📄 rule

Aside from the 1 to √2 ratio, the area of A0 paper is exactly 1m². People behind ISO 216 thought of everyting.

Wait, the US genuinely doesn't use A4 etc.?

Wait a second if the bank app can't transfer money how do they do it? Just barter with guns? Are the bullets like coins?

fun fact: the length to width ratio of ISO 216, √2:1, is the same ratio as the tritone in an equal tempered 12-tone musical scale. If you fold A4 paper in half, you get a piece of paper with the same length to width ratio as before; analogously, if you invert a tritone, you get another tritone.

idk why the image says "european", the standard is worldwide. only north america and parts of latin america don't use it afaik.

The annoying "letter" paper size is for some unknown reason what windows always sets as the paper size unless I change it to A4 manually. Naturally if I forget the printer won't print. US paper sizing - annoying me on the other side of the Atlantic.

Is this why my printer has wierd size "letter", that is not sized like letter?

My country (not USA) uses American paper. I hate it.

Do Euro printers say PC LOAD A4?

I think they probably do.

I want to only briefly defend the NA system in terms of naming. I get it, I worked in printing for decades, I know how shitty it all can be. But Letter and Tabloid communicate well for something that is otherwise all the fault of press guys.

It's a beautiful standard that works wonderfully until you have to deal with any actual measurements. 210 x 297 mm - so easy to remember and divide.

As a math nerd, I appreciate the fractaline nature of your paper.

But as an american, what is the practical advantage?? The sizes are so far apart, and you dont get papers with different ratios? Like for example Letter and Legal are both 8.5 inches wide, can be used in any standard cheap household printer, legal is just longer so you can fit more stuff on the page. Letter paper folds into thirds to fit snuggly in an envelope and legal folds into fourths. Other paper sizes are so niche and rarely used why does it matter if theyre a perfect mathematical ratio or not?

Wait... You can't transfer money with a banking App???

America got someone triggered over paper.

Let's not even start with the metric system (used everywhere) and the imperial system (used in the usa and some african countries).

The US also doesn't officially use the metric system sigh.

PC LOAD LETTER? the fuck does that mean!?

Lol, people find the silliest things to be angry and indignant about.

I am just grateful paper isn’t measured in hands

What the fuck, that was way more hilarious than a blog post about financial securities messaging ought to have been

Relevant CGP Grey

1.414, the magic number.

Not-super-fun fact: an 8.5 x 11 inch paper can be useful if you lack a ruler in an American office & you need to measure an inch or a foot.

If you fold the paper like in an image I'll try to attach, the hypotenuse is 12.01 inches.

Edit: then you fold the 12.01 inch side against the 11 inch side to get a 1.01 inch measurement

Not exact, but good enough if you need to know your neck size to buy a fancy shirt online - not that I would ever waste my corporation’s time that way!

What NA does not do this what the fuck, backwards ass country in so many ways.

To be fair, A4 yields unwieldy pages that are too long to comfortably read. And when do you ever need the feature to fold an A4 sheet into A5?

dude devastated americans xD

TIL that there are different standards of paper sizes in other parts of the world. I never encountered this before despite living in Germany for 10 years, probably because the last time I was there was 30 years ago.

I dunno, it doesn’t look so good once you get to “Etc.” size.

do they go down to A -1, A -2 and so on

Eh, letter's height to width ratio looks better.