A difference of opinions at the Bitcoin Foundation regarding the XBT proposal?

[bernard75]

3. If bitcoin is a currency, can Mr Matonis provide an example of a currency that is valued at ~$300-400? There is none, of course, so this historical precedent works against bitcoin having 8 digits after the period.

How is this relevant for the definition of “currency”?

Because if it is a commodity, then there are commodities priced as high or higher per unit (gold, platinum, etc.)
However, there are no currency units priced in hundreds of US dollars.

But there are a few currencies worth only 1/100s(even the JPY) or even 1/10000s of the mighty USD, so why not the other way round?
This argument is not viable.

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[bitnanigans]

Having 2 decimal places for the ISO standard makes sense, and it doesn't affect the conversion or other factors.

Just for perspective, there are 1000000 Zimbabwean Dollar notes, so having values like 1000000XBT to represent 0.01BTC isn't too far-fetched.

[CIYAM]

This seems like a *storm in a teacup* to me.

No-one is asking anyone to change the way that their preferred Wallet displays things - the idea of an XBT code is just for *standards compliance* so whatever is *normal practice* is of course what should be used for that (do most people concern themselves with XAU when talking about gold?).

[fathur01]

Having 2 decimal places for the ISO standard makes sense, and it doesn't affect the conversion or other factors.

Just for perspective, there are 1000000 Zimbabwean Dollar notes, so having values like 1000000XBT to represent 0.01BTC isn't too far-fetched.

Then people will get even more confused I think.. 100million will be 1 btc, while 1million seems more logical. I say we go with 1000 mbtcs = 1 btc, not too large not too small, just perfect.

[gafter]

I see your point, but agree with R2D221 and Jon Matonis. Don't know whether 'catastrophic' is the right word, but it would create too much confusion.

As per your example, from the small/medium business or even customer's perspective, you'll be more likely dealing with amounts ranging say between BTC0.01 to BTC100 rather than BTC0.00014321. A few examples:

BTC99.15 = XBT99150000
BTC1.456 = XBT1456000
BTC0.025 = XBT25000

To me, that doesn't look much better than 0.00014321, does it?

Numbers larger than 999 are generally presented with commas for readability. There is no convention for digit separators for numbers less than zero. So your comparison should be

BTC99.15 = XBT 99,150,000
BTC1.456 = XBT 1,456,000
BTC0.025 = XBT 25,000
BTC0.00286 = XBT 286

Only the last two of these numbers is in the range of realistic daily transactions (e.g. song download or lunch), which are the transactions the display unit should be optimized for.

[pawel7777]

First of all,

1. Mr. Matonis talks like he gives everybody else a dictat on how XBT has to to be calculated.
...

Biodom, good news for you. Jon Matonis resigned.

The time has come for me to resign as Executive Director of the Bitcoin Foundation. Thank you for all of your passionate support! More soon.

https://twitter.com/jonmatonis/status/527846975769956352

[Klestin]

OP has missed the entire point. The number of digits after the decimal is currently defined as 8. This could change at a later date to 10 or more digits, to support a world in which the exchange rate (or other factors) calls for finer delineations.  If/when that happens, the magic "2 digits to the right" that OP is after will go away anyways.

The number of digits to the right of the decimal is in many ways arbitrary. Changing it is unlikely to prove controversial.

However, the location of the decimal is absolutely not arbitrary and is extraordinarily unlikely to ever change. If you have 1.1 Bitcoin today, you will (barring spending) have 1.1 Bitcoin tomorrow. This is the base promise of Bitcoin. 1.1 will not become 1,100 any more than 21 million will become 21 billion.

With this in mind, 1 XBT = 1 Bitcoin seems to be the only logical choice.

In any event, XBT is very unlikely to replace "Bitcoin" in everyday verbal usage. If you want the world to begin speaking in uBTC/mBTC/bitc, price your merchandise accordingly.

[bitnanigans]

I don't even think this should be a debate. Every ISO currency makes use of 2 decimal places.

[KingOfTrolls]

I don't even think this should be a debate. Every ISO currency makes use of 2 decimal places.

This is simply wrong:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217

There are hundreds of millions of people who use currency which is not subdivided into hundredths. Why would they want to adopt two decimal places, just because bitcoin?

An international standard needs to treat all peoples equally. I think we should choose the lowest common denominator (i.e. the smallest possible denominational unit) as a compromise between the diverse financial traditions.

[solex]

I don't even think this should be a debate. Every ISO currency makes use of 2 decimal places.

This is simply wrong:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217

There are hundreds of millions of people who use currency which is not subdivided into hundredths. Why would they want to adopt two decimal places, just because bitcoin?

An international standard needs to treat all peoples equally. I think we should choose the lowest common denominator (i.e. the smallest possible denominational unit) as a compromise between the diverse financial traditions.

MOST people are used to 2 decimal place currencies. So by your own comment, they need to be considered.

And satoshis are too ridiculously small to be useful.

As the wikipedia article mentions:

The code JPY is given the exponent 0, because its minor unit, the Sen, although nominally valued at 100th of a Yen is of such negligible value that it is no longer used.

Some currencies do not have any minor currency unit at all and these are given an exponent of 0, as with currencies whose minor units are unused due to negligible value.

[KingOfTrolls]

MOST people are used to 2 decimal place currencies. So by your own comment, they need to be considered.

Yes, everyone needs to be considered. The only clean solution here, to make it right for everyone, is to hide the ISO 4217 code in the back-end whenever possible, and display to the user whatever their locale settings are. The average wallet software should allow this kind of flexibility.
This way the ISO code would become a pure technicality for low layer applications. It makes sense to use the same unit as used in the blockchain / by the protocol then, doesn't it?

And satoshis are too ridiculously small to be useful.

How is that any different than µBTC?

[solex]

MOST people are used to 2 decimal place currencies. So by your own comment, they need to be considered.

Yes, everyone needs to be considered. The only clean solution here, to make it right for everyone, is to hide the ISO 4217 code in the back-end whenever possible, and display to the user whatever their locale settings are. The average wallet software should allow this kind of flexibility.
This way the ISO code would become a pure technicality for low layer applications.

^ Everything here is sensible ^

It makes sense to use the same unit as used in the blockchain / by the protocol then, doesn't it?

No. The purpose of an ISO is to help make bitcoin amounts easily represented in the world's non-bitcoin, existing, mainstream/legacy financial/accounting systems.
A 2dp code achieves this best. In fact, 99% of them expect it.