hey - correct usage of "M"

Bob Noel

Bob Noel

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Bob Noel
11 April 2022 newpaper: Headline "FAA issues $81M unruly passenger fine, highest ever"

"The woman, who was not named, was fined $81,950 for her alleged behavior on a flight on July 7"

edit: correcting bad cut/passte
 
'passengerfine' isn't exactly model grammarusage, either.
 
They’re not completely wrong. Until recently, M was a pretty standard abbreviation for “thousand” and “MM” is million. It’s based on the Roman letter for thousand.

You can see it in lots of Latin based languages. Spanish (mil), Portuguese (mil), Italian (mille), French (mille).
 
Sluggo63 said:
They’re not completely wrong. Until recently, M was a pretty standard abbreviation for “thousand” and “MM” is million. It’s based on the Roman letter for thousand.

You can see it in lots of Latin based languages. Spanish (mil), Portuguese (mil), Italian (mille), French (mille).
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if you were responding to me, I wasn't being sarcastic. I was noting that it was actually used correctly unlike people who think that "M" is million.
 
EdFred said:
K -> Kilo -> Thousand
M -> Mega -> Million

Greek vs Roman.
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M is for metre. So it's means one of something.
We use K for 1,000 in cert documents, the FAA seems to be able to read it.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
M is for metre. So it's means one of something.
We use K for 1,000 in cert documents, the FAA seems to be able to read it.
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Yes used in the ever so common:
MeterHertz
MeterJoules
MeterWatts

perhaps you are thinking m rather than M
 
yup... don't forget Megadollars.

get off my lawn
 
I prefer MM for millions, but anymore I am happy that a news article I'm interested in is not written in omg ^^ txt u lol format anymore. To use proper spelling, abbreviations, or to have done a modicum of research not involving twitter is just a bonus.

same, lawn, off. :D
 
I agree with schmookeeg. Traditional English (before the advent of computer lingo) has M for 1000 and MM for million.

Unless you're in the terse, space constrained headlines, it's best to spell it out.

The price of the houses in the exceed two million dollars. Alternatively, $2 million.
 
M James Bond.

In the final novel of the series, The Man with the Golden Gun, M's full identity is revealed as Vice Admiral Sir Miles Messervy KCMG; Messervy had been appointed to head of MI6 after his predecessor had been assassinated at his desk.

Criminy, do I have to so everything here.?? :lol:
 
flyingron said:
I agree with schmookeeg. Traditional English (before the advent of computer lingo) has M for 1000 and MM for million.

Unless you're in the terse, space constrained headlines, it's best to spell it out.

The price of the houses in the exceed two million dollars. Alternatively, $2 million.
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Computer lingo came about in the 1870s? Whodathunk.
 
mmmmmmmm, beer.

so does that mean thousands and thousands of beers or millions of beers?
 
I don't know what point you are trying to make Ed.

First off, mega is indeed Greek, but it doesn't mean million there, it just means large. It didn't become part of the scientific use until the early 1900s to mean million. The M meaning 1000 comes from the French mille, which derives from the Latin for thousand.

OED places the use of M as 1000 in English text back to the fourteenth century where it was adopted from the M use in Roman numerals (certainly derived from the same word as above).

M for Million started to appear around 1955. Yes, that is likely a little too early to ascribe to
to computers, but it is way later than the 1870s you allege. K however, is pretty much unheard of outside of certain computer and scientific use.
 
Gettouttahere with that "metre" talk. I want my measurements based upon the King's anatomy.
 
flyingron said:
I don't know what point you are trying to make Ed.

First off, mega is indeed Greek, but it doesn't mean million there, it just means large. It didn't become part of the scientific use until the early 1900s to mean million. The M meaning 1000 comes from the French mille, which derives from the Latin for thousand.

OED places the use of M as 1000 in English text back to the fourteenth century where it was adopted from the M use in Roman numerals (certainly derived from the same word as above).

M for Million started to appear around 1955. Yes, that is likely a little too early to ascribe to
to computers, but it is way later than the 1870s you allege. K however, is pretty much unheard of outside of certain computer and scientific use.
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Mega was adopted as a prefix for SI units in 1873. Well before computer lingo.
 
eman1200 said:
mmmmmmmm, beer.

so does that mean thousands and thousands of beers or millions of beers?
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MMMMMMMMMM, beer would be millions and millions of beers. mmmmmmmmm, beer would be a very tiny quantity.
 
The finance world also generally uses m=1,000 and mm=1,000,000, at least in shorthand.
 
EdFred said:
Mega was adopted as a prefix for SI units in 1873. Well before computer lingo.
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So, that has nothing to do with M being used for Million in written English. We're not talking about MHz or MOhms here, we're talking about saying things like "The budget may exceed $1M."
 
flyingron said:
K however, is pretty much unheard of outside of certain computer and scientific use.
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flyingron said:
So, that has nothing to do with M being used for Million in written English. We're not talking about MHz or MOhms here, we're talking about saying things like "The budget may exceed $1M."
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So you've NEVER heard someone say something along the lines of, I "make 44k a year." Even before anyone I ever knew started using computers, k (kilo, 1000) was used a lot. Maybe it was regional, but no one around here ever said they made 44M a year.
 
EdFred said:
So you've NEVER heard someone say something along the lines of, I "make 44k a year." Even before anyone I ever knew started using computers, k (kilo, 1000) was used a lot. Maybe it was regional, but no one around here ever said they made 44M a year.
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for the software engineer, "k" isn't 1000, it's 1024.

iow - context is important.
 
asicer said:
IEC 80000-13 defines "K" (kilo) as 1000 and "Ki" (kibi) as 1024.
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hahahahahaha (not laughing at you)

software engineers never ever use "Ki"

ok, I've been retired for 5 years, so maybe now it's used.
 
At my job $M is million and $K is thousands. Although I also use $B a lot too. Big company. :)
 
Oh please... don’t stop. This is pretty awesome!

No, really. I’m serious. This is freakin hilarious. I’m just not smart enough to contribute. So.... don’t stop!

mmmmmmmm beer is my favorite. But it’s all good!
 
If you mix up Mohm and mohm resistors, you're maybe going to burn something up. Likewise mV and kV.
 
Oh oh oh... now I can...

So there I was... worked in a tv repair shop in high school. I fixed all the cheap stuff for the owner. Got a clock radio, dead as a door nail.

Boss pointed out the big ceramic resistor basically hooked up to the power cord and said check that. I knew how to use a voltmeter, appeared to be open. He handed me a new one, I soldered it in and plugged her in...

Heard a cool squeal followed by a snap, whiff of ozone and confetti. Hmmm....

Boss walks back over, picks up the old resistor and checked it on the MEGA OHM setting. Apparently not bad. Who knew? I dumped 100 volts into a couple volt circuit. Pretty much fried everything. The capacitors created the confetti as they blew to bits.

Was reported as not economical to fix...

Back to your regularly hijacked thread...
 
asicer said:
IEC 80000-13 defines "K" (kilo) as 1000 and "Ki" (kibi) as 1024.
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Lower case k for 1000. Upper case M for 1,000,000. kHz = kiloHertz. Why the capital H in Hertz? Because the unit is named after a person. Heinrich Hertz.
 
Slight drift…

computer language/lingo has been mentioned..

I listened to a professor who studies languages speak about how texting and such has changed language. They spoke in a historical context that what we are witnessing is a very rapid period of the evolution of language… that languages as a whole evolve to be simpler over time. That we may see the phonetic spelling of words as sacrilege for those of us who had to work hard for spelling tests but it’s as normal as the day is long.

He sited examples such as reading Shakespeare is difficult often even for those very astute with English, or even George Washington’s farewell address. That both structure of language and accepted spelling of words has changed over the centuries… His opinion was that text is simply another step in that direction and likely will not raise an eyebrow in a generation or two’s time for much of it to be one semi-“official”

It was interesting, IMO :)
 
Huckster79 said:
Slight drift…

computer language/lingo has been mentioned..

He sited examples such as reading Shakespeare is difficult often even for those very astute with English, or even George Washington’s farewell address. That both structure of language and accepted spelling of words has changed over the centuries… His opinion was that text is simply another step in that direction and likely will not raise an eyebrow in a generation or two’s time for much of it to be one semi-“official”

It was interesting, IMO :)
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So he's also a surveyor? :D
 
Huckster79 said:
...

He sited examples such as reading Shakespeare is difficult often even for those very astute with English, or even George Washington’s farewell address. ...
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"sited"

heh heh heh

(sorry, couldn't resist)
 
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