitcoinity, Bitcoincharts and Clark Moody could single-handedly do this.

[BIG NUMBER] / BTC
[BIG NUMBER] / Bitcent
[BIG NUMBER] / mBTC

Whatever fits best.

OK, speaking as a sales copywriter, my job is exactly this kind of thing.

Trust me, such subtle changes can makes a HUGE difference.

Talking of copywriting I need to get on with some work but I'll throw a few points out to muse on:

1. Yes, to the guy who mentioned becoming a bitcoin 'millionaire'. Ideally that should be something to aspire to, not something you could buy with pocket change or about the price of 1 BTC now. Something around $1,000 to $5,000 to become a bitcoin millionaire would be cool, and still leave others happy to own "hundreds of XXX"

2. I recently just purchased 1.0 BTC, for the exact same reason that it felt silly and cheap to own anything less. It IS a big mental barrier. Right now we're asking people to join in with an idea, where the entry cost is around $100 or more, plus transfer fees etc. It's ridiculous that someone should consider this currency to be "expensive' but that's the way the human mind works.

3. Don't ask me or any other copywriter which is best, a fraction of a big thing or lots of little things, because the studies on this are all over the place and inconclusive. For example some studies suggest people think "12 months" is longer than "1 year", whereas other studies show the opposite. For my own writing I tend to use the smaller unit if I want something to seem longer ("and get a full 12 months coverage!") or a large unit if I want it to seem smaller ("..and you'll have paid it all off in less than one year!"). I repeat though, the studies are inconclusive.

4. No, don't go to the Satoshi just yet. That's even harder to get your head around than the idea of a single unit costing so much. Once you talk of how a single unit is some tiny fraction of a single $ cent you make bitcoin seem worthless. Again, this is how the human mind works, whether we like or approve of it or not, that's how we DO think, plus no outlet anywhere will be able to mention it without the usual drama of "the unknown hacker..." crap.

5. THE biggest challenge for bitcoin, greater than any technical issue or personal issues with some guy called Gavin (???) which mean NOTHING to me or other noobs, is indeed the whole social acceptance thing. Please DO NOT under-estimate these perception issues. I get paid thousands of bux to make subtle changes that can mean many more thousands of sales in the longer term for clients.

The subtle difference between a currency that seems normal and which one can simply buy $100 worth, or something where it costs $100 just for a single coin, is not really subtle at all. It's actually a BIG barrier to entry.



AC

Definitely a change for the better if this were to take place.  I do think it's a recent problem mostly since April, but would be a big step moving forward especially before the next hype wave.

i agree totally with the premise but you may as well just go ahead and go to satoshis. $1 is about a million satoshies. So if you want to receive 100,000 dollars you could say "one hundred thousand million satoshies please" =)

so,
10 mBTX is actually 1 Msatoshi [million Satoshi]?

actually i don't like the idea of cents or millicoins, and i don't think it's easy to work in numbers like millions

i ask again, why not find a name for the middle unit 0.0001 BTX? and then we keep the discussion for most people in the realm of 5 digits.

i say call 0.0001BTX Bits
A bit (a contraction of binary digit) is the basic unit of information in computing and telecommunications. A bit can have only two values: either 1 or 0. A bit can be implemented in hardware by means of a two state device. Eight bits form a byte.

but i guess any name would work...

When I buy water, I never buy less than 1.0 gallon. (wait, no, I bought a 1/8 gallon bottle of water the other day)
When I buy land, I never buy less than 1.0 acres. (wait, no, my house is on less than 1/4 acre)
When I buy fabric, I never buy less than 1.0 yard. (wait, no, sometimes if I only need a small amount I get less)

The whole argument that people want to buy a whole bitcoin is silly. And anybody who claims bitcoin has a higher barrier to entry now than six months ago because the price went up should be kicked in the kidney. It is just as easy to buy 100 usd worth of bitcoins now as it was six months ago.


Why invent something new when we can just take the metric system which people are familiar with and use mB (read millibits)?

Everybody knows 0.001 L = 1 mL and 0.001 g = 1 mg, so it just makes perfect sense for 0.001 BTC = 1 mB .

so 1 satoshi = 0.00001 mB, that is a bit easier to read than 1 satoshi = 0.00000001 BTC

Ever took a look at the prices in the supermarket and wondered why they are like $99.99 ?

When you buy lands or fabrics, you will not measure it this way, that comparison is stupid.
If you buy water, actually yes you often buy 1 liter packages in the supermarket.

I always put £20, this way petrol prices never go up for me!

You are paying 20 for a liter of gas? Wow, that's expensive!

Nope, I put £20 no matter how many gallons that is :D Fixed price petrol for me, yay.

I totally agree, and I 'll try  most of the time to use  mBTC.
i actually think it's a big issue that could stop bitcoin from rising up in value. I would not like to own 0 point xxx of something and if i can't afford the full thing i'll certainly switch to something cheaper lite litecoin.

And I would add that, I am not a big fan of the "satoshi" thing ..Yeah I know it's cool it put some kind geeky mystic aura in that cryptocurrency but (with all respect I have for that Satoshi person or group of person) I don't think it's a good marketing idea for bitcoin. It might not sound really serious, really reassuring, really cool for many people ..including me actually

I think this thread is spot on.

First, let me say I don't like using XBT. Although I understand the reason behind it I believe it will confuse people (the majority that use it); already in this thread people are putting the X in different places. BTC makes sense and is the most widely adopted.

Second, I do think we should make a concerted push toward mBTC (we shouldn't skip all the way to Satoshis).

Newer people will not know that we had a large discussion about moving the decimal place early in this forum's and Bitcoin's life. Some of the exact same reasoning about perception being key was brought up, including by myself. In fact, if you look at the chart on this page (http://bitcoinquickstart.com/how-does-bitcoin-get-value) you will see there was one weird spike in Bitcoin's price history where it went from around $1 to $30 and back to around $1-2 in a short timespan. Guess what. That spike, if you look at this forum's history, corresponded with discussing moving the decimal place in a concerted way. People understood that if 1 mBTC reached dollar parity then owning whole bitcoins would mean a lot of value (1 thousand times more, to be precise), and the price shot up, then crashed.

We mostly didn't move the decimal place. I think because it wouldn't have made sense. We had only recently reached dollar parity, giving Bitcoin that crucial credibility boost. It wouldn't make sense to hide that by referring to everything with mBTC which would then be worth about $.001. Now, however, things are different. We've reached $100, and I think perception is one reason we're sort of stuck there. If we go to mBTC now they would be worth $0.10 each approx, which is easy to comprehend.

I think we need to push the exchanges to do this. If they do so everyone else will follow.

Count me in for mBTC, but my psychological threshold to think primarily this way is a floor price of about $0,25/mBTC. Units worth much less than that are barely worthy of merit now, IMHO. Bitcoin is hard money after all.

I'll switch my client to mBTC at $0,25/mBTC.

Unless I can buy 1 Google, I am just going to go buy something else. I do not want to own 0.000000001 Google, I want the whole damn thing. Why is Google so expensive? They should lower the price so I can have it ...


Satoshi had no idea what the price of a bitcoin was going to be. He just put the decimal about half way through the total (21 000 000.000 000 00), and that is why a bitcoin is the size it is.

+1 to OP and post #61.

I like the notation mB too, but I'd prefer it pronounced em bee. (Micros would then be uB and pronounced you bee.)

Edit: Come to think of it, embits and youbits sounds nice too.

Could the Bitcoin Foundation help spreading this? It could be under a Best Practices section.

I agree with the one guy who seemed to have the fresh idea of picking the mid-point (four decimal places) and just calling it a "bit." That is a really cool idea because it does away with the jumble of "mBTC" and sounds NATURALLY like it should be the acting base unit of BITcoin.

Then it would be easy to tell people, "You want Bitcoin? You need to buy bits. The exchanges sell bits. Merchants price in bits. A bit is $.01 right now. How many would like?"

I like this idea! This is a highly appealing streamlined solution. It's non-geeky too because you're not even thinking of decimal places like you would with mBTC. We just take the midpoint and give it a very simple convenient name which is actually in Bitcoin so it can stand for Bitcoin.

Think about mBTC. What is that? It's a code you have to decipher. It's a jumble of letters, not a word. Those letters will be assaulting your eyes forever. A bit, on the other hand. What is that? A small word - light and airy - no caps even, no codes. Everyone recognizes that it means some kind of small unit. Yes, exactly. It's the base unit of Bitcoin.

So how many bits are in your wallet right now?

This is how I work too, except that I don't have a name for it. Eight decimal places call for either 4 subdivisions of 2 places each or 2 subdivisions of 4 places each.

Yes, it makes sense to name just a few groups of divisions. The midpoint is a bit and the endpoint is a Satoshi. So you can then describe everything in between in terms of these two quite easily. And, of course, you still have the full bitcoin reference as well. So these three simple names can cover very small to very large amounts easily.

IMO, the math-like names are just too cumbersome. They're just awful for use in mass adoption. But with bitcoin/bit/Satoshi, you have three groups of ten thousandths that cover the whole range.

But nobody uses tenthousandths. We are all used to converting from mm to m, or from km to m, or from mL to L, which are all increments of three orders of magnitude.

+1  If we redefined a bitcoin to mean what we now call a mBTC, and its price went down to $0.10, I think we'd see a lot more interest from casual investors/potential-adoptees. Going from $0.10 to $0.20 seems a lot easier than going from $100 to $200. At $200 every one is screaming 'bubble', simply because it's a big number.

Just price your bitcoins in gold. Get your bitcoins quick while the price is low! Just 0.0736 XAU per bitcoin today!

well, i think the reason it does not have a 'spaced 3 digit increment name' only makes it special and in need of a name.
but if it is important to stick to the 3digit division we could move the 'bit' a decimal point up or down. 0.00001BTX, still less digits then using either extreme and starting to count from it.

That's irrelevant here. Once adopted, no one need know or care that it's a ten-thousandth. The bit can describe a large range of Bitcoin by itself quite comfortably precisely because it's the midpoint of the decimal range.

Bitcoin is a digital currency. It does not require numerous actual coins of incremental denominations to function. It's just a number we keep in a ledger. We do not need to reference intermediate decimal places at all when we have convenient groups of divisions - in this case, three. We have Bitcoin/bit/Satoshi. That's all we need.

The mathematical names for each decimal place are simply not needed here. In the US, the dollar is currently denominated in pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, half-dollars. These coins are PHYSICAL OBJECTS. If the dollar were totally digital in practice, we would not need all these divisions. We would just use pennies and dollars for reference. No one would say, "I need two quarters (or five dimes, or one half-dollar)," if we weren't using actual coinage. No, all of that is just 50 pennies, and a "penny" would just be the name of the most convenient unit to describe a range of the dollar (three decimal places).

So for a totally digital dollar, you'd only need Dollar/Penny (unless it hugely deflated). You can describe the range of $.01 to $ infinity with these two words along with already established large-scale descriptors like million and billion.

Since Bitcoin has eight decimal places, it makes sense to simply divide that in half and have two four-decimal ranges as a convenient reference - bit and Satoshi. Remember, there are no physical coins here. The mathematical or shorthand names of the intermediate places are irrelevant when describing a range for the sake of convenience. This is a currency and we need it to be as convenient as possible. We don't need nine divisional names for the the damn thing. Three will do just fine.

Bitcoin has a hard cap on the main unit - 21 million. It has currently 8 decimal places to allow for smaller units to accommodate mass adoption. People will only need to reference "Bitcoin" or "bit" to describe anything from .0001 to 21,000,000. They'll do that for a long time. There's only one conversion factor to remember. That's all you'll need to know. It'll be a common factoid: One Bitcoin equals 10,000 bits. One bit equals 10,000 Satoshis. Put it up on Wikipedia and you're done.

That is so simple and convenient. Tell me, why do we need anything else?

We need alias denotations to change people perception of thinking one whole bitcoin is worth allot.
at 10000$/bitcoin we need new denotations not based on BTC itself like mBTC or uBTC.
like a satoshi
we could use exponential increments from a base of 16
1satoshi = 0.00000001BTC = satoshi
16satoshi = 0.00000016BTC = alias
256satoshi = 0.00000256BTC = alias
4096satoshi = 0.00004096BTC = alias
65536satoshi = 0.00065536BTC = alias
1048576satoshi = 0.01048576BTC = alias
16777216satoshi = 0.16777216BTC = alias
268435456satoshi = 2.68435456BTC = alias
why base 16? idk, anything that has small enough interval and not too many aliases to remember.

the mindblock is perceptual and based on language dynamics
has nothing to do with ease
bitcoins, btc, mbtc, ubtc all use a bitcoin as the base,
people want to own units, not subdivisions.

If we can introduce a new language for bitcoins to wrap the subdivisions and disassociate it from a single whole btc,
people will be more willing to buy some of alias A, B or C and less likely to think its overvalued.
but theres actually a more important problem below that, the us dollar is bitcoins reserve currency, we dont know how else to express value quantitatively.

Thats an interesting point, and it begs the question, why wasnt the satoshi used right from the start? I'm going to go out on a limb and say its for the very same reason (but in reverse) that we are discussing now with regards the move from Bitcoins to micro-bitcoins. If the first block reward had been 50,000,000,000 satoshis (i may have got my zeros wrong. blame wild turkey) then it would have made everything 'seem' worthless. Even more so when mining 50 coins was no big deal. That first pizza would have cost trillions(?) of satoshi. (as it was 10,000 was quite a stretch).

So I think it goes to show how important the location of the decimal point is in the perception of things. I know I've certainly switched my QT miner to show mBTC does wonders for the soul!

The developer(s) gave us 8, so with equal division we're left with 2 four-decimal groups if we wish to describe the large range to the right of the decimal conveniently. If he/they had given us 9 spaces, then it would make sense to go with the convention of groups of threes that we use typically with large numbers above 1.

It doesn't matter in the least, however. Currencies typically have unique qualities like this. The dollar currently only goes two places to the right of decimal, but uses non-equal divisions of 1, 5, 10, 25, and 50 for coinage. Again, that's because it's a physical currency still. Other currencies have their own unique divisions and coinage - which, by the way, makes them interesting and fun. Currency is part of culture.

We don't have coinage in Bitcoin, so we only need a few convenient divisions. Because we have 8 decimal places, we must use either groups of two or groups of four. Two groups of four is the obvious choice.

I'm totally sold now on this idea of Bitcoin/bit/Satoshi. I think it's unbeatable. It even looks and feels artful when you lay it out like that. Very elegant.

I think that we should be going to microbits (100 satoshi = 1 microbit) but there is no support for my idea.  There seems to be support for moving the decimal about 4 places, which is better than nothing.

The problem is that people keep trying to tie this into the metric system, which is more hassle than it is worth.  For example the euro is not at all metric, even though it is a new currency that could easily been made metric.  So let's call the new unit millibit instead of millibitcoin.  Let's have the symbol be the actual mill symbol ₥ instead of the nonsense that is mBTC.

This idea isn't my favorite idea, but it is the idea that will have support:

1 millibit = 1₥, which currently costs about $0.11 on MtGox.

Again, this isn't my favorite idea but it is the idea that will have support.  Who is with me?  Its time to win.

Here is what we use

1 drop of bitcoins = 1 satoshi = 0.00001 mBTC = 0.00000001 BTC
1 teaspoon of bitcoins = 120 satoshi = 0.0012 mBTC = 0.00000120 BTC
1 dessertspoon of bitcoins = 240 satoshi = 0.0024 mBTC = 0.00000240 BTC
1 tablespoon of bitcoins = 360 satoshi = 0.0036 mBTC = 0.00000360 BTC
1 cup of bitcoins = 5400 satoshi = 0.054 mBTC = 0.00005400 BTC
1 pint of bitcoins = 10800 satoshi = 0.108 mBTC = 0.00010800 BTC
1 quart of bitcoins = 21600 satoshi = 0.216 mBTC = 0.00021600 BTC
1 peck of (dry) bitcoins = 172800 satoshi = 1.728 mBTC = 0.00172800 BTC
1 hand-full of bitcoins = 20736000 satoshi = 207.36 mBTC = 0.20736000 BTC
1 piggy bank of bitcoins = 44375040 satoshi = 443.7504 mBTC = 0.4437504 BTC
1 black leather case (german made) of bitcoins = 995328000 satoshi = 9953.28 mBTC = 9.95328 BTC
1 shovel of bitcoins = 2388787200 satoshi = 23887.87 mBTC = 23.88787 BTC
1 bag of bitcoins = 7882997760 satoshi = 78829.9776 mBTC = 78.8299776 BTC
1 wheelbarrow of bitcoins = 33108590592 satoshi = 331085.90592 mBTC = 331.08590592 BTC
1 double cherry truck of bitcoins = 960149127168 satoshi = 9601491.27168 mBTC = 9601.49127168 BTC

mBTC conversion for tortilla.

your idea does have a great deal of support over here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=149150.msg1627177#msg1627177

i am 100% in support of using XBT (as official) vs BTC (as informal -- and rejected as a valid ISO (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=149150.msg1742842#msg1742842))

BTC -> would remain 100,000,000 satoshis (called 1 Bit-Coin)
XBT -> would be 100 satoshis (called 1 Eks-Bit)

read the above posts (as well as the supporting arguments) and see if you don't agree
-----------------------------------

back to the OP; i totally agree that BTC is a complete turnoff -- as a self-proclaimed bitcoin evangalist its a pain in the ass trying to convince people to cough up >$100 just for 1. i speak from personal experience that a few mBTC to a n00b would be an EASY SELL

I created a new thread where I'd like to discuss the use of a 'Gavin' as a substitute name for 0.01BTC (or 'BitCent') at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=198618

This old chestnut ...  :D ... in computing age most people using computer are now familiar with kilo, mega and giga ... RAM, cpu HZ, networkspeeds, HD capacities, etc ... (millis, micros, nanos only specifically used)

==>

1 bitcoin = 100 megasatoshi

0.01 bitcoin = 1 megasatoshi

0.00001 bitcoin = 1 kilosatoshi

0.00000001 bitcoin = 1 satoshi

If we start using the base unit now then scaling down will enable using the familiar scientific positive exponent order of magnitude nomenclature ...

Also I just like the sound MEGAsatoshi  :)

and just for Vladimir:
(NB : 10 bitcoin = 1 gigasatoshi ... )

Great post

I lol'd  :D
especially @ "1 peck of (dry) " ... BAHAHAHAHA

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=198952.0

Now that the price has been stable at ~0.1 USD/mBTC, everyone should be thinking in terms of mBTC (or mXBT if you like that more). If we think bitcoin is here to stay, there is just no reason to stick to the old BTC unit.

Oh and I like being a µBTC millionaire! :)

Nice post, I like mB, I have 1000 mB, is like having 1000 USD. And it's 10 bitcoins. Easy to remember.

I would like to give my opinion about the issue. I think we should stop using Bitcoin as the name of the coin and just leave that term for naming the protocol or network. And then we should use independent names for the different current Bitcoin, milliBitcoin, microBitcon and so on.
For me, to start using mBTC to get people more confident just because they are dealing with smaller numbers does not make much sense. After all, people are stupid , but not THAT stupid. And I do not see why someone who is dubious about jumping into the wagon if 1 BTC = 130 $ would start buying if we display 1 mBTC = 0.13 $ instead.
However, I do believe people would be more confident if we actually go one step further and use independent names and drop the whole milli and micro terminology.
So, for example, we have 1 alpha = 1 000 betas = 1 000 000 gammas.
"Would you like to buy some Bitcoin? At the moment 1 beta  is 0.5 $" .
" You can pay in Bitcoin if you like. This hardrive is 350 gammas"
...
The names alpha, beta and gamma are just examples for potential names. What I want to emphasize is that to use the term Bitcoin (and derivatives) for both the network and the units is, in my opinion , a bad idea.

not until BTC reaches 1 grand

I happen to fully agree with this: we should start using mBTC

Psychological factor is VERY important. I'm sure that a lot of people would be eager to jump on the train if we started using mBTC, because +$100 for one unit of a currency, virtual or not, sounds way too expensive for the average Joe - even if technically is irrelevant.

Maybe we should just start pricing things in satoshis, or sat? Currently 1 USD = 885000 sat.

Do these friends also get confused about say, a 0.25c phone call or a $100 bill?

i agree that in the long run we need names, not milli and micro.
and as said here the first name should be of the middle unit between satoshi and bitcoin... 0.00001 bitcoins should have a name first because it makes more sense.

In the US we measure lengths in feet and inches and miles, we have names for each of these things and converting between them is a bitch. Elsewhere, people use millimeters and meters and kilometers, and converting between them can easily be done in your head.

Now you want to name something (0.00001) that is not the middle between bitcoins (1.0) and satoshis (0.00000001), the actual middle would be what some people above want to call bits (0.0001), but is also not millibits (0.001) or microbits (0.000001)? What you typed (0.00001) I guess could be a millibitcent, there were some people trying to name it that a while back, or you could call it a kilosatoshi. I would call it either 0.01 mB or 10 uB.

Bitcoin is complicated enough as it is.  Why not merely say that on may buy 100 million Satoshis for 100 dollars?  1 dollar = 1 million Satoshis.  Later, 1 dollar = 100,000 Satoshis.  And so one until 1 dollar = 1 Satoshi.

+1. We are beginning to see huge support for this lately. http://www.coindesk.com/june-2-m-day-promotes-millibitcoin-as-unit-of-choice/ (http://www.coindesk.com/june-2-m-day-promotes-millibitcoin-as-unit-of-choice/)

You are incorrect here as we can actually break bitcoin infinitely smaller fractions. Just needs a software patch

so suddenly we become millionares ;D

No this is just discussion about moving a decimal point. It's better to pay in 500 uBTC than 0.0005 BTC

I hate comparing bitcoin to gold, but when the price of gold shot up. People still quoted it in the per troy ounce gram, yet still understood that they could own a couple grams of gold and that it would have value even if they could not afford an entire ounce.

I think this is a good post.  I hope this continues

No, we're not (although for most things, but not Bitcoin, I prefer Standard), millibitcoins is just a mouthfull. I use em-bits in real life conversation, and mBTC in text.

What? 2.1 quadrillion not enough? You're crazy: That's 300,000 satoshis for every single person on earth.

I tend to agree.

But, as long as you're redefining stuff...

Why stop there?

Redefine the regular BTC as the HectoBTC, and redefine the .01 BTC as the regular BTC.

Presto ! Now there will be 210 million BTC in the world !

we need to change naming of bitcoin but to be honest im getting confused. there is many threads and many propositions, is there any chance someone will create a consolidated thread maybe with poll with all options. i know it was somewhere too but dont know if it included all options.

to me best idea would be to use 100satoshi = 1XBT since that would be most natural to people who are already using nomination of $1.99 for example, in btc it would be 1.99XBT (100 satoshi).

btw could we somehow convince mtgox and others to change their denomination also, for example:

1.00000000 btc = $130
10,000.00 XBT = $1.3

its psychological difference and much better to read.

Completely agreed.

However it will be difficult for me (and many people) to switch, as I am used to BTC. But I will try to adapt.

The transition will have to take place and develop itself organically. People's psychological thresholds may differ. For me, I'd still rather think and operate primarily in full bitcoins until the exchange passes 250 USD or so. After that, mBTC makes a lot of sense.

the problem with micro and milli is that its one letter. 50mBTC and 50uBTC can be misspelled and you have two different values here. with XBT (as 100 satoshi) its not that simple.

1.234

1 coin
23 cents
4 bits

1 usb block erupter: 2 coins
1 dozen beer: 20 cents
1 bag of candy: 8 bits

Nobody's going to ever say the word "millibitcoin" in conversation. Even "millibits" is cumbersome: three full syllables.

There's a reason why people call dollars "bucks".

The other problem is that the average person will be very confused when you tell them that m = milli and u = micro.

Same way no one says "I bought 1 kg [kilogram] of sugar"?

As one of the metric system's "lost boys" (I'm canadian), I buy sugar by the pound.

If I had to use metric weights, I guess I'd say I bought "a kay" of sugar.

I likely wouldn't say I bought "eight ems worth" of candy :)

Just because you are not used to it, doesn't mean no one will be able grasp it. Millions of people use the word kilogram in every day's talk and are happy with it as a very convenient unit.

Too true. It's not like "buck" is an official term for the dollar, either.  :)

Two things are necessary for the switch to mBTC to happen I think:

The Bitcoin-QT client needs to make mBTC the default unit and MtGox needs to price bitcoin in terms of mBTC.

Regarding the latter, ideally a smaller exchange would switch to mBTC first, so MtGox can see how it affects trading volumes, and if there are no adverse effects, it can make the change itself.

The "mill (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mill_(currency))" is perfectly acceptable as a short form for mXBT. If millibitcoin or bitmill are too difficult to say, simply using "mill" is enough. (e.g. in Europe, they sometimes say cent instead of eurocent).

The "bit" is obtuse and is a neologism. This is compounded by disagreement as to what "bit" means, as some argue it should be the nonsensical 0.0001 unit. Moreover, "bit" is already used to measure information—this will cause confusion when quoting prices for internet connections ("5 Gb/s for only 3 bits/month").

just to clarify, 1 millibit would be 0.000001 BTC?

There're pros and cons for this but I'm not sure it's time to do it yet.

We're still in period where loads and loads of people don't have idea what's bitcoin or they've heard about it once, twice or many times but never paid attention. Changing it would lead to another confusion as they would suddenly start to listen about some other thing and bitcoin would lose lot of it's brand marketing vaule. I mean, I still haven't being used to Miscrosoft's Live brand. I want my hotmail back  ;D

The other thing is that "There is going to be only 21 millions of them" was a big selling point in recent weeks. There's no article that is basic bitcoin introduction that does not include this one. And when I put myself to average consumer body that one sounds attractive.

It's certainly valid discussion and times might come when it might be needed but I'm not sure we are there yet though I do understand why some people tend to think different.

And on the end, if it would be done I'd be keen on both bit and satoshi rather than millibitcoin that sounds awful and is not brandable at all.

I posted this on another thread that was trying to get people to stop calling bitcoin a "virtual" or "digital" currency because it makes ignorant people write it off as somehow not real or of imaginary value. The same point applies to this argument.

quote:

Getting all riled up over semantics like this is the most useless expenditure of mental energy. The same goes for those working diligently to figure out what we should call fractions of a Bitcoin (mBTC vs. satoshis vs. whatever they've come up with now). We don't need to spoon-feed sanitized and PR packaged Bitcoin to those who are unwilling or incapable of understanding what it is. Those who do understand its power should be the ones that reap the benefits of early adoption. The mental energy that's being spent to try and figure out how to re-package Bitcoin for these people would be better spent teaching them what it ACTUALLY is. A virtual currency, backed by the power of cryptographic protocols and a p2p network that maintains its legitimacy. Maybe I just have too much faith in humanity...

Also, this is basically a form of mentally inflating the currency, even though it's real value is un-inflatable.

I think 21 million is just too few units for a global currency. We see in the example of other digital currencies that people seem to pay more relative to the currency's value when it is divided into more units.

XRPs are a good example. In case you don't know, they are the currency of Ripple, a brand new debt transfer network with next to zero real activity. There are 100 billion XRPs being issued. Each BTC can currently buy about 6,000 XRPs at the one exchange XRPs are currently trading on.

6,000 sounds like a lot right? Well when you consider an XRP is only 1/100-billionth of the entire XRP supply, that means the entire XRP supply would be able to buy nearly 17 million BTC.

The liquidity is too low to get an accurate estimation of a market cap for the currency, so we can't conclude that XRP's market cap is really 80% of BTC's, but that a completely unproven currency is trading as high as it is on one exchange I think really suggests that people think a currency is being sold at a low price relative to its 'true value' simply because the number attached to the unit is low.

People don't think about how much of the total currency supply that unit actually represents.

Think of it another way: do you think there would be more psychological resistance to invest in BTC when the price of a unit is $0.12 or when it's $120? I think in the first case, the price could easily double without people screaming 'bubble', because the lower number makes them think it's still cheap.

Yes maybe bitcoin should be valued in mBtc. This would make it more appealing and affordable. If the bitcoin clients switch to mBtc by default so new users would get 3mBtc, there would be less of a psychological barrier.

Also. Shit I've forgotten what I was going to say!!! Brb

I think this is relevant up to this day still. I go by mBTC.

There's only 2 ways to label bits. Enough or not enough.

I read the first page, then couldn't take it any more.

It doesn't matter what the exchange rate it when used for commerce. Nobody checks what the current exchange rate is for the US dollar prior to loading some giftcard to be used at some outfit, paying some high fee for the privilege for doing such.

Most people don't need to transfer large sums of money across borders for some non-nefarious reason, but those that do pay a high fee for a transaction that may take days, if not weeks. This is only one problem that Bitcoin solves, thus allowing one to transfer instantly with virtually no fees. Once the recipient receives the funds, they may have to wait a few minutes (due to confirmations) before they're able to spend or transfer the funds themselves, but how likely is that that they would need to do such so quickly.

<phone conversation>

Max: Steve, I need $10K for such and such.
Steve: No prob! <30 secs later Max has funds>
Max: <while still on the line> Got it! Thanks, bud.

<6 confirmations later>

Max: Here's the $10K for such and such.

Show me a system that can accomplish the above more smoothly, and I'll show you the beginnings of the demise of Bitcoin.

Indeed, this is what happens in the fiat world:

Max: Mark, I need $10K to pay my rent and food bills
Mark: No prob! 2 weeks later you'll have the funds
Max: <while still on the line> 2 weeks have passed now. Hello? Hello? Are you there??

Nice!
That's why we love bitcoins!

No, 0.001 BTC is 1 millibit (abbreviated 1 mB). 0.000 001 BTC is 1 microbit (abbreviated 1 uB).

Some people are using the more ISO compliant XBT for bitcoins, so you could say 1 millibit would be 0.001 XBT.

In the long run: I like a one syllable word for those who stand in markets and have to say the word 'bits' 500 times a day.

Would you rather say millibits or bits five hundred times a day?

I believe the term 'bits' will gravitate to mean something along the lines of a days wages, a months cost of living. It will be regional.

See post above, mBit easy enough to associate with MY bits. uBit is easy to associate what I can afford to give to YOU bits.

On the internet, and in advertising please be 100% formal as requested by the original post. It is more honest to type mB & uB. You write mB if I'm reading it casually out loud I'm just saying bits - assuming everyone around me knows without calculating where to place the decimal . So everyone be kind to people who just say 'bits' casually. Advertise correctly but when speaking 'affectionately' about bitcoins just call them bits.

Like 'come here kitten, i've got some bits for you.'

The beauty of SI (or engineering notation) is that we don't all have to switch over at the same time. You can use kBTC. BTC, mBTC, µBTC or nBTC when it is appropriate.

For example, when you want to move over $2Million USD equivalent value, you could use "10kBTC" instead of "10,000BTC" (the latter may be interpreted as 10BTC by people normally using ',' as a decimal separator).

If you want to buy a beer, you would pay 25mBTC instead of 0.025BTC.

Transactions smaller than 54.00µBTC tend to be dust transactions.

The resistance I see is that Bitcoin has a large user-base residing in a country that has not yet adopted the Metric system.

My keyboard actually has the µ symbol :D

Just no. A bit refers to a single decimal place in binary notation. If people were using "bits", I would associate that with the base unit that is actually represented by a single bit (10nBTC).

"mills" are fine once people understand you are actually taking about Bitcoin and not some fraction of a dollar.

Can we please take a step outside the bitcoin bubble for one second and listen to ourselves?


"If people were using "bits", I would associate that with the base unit that is actually represented by a single bit (10nBTC)."

"the word "bit" is a neologism.  It would cause confusion, for instance, a company offering "10Gb/s for 3 bits"


Seriously?  THOSE are some of the objections as to why 0.001 BTC shouldn't be branded as a "bit"?  I have some questions for you:

1)  What percentage of the population would be confused by the term "bit"?  (besides a handful of cryptogeeks who apparently would just be TOO confused to process TWO separate meanings for the word "bit".)

2)  Is your grandmother more likely to use a "millibitcoin", or a "bit"?  

Those are the ONLY questions which should be relevant to this discussion - not whether you are so cool that you know the base unit that is actually represented by a single bit.  Because in doing so, you are rejecting a proposal which is, from a branding perspective, far better than any others that have been proposed - that is, if your goal is mass-adoption of bitcoin.  

mBTC is my preferred term for smaller quantities. Users looking for a short name could refer to them as "milli", omitting the reference to bitcoin alltogether. This type of usage has precedence in a common usage of the word "kilo", the SI-prefix for 1000, which is often used instead of "kilogram" (1000 gram) in several western European countries, omitting the reference to gram alltogether.

Don't worry, there's no possibility of confusion. Nobody under the age of 50 has ever used the word "mill" to refer to a fraction of a dollar, for obvious reasons. Hell, it won't be long before young people start asking their parents what "cents" were.

She's probably more likely to call them "mills", since she is old enough to remember what a thousandth of a currency unit was called, back when that was actually worth something.

I did not state it explicitly, but by dropping the order of magnitude, it is no longer clear how many satoshies a 'bit' is supposed to refer too. Since 100M Satoshies is already has the 'coin' short-form, it makes sense that a 'bit' would refer to 1 Satoshi.

• Imagine that everybody adopts BitDreams' suggestion that 1 'bit' equal 1mBTC.
• About 20 years pass. It now costs $1337 USD to buy one mBTC.
• People decide to move the decimal over again: now 1 'bit' equals 1µBTC.
• Hilarity ensues when coffee suddenly costs 33 bits instead of 0.033 bits.

You say that like people in the US have no idea how to use the metric system. I live in the US, and I use the metric system more often than I use the non-metric system (I work as a scientist). People casually refer to thousands of dollars as "k", which comes from the metric. Everybody learns how to use the metric system in school. I think the difficulty of changing to the metric system is highly overstated.


There will of course be slang terms used by people who have to refer to the money over and over again. Just like how people use the one syllable term "buck" instead of "dollar". To me, "bits" seems like a quick and easy word to say when trying to say something fast, while "mills" is slow and does not roll of the tongue easily enough to catch on. I imagine in the future things will be priced in millibits, and you might say to your friend "could you spot me a couple bits for a drink, I left my phone at home again?".

"bits" is my first thought too, and I like it the most. But, if bitcoin takes hold, the market will ultimately decide what expression we use.
My vote goes to "bits" though. And I will use it until nobody understands me.  ;D

I also like the way "bits" rolls off the tongue. Also for the idea of putting it halfway between satoshis and bitcoins. When "bits" goes obsolete, satoshis will work perfectly.

Even a large number of satoshis would work better than a fraction of a bitcoin. Having traveled in other countries with high rates of inflation, most people don't seem to have trouble with large numbers. It is fractions of a unit that seem to give most non-mathematicians problems.

Besides, you can still buy a million satoshis for less than $2. Perfect selling point to those who are new to bitcoin.

Did this gain any traction?

Why don't you tie it in with world bitcoin day.

I am totally over BTC, long live mBTC / mXBT

BTC can be exclusively for the rich folk lucky enough to own so many mBTC!

I'm down to start talking in mXBT, for all the reasons stated and more.

The only way it's gonna stick, though, is if you start using it casually in all of your posts, not just in this thread. Only once it becomes pervasive on bitcointalk will it start spreading to other sites. Let's do this!!!

Bump, and bookmark ;)