Re: Mega doesn't mean million

From: Max <max_at_maxie.com>
Date: Sat, 30 Mar 1996 20:35:55 -0500

At 02:32 PM 3/30/96 -0600, you wrote:

> Of all the terms listed there, two tend to be used to just mean big
>(Mega) and small (Micro) I have a real problem with Mega meaning the
>same thing on the Kat world that it does here (That is meaning million in
>some instances, and big in others.) since Razor *has* said "million Megavolts"

Shouldn't cause you a problem. A million-mega is a common electronic term
here too, at least it was until recently. Since giga became popular, a lot
of times now you'll hear it as 1,000 giga. The same things happens on the
small end of things, a pico-pico is very common, and you'll never hear
someone use a nano, it's always 1000 pico. Alas, the quaint usage on the
high end of things may be dying, as 'tera' is starting to take hold. I'll
miss it.

It's unlikely Razor (being a techno-Kat of sorts) would have used 'mega' in
an abstract way, so it is likely he meant a 1 teravolt missile. (If a
Katvolt = Earthvolt, OUCH!) If he'd said it as a 'teravolt missile', not
only would a most of the viewers not get the meaning, it just wouldn't sound
that impressive.

I believe this million-million got it's start because it was an easier to
understand concept than 1 tera. (1,000,000,000,000 look at all the pretty
zero's!)

 Max




Received on Sat Mar 30 1996 - 20:45:56 PST