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Bureau of Engraving and Printing Issues New US$20
jea6 writes "Hot off the Western Currency Facility presses in Fort Worth! The Bureau of Engraving and Printing is issuing the new US$20 note to banks today. The newly redesigned Series 2004 $20 notes have background colors (so long, greenbacks) and improved security features. Ask your bank to send a few your way. Unlike the U.S Mint's "Golden Dollar", these notes will be issued to replace the Series 2001 note. Look for a redesigned Grant in 2004 and a new Benjamin in 2005. The US Government is spending $53,000,000 over the next 5 years to make sure everybody knows that this is a real note, so go get acquainted with one."
So the USA is catching up with the rest of the world at last?
So, when will the USA switch to Euro?
A monkey is doing the real work for me.
About Our Canadian Monopoly money then! Mwah! Actually it's a good thing I think, makes it harder to counterfit, and eaiser to recognize at a glance. What is really cool is the $AUD (australian) with the plastic style see through portion of their money. ~The Doc.
...any very high-quality, very high-resolution images yet? I want to, um, memorise it so that I can't be tricked. In fact, why not print a few, let's say, thousands of it on my color laser printer - memorising is so much easier if you don't have to stare at a computer screen!
Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
That, they didn't change.
I know it's kind-of silly, but I always really liked having all green bills. It makes my money-wads look a lot less messy. I've had money-wads of multi-colored bills, and it just gets ugly. The mass of colors ends up so busy that its irritating to look at.
Of course, I'm a little obsessive compulsive and my favorite color is green, but it's alright to have a biased position.
There will be no recall or devaluation of any U.S. currency. Old or new, all U.S. currency always will be honored at full face value.
So, tell me, if I'm a counterfitter, why wouldn't I just copy the older bills and 'age' them in the washing machine?
Only in America will they spend $35 million dollars to promote something everyone already wants, money.
sin(6cos(r)+5A)
In 2001 they released a new bill design, and said "we want to stay one step ahead of the counterfeiters". Before that the bill had been unchanged for, what, 30 years? And now three years later, they're releasing a new bill? Its being kept hush-hush, but this is a clear sign that our currency is being successfully counterfitted.
The 20 is the most forged in the US, while the 100 is most forged outside the US. I have seen a clerk us a special marker pen to check a 50 someoen tried to use at a restaraunt, but what is the new method for this new 20?
Just incase you have to leave the electronic banking world and use hard money.
You have 5 Moderator Points!
Which Helpless Linux zealot/MS basher do you want to mod down today?
Would the color of a Bill Clinton bill be pink? ;-)
The USA will adopt the Euro currency the moment European countries stops depending on the USA to resolve every international crisis.
As a show of unity, France and Germany will adopt the Russian Ruble - the three countries will rename the currency the "crumble". Crum - for short.
Euro - what a shitty name for currency!
The Aussie notes are amongst the best in the world, IMO.
Different colours for different values.
Different sizes for different values.
They're based on Polymer. Put one through the wash, it comes out looking like new. Well, almost.
Some extremely sophisticated anti-counterfeiting techniques.
Our Reserve Bank has even been thoughtful enough to worry about those with vision impairment.
And, they just look cool.
I imagine this chnage in the currency will require new vending and change machines. I hope places do it a lot faster than the last time around... the school I went to still doesn't have a change machine that can support the most recent $5 bill.
What about all the ones the US did nothing about? Sierra Leone? The Argentinian Junta? The Malaysian emergency? No, you've heard nothing about those. Especially not the last one, which shows how to beat communist jungle fighters...
They still look rather dull and boring. Why make all the notes the same colour? it's easier for people with poor eyesight to distinguish between the different notes if they're different colours and sizes.
I'm British. I'm used to European money, which is all different colours and different sizes, and in a lot of cases is made out of plastic. You probably don't realise just how weird American money looks to us; it's all the same size, it's all the same colour --- even the material feels odd; thin and papery and not very robust. (Rag paper, isn't it?)
When I last visited the US, dealing with American money was a continual surprise. Normally when I visit another country it doesn't take long before I can recognise notes by colour and size, which makes it much easier to handle. With American money, I kept having to peer at it to work out what it was I was about to hand over. I got the impression that they were designed by someone who knew about ergonomics, but wanted no truck with the idea.
Of course, this is mostly just a matter of being used to a different system (I expect that with some practice you get used to looking at the picture rather than the overall design), but I do wonder how blind and partially sighted people manage.
While this isn't a complete solution, at least the high-denomination notes will look different from the low-denomination notes, which will make it much less easy to, e.g., tip someone a hundred dollars instead of one. (Although whether this is considered a benefit depends which side of the transaction you're standing.)
How does this compare with other countries? As an Australian I must say I prefer AUD/NZ style notes but prefer the American coins..
:)
Those security measures have been around since the 80's in Australia by the way.. we welcome your currency to the 80's
The US Government is spending $53,000,000 over the next 5 years to make sure everybody knows that this is a real note, so go get acquainted with one."
From the parent post:
Only in America will they spend $35 million dollars to promote something everyone already wants, money.
The other $18 million is being earmarked to fight dyslexia. Or was it $81 million?
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
Euro - what a shitty name for currency!
Even more creative than "Dollar", because this name was ripped off from the Austrian currency "Taler" that was first established in the 15th century. But Euro on the other side symbolizes unity, a unity of countries with a currency stronger than the dollar (it is way stronger, even OPEC thinks about switching from Dollar to Euro as standard currency).
A monkey is doing the real work for me.
Thousands of peices of clipart rendered obsolete!
ADVENTURERS! - ANTIHERO FOR HIRE - CARDMASTER CONFLICT
Banknotes don't last forever. In a few years' time, the old-style $20 notes will have been withdrawn by banks simply because they're old and tatty and falling apart. (By which time, the counterfeiters will have figured out how to forge the new notes, but hey).
-Stephen
I'll take 5 plates, 10,000, gallons of ink and as much printing paper as you can give me.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
is that the sound of a dollar prices tumbling i hear or just the noise from a nation of unemployed going down the pan ?
Remember being absolutely amazed by the $5 note when in Oz in 1994 (I think it was the only plastic one at the time).
Tell me tho, Is there any truth to the suggestion you can bake these notes in a slow oven to shrink them to make key-fobs? Or were you Aussies just pulling my leg?
Just another trick of the "Iluminintia" to keep you under the boot heel of the fake Federal Reserve. A note is still as worthless as it ever was, amazing that we get charged such a high price for a group of counterfeiters to give us our own money. I wonder what the Dove Report has to say about this one?? LOL (in a whispy, fairy-like voice) "Oh beloved Ascended Master Franken Berry! Please forgive those who make pink $20's! We are mere mortals who love your cereal, but can never find it in stores... only our Target stores!" or something like that...
Is it just me? Or does it look like someone splaterd malted butter all over the back of the bill? I understand we need to be secure, but couldent we do it a bit more subtly? People are eventually going to learn how to print their own 20s just like that, and anyway, they can still use the old ones they can print of.
DUKEY!
would be to alter the sizes so the blind can tell them apart, just about every country in the world has different sized bank notes for this reason, why not the US....
Kingdom of Loathing (www.kingdomofloathing.com) Addicted is me
It's a nuisance having all the notes different colours. They become less uniform. It's bad enough that they have different pictures on them. Can't they all be the same except for the value? Only the laziest of people and those stupid Canucks can't be bothered to read the number.
What's even more annoying is that small change comes in different sizes. Not only that, but the sizes are illogical. I mean come on! 5c is bigger than 10c! We need to make themn all the same size and all the same colour to remove this confusion.
even OPEC thinks about switching from Dollar to Euro as standard currency
If this ever happens, the US is up shit creek. Expect lots of trouble if they try to do this. Remember Iraq?
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
The issue I see with this form of anti-piracy copy protection is that the methods to detect fraud take too long.
When I worked in retail where a typical purchase was about $35, we saw Twenties all day long. The only thing we did was make sure it was put in the drawer facing the same way so the manager wouldn't get upset when he did the count that night.
For $50 or $100 we had a yellow pen that you ran on the bill and the ink would be brown for a good bill, black if it was not.
THAT'S IT - there was no using a microscope to read Jackson's lips as he spoke the word "Republic".
Bottom line is, unless retailers perceive there is a problem to their bottom line because the banks won't accept their cash deposits full of bad cash, the best solution is for the mint to print fewer bills and assume a certain percentage of fraudulent bills are in circulation.
It woudl save the treasury money on ink and cotton paper!
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
All the big portrait remakes of U.S. currency neglected the one dollar bill.
From what I understand, paper money costs more to maintain relative to coin over a period of years. Wear and tear means reprinting and replacement over a shorter life cycle for paper currency.
There's been 2 or 3 attempts to get US to use one dollar coins, and the vending machine manufacturers and the casinos would welcome the move, but people keep wanting to use those $1 bills over the Ike dollars, the Susan B. dollars and I'm not sure what else.
What's weird is that coins up to $20 denomination were used in the 19th century. And that was when $20 represented something like 2/3 of a month's wages for many people.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
It looks like Queer Eye visited the US Treasury.
The US mint anf Govt is being really stinking stupid.
Let's make new hard to copy bills...
oh but the old stuff is still perfectly fine...
so all counterfitters need to do is continue what they have done forever? as the new bills mean nothing to them as the old bills are still useable and therefore the counterfits are still useable.
pure stupidity... have the banks pull them out of circulation and announce a death date for the bills. I.E. 60 days after the introduction of the new bill the old bills will be worthless. you can trade them in at a bank after that. (and the bank inspectes them carefully)
anything else is a waste of time and effort.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Euro - what a shitty name for currency!
It makes the name of budget black holes like "Eurofighter" so much mnore appropriate though
The much-stronger-than-the-US-dollar Sterling wishes to disagree.
I only occasionally use cash now.
Most of the time I use my credit card, faster, easier, less to carry, no lost change, no pockets of change, no rolling of change.
I get a nice clean statement telling me what I have purchased.
I just use cash for the few places that don't take Credit cards.
They've got so much going for them that Australia mints notes for a number of other countries in the region. There is a down side to them, though. The plastic doesn't feel as nice as the paper money, and I still think they're a little harder to handle.
replace the $1 and $5 bills with coins. Harder to counterfit, and much longer lasting. I just visited Canada, and they do not use bills for anything less than $5. They have a dollar coin with a picture of a loon (type of duck) which they call a loonie. They also have a two-dollar coin which looks like a euro that they call a toonie. Who says Canadians don't have a sense of humour.
In criminal and illegal business the Euro has wolrdwide achieved a leading role due to the existence of the 500 Euro notes. So you can stuff more money in a bag etc. Furthermore criminals switched much of the money laundries and storage to Europe. This has a major impact on the economy - the criminal market is worth at least 1100 billion Dollar a year. This has even lead to the radical decline of the Dollar we see these days.
So the US authorities being not all that stupid are going now to introduce smaller Dollar notes to fight the Euro's competitive advantage and stop the continuous devaluation of the Dollar.
Owner of a Mensa membership card.
is start making the bills in different sizes. what good do different colors do for blind folks?
!(^((ri)|(mp))aa$)
You know, I found I derived more enjoyment and satisfaction from the flash tutorial talking about the new bill than I'll ever enjoy from fondling the real money. *sigh*
Rooting for the yankees is like rooting for herpes.
I, for one, welcome our new capitalist ov... oh wait.
God the US treasury has finally discovered that different colours allow people to distinguish different value notes more easily. What's next, different sizes of notes to help the blind?
> US Government is spending $53,000,000 over the next 5 years to make sure everybody knows that this is a real note, so go get acquainted with one.
Well, you have to spend money to make money..
An Idea I've had for an while: let Chille, and other countries that use the US dollar as the national currency design their own bills, for circulation in their country only. They would be legal US currency, and you could spend them in any US store, but the only way to get them in the US is to physically go to that country (where they would be common).
Better yet, we can put some limits that would help in the long run. Let them do a $1 coin, but not $1 bill. National pride should then get people to prefer the $1 coin, and that would go a long ways to saving the US more money that implimenting the system would cost.
Not exactly ontopic, but an interesting idea that goes along with the topic. Tell your friends and congressmen to do it as a goodwill gesture to those countires that are not maintaining a currency.
The subject line was hyperbole, but really it is getting there. My current spending habits are that >95% of my monthly spending is totally electronic, and the remainder will be electronic soon enough (delivery. Most delivery drivers are being equipped with wireless debit pads for using your bank debit card at your door). At any average store or restaurant, overwhelmingly patrons are paying by debit card rather than dealing with cash and all of the change issues (especially here in Canada where up to two dollars are change - the bulk of change that can be acquired in a day of using paper currency is staggering...literally). The exception to this rule is Tim Hortons, a ridiculously popular coffee shop that refuses debit cards for speed issues.
The release of the new bills is not hush hush. The complete failure of the 2001 bill to stem the rising tide of counterfeiting is being kept hush-hush. They don't want more people jumping on the bandwagon.
Notice it's columns with an "s", but the figure on your keyboard "$" only has one column. WTFIzUpWithThat?
Can we think of an expermient to test whether the gubmint is 0 steps or 1 step ahead of counterfeitters?
The Mint is doing something right -- they're not printing the old $20 anymore, and are switching to the new peach-colored one. *Unlike* with the Sacagawea dollar, where they kept producing paper dollars. How did they expect people to make a switch when the old & familiar is still available?
Chip H.
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just send a new $20 bill to every person in the US?
I am NOT a man!
I am a free number!
Spending 53 million to make sure everyone knows the new bills are real doesn't seem like such a big deal when you're the one in charge of printing the cash you spend!
And if you want to go back further, thalers were so named becausee they were made with silver mined at Thal.
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
American bills had always been pretty bad because they had to print a lot (several times more than what ciruclates inside the US) since it's an global currency, not just the currency of the US of A, and as a result printing bills had to be very cheap and very fast. They thoguht that conterfeiting was a necessary evil.
And now, even though they'd sooner tear their left arms off and beat themselves to death with them than admit it, those new bills introduce a lot of the security features the Euro (most expensive bills ever made) bills use. Interesting change of policy.
A new Iraqi currency without Saddam's face on it will be introduced soon. I saw a quick glimpse, they're greenbacks. Ahem.
I wonder what color this recycled paper will be in a few years. It's made from 30% recycled US currency, and it's a nice pale green right now.
Pillars of Hercules: the name refers to Gibraltar and one or two mountains around Ceuta. The ancient Greeks believed that Hercules had set up the mountains as a warning not to pass out of the Med into the Ocean.
As far as the strength or weakness of the dollar or euro, the euro has all the benefits of the mark and all the liabilities of the lira going for it. Right now it seems to be in a mark phase; eventually we may see it hit a lira phase.
So, when will the USA switch to Euro?
When will the Euro and the Dollar freeze parity?
And before you start ranting or laughing, think about it.
I say in 20 years from now the latest we'll have a unified currency across the western hemispere. At least the western hemispere.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
One of the little hassles of life I struck when moving from New Zealand to the US is the greater effort required to empty my pocket of coins. I'd never seen those little boxes of pennies on shop counters. In NZ we gave up our 1 and 2 cent coins long ago and nobody seemed to suffer much. In the US this is the subject of a raging debate. Change (no pun intended) doesn't come easily here. In NZ we also have $1 and $2 coins and prices are usually inclusive of tax so there are fewer oddball amounts to pay.
Clicky clicky.
Right now, 1 EUR = 1.17USD.
We might be able to Slashdot the US Treasury Dept.
There are four boxes used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order.
On your next trip to America, just remember this simple little mathmatical formula:
1 is less than 5 is less than 10 is less than 20 is less than 50 is less than 100
If this still proves to be difficult, just hand over your wallet to one of us and we will audit your currency for you...for a small fee.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
You might have missed the numbers in large print... US currency is designated with positive integers like "1", "5", "10", "20", "50", "100", which indicates the value.
The texture of each bill is slightly different. The newsstand near my office is run by a blind guy who is likely the fastest money sorter/counter that I have ever met.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
And I thought only german names for authorities where obnoxious.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
duh, like e2 is a credible source.
all variations of "thaler","taler" and "dollar" stem from the silver coins produced at the "Joachimstaler Silvermine" (which is named after the village Saint Joachimsthal in the Erzgebirge in what is today Germany) where silver coins are produce since pretty early. You may look that up in your favourite book of etymology.
You may also know that Austrians speak german (or germans speak austrian, by the time the words came up nations like today didnt even exist).
So yes the term doller comes a word that is as much austrian as it is german. Just because some spanish guy used the term "taler" to denote something similar to a taler does not make it a spanish word.
the most sexp i get is my paren-mode.
"The US Government is spending $53,000,000 over the next 5 years to make sure everybody knows that this is a real note" ...you have to spend money to make money.
"The Bank...I WILL KILL IT!!!" -- Andrew Jackson, circa 1820s. isn't this like rubbing salt in a wound of a dead president?
The site is loaded with information on not just notes but coins as well, just browse around.
And, they just look cool.
I have to say, nothing says 'World Power' like having a guy named 'Banjo' on your money. Plus, all the portraits that appear on your bills have a common flaw. The subjects all appear to be suffering from extreme constipation. I guess the colors and stuff are okay...however, it must be hard on the slang users. It just sounds wussy saying "Yeah, I'm really clockin' that pink and purple slangin' them keys, boy"
I have to say, I'd rather see green/black than tie-dyed any day. That's just me though, and my observations are based solely upon asthetics. I suppose it's cool to get not just money out of your wallet, but an explosion of riotous color, as well. It makes mundane things like buying nutella bright and cheery.
http://xkcd.com/386/
Wouldn't it be cheaper to just send a new $20 bill to every person in the US?
How stupid are you? The current US population is roughly 280 million. So, off the top of my head, they're spending a little more than 20 cents, not $20, per capita to get their message out to the public.
If you think that ~20 cents = $20, then you shouldn't be let lose with money. Heck, you should give every penny you have and earn to me right now.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
...is that the US has never had a good one. At least, not in recent memory.
* The Ike dollar (I keep one in my wallet as a memento) is *huge*. But five of those in your pocket and you're encumbered!
* The Anthony? Bah. The "Carter Quarter" has it's heart in the right place, but not it's head. Too easy to mistake for a quarter.
* The Sacagawea? Getting better, but still poor. The color change helps, but the size and shape is bad. If you're blind, it's impossible to tell from the quarter, like the Anthony.
What I'd do:
* Redesign the dollar coin to be 1/10th larger than the quarter. This would be smaller than the half dollar, but still be big enough to tell what it is by touch.
* Make it a different SHAPE. Square or pentagonal with rounded edges, for example.
46. The Hobo smiles, his eyes glaze over, and he burps. "Beware the man who has lived longer than the Wasteland."
The much-stronger-than-the-US-dollar Sterling wishes to disagree.
Unfortunately, since it's inanimate, it can't. Also, it doesn't look cool. It may be stronger than Hulk Hogan; I don't know and I don't care. It still looks like an old lady with a large stick jammed somewhere unpleasant. Looks != performance.
http://xkcd.com/386/
Euro is stronger right now..but the week political unity of the EU could and likely will change that sooner than later.
The only way to bust a doper--is when you yourself become a smoker!
RFIDs are in the $20s
Note that Germany as such did not exist until the mid of the 19th century. Most of the territory of Germany was part of the Holy Roman Empire which was ruled by the Habsburg family and is the predecessor of the Austro-Hungarian empire.
When looking into an ethymologic dictionary, remember that it does not state the country but rather the language from which the word originates, thus a word marked as "German" could as well have an origin in Austria, as we are speaking German.
where's all that Karma?
'Scuse me? Money has to be promoted to the public? Oh what a waste. In my lifetime the 2 USD bill was a fairly special item to receive, so we saved them
I wonder if someone could put together information on these:
A. How much money has overall been spent in advertising newly issued US currency?
B. How much was spent advertising the Euro?
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
1. Print Money
2. ???
3. Profit!!!
I wonder how new dollar bills affect vending machines that accept cash. Granted, most coke machines don't deal in anything but one dollar, but with the "self-checkout" popping up in supermarkets (i hate it btw), the machines accept bills in any denomination - they will probably have to adjust whatever it is they use to recognize new bills.
grisha.org
While the USA has added a number of security features they are still all the same colour. This is an important issue since colour makes it harder to copy with a colour photocopier and also from a 'user' perspective colour helps distinguish the value without having to check the text. Its so easy to pull out the wrong value out of your wallet when they are all the same colour, unless you pull them out and look at the text. When they are different colours you just need to look at the colour and pull out the right coloured notes.
Sometimes the best security is in the ergonomics. Shop keepers don't always have the time to check the security features on all the notes.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
In these days of 100dpi screens and vector fonts, I don't know why dollar signs arent drawn properly. Pound signs are the same - there are supposed to be two horizontal bars, but they are commonly only drawn with one on most character sets.
Changing the colors isn't going to stop couterfiters. The US government isn't necessarily fighting counterfiters, it IS fighting technology. I recently read that a University of Toledo Co-Ed was arrested in her dorm room as she was printing MORE counterfit $20's and $50's on her personal computer. Hello! Most places check BIG bills with that special magic marker. She was caught because she gave a $50 to a friend who tried to pay for dinner with it. When the police arrested him, he turn her in. The only way to deter counterfitting is to make the punishment extremely harsh and rank it up there along with terrorism and treason. In a sense, the anti-social neurologically dysfunctional criminal is committing a form of economic treason. They should be sentenced to LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE in a hard labor camp busting rocks in a dungeon, never to see daylight again, with a 40 pound steel ball chained and permanent welded to one of their ankles. And they thought being poor was bad?
Besides, I think the new colored money looks like play money. It looked so much better before, so "business" like, so plain, so drab. Man, it was serious. Now all I think about when I see these new bills is an excerpt from "The Bird Cage" when Robin Williams asks his live-in partner: "What about those? Oh, that, well, one does want a hint of color!"
It also costs them money to handle cash. There is extra security for storing and handling cash, keeping change on hand, making bank deposits, bank service fees, etc. There is a whole industry built around providing support services for the use of cash in retail stores, and that is an additional cost for the retailer.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
I'm not worried about dollar stores, I'm worried about Strip Clubs. "And now, on the center pole, Candi!" - Jingle Jingle Jingle.
Newer ones have Sir Henry Parkes and Catherine Helen Spence
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
Why does Ben Franklin look constipated?:)
When the U.S.A. became a nation, the dollar acquired the category of national currency. In those coins were engraved the Columns of Hercules, the symbol for the Spanish Empire, that ultimately were converted into the sign that epitomizes dollars and money everywhere: $
o rigin .html
Not according to:
http://www.alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fx
"Since three of the four names given above for the Spanish dollar start with p (and pluralize with s), it was natural for abbreviations like p and ps to be used. Sometimes ps was written
s
as P -- P with a superscript s....Now, what happens if you write P with a superscript s *fast*...Naturally, you join the letters....Reduce the P to a single stroke and you have the form of the $ with a double vertical; omit it altogether and you get the single vertical."
counterfitting US bills is mainly done by taking a low value US bill (1, 2 or 5) then bleaching it as white as possible. The paper retains the texture/chemicals for fraud tests
The fraud-checking pens test for bleach on the paper. Which is a chemical. Stop lying.
I used to run a computer network at a fairly large amusement park in Scotland. When all the rides were paid for by cash, the week's takings were collected in a 7.5 ton truck. They went over to paper tickets and wristbands, allowing parents to use banknotes. That first week, they picked twice the value of takings up in an Escort van...
When I was in the service and overseas, this was a common attitude to the local currencies among many service members, indentifying the local bills with monopoly money.
The irony is, that if the economy continues to be go downhill for regular folks (vs getting better for the bigwigs), then GWB will go down in history as the president who introduced "monopoly money" as the standard US Currency.
Your milage may vary
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
mod parent up please!
"Banjo" Patterson is a well respected Australian Poet. God forbid a country honour people who made a contribution to Australian society, rather then people who managed to get enough votes to run the country.
What we really need are features making it easier for blind citizens to tell the different bills apart. I find it hard to believe some of the more prominent advocacy groups haven't pushed this harder.
The average life expectancy of a bill is actually shorter than the average length of time it takes for a bill to reach public circulation. Most bills never even make it to the public's hands before wearing out. If you're in London, you may not have any American currency on you, so I'll pull out my wallet and have a look at the dates: 2001, 2001, 2001, 1999, 2001, 1996, 1999, 1999. Only one bill is older than 4 years, so in a few years when the old bills have worn out, it will be nearly impossible for counterfitters to introduce large numbers of old bills without drawing attention to themselves. Plus, if only 10% of the money in circulations is an old-style bill, stores will subject it to more scrutiny, making it harder to create a convincing counterfit.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
>> stronger than the dollar
This is like saying a gallon is stronger than a quart.
Currencies are just different units of measurement. What you need to keep your eye on is the PPP, or purchasing power parity, fancy econ-speak for the idea that all currencies should have equal claim on resources after differences in the currency's face value have been worked out. The PPP for all currencies should be about the same in the long run, or arbitrage will occur to shore up the difference.
Check out the Big Mac for a semi-serious overview of PPP.
Having a different size for each denomination must make bill handling machinery (such as change machines and ATMs) needlessly complicated.
http://www.bank.lv/eng/main/lvnaud/papnaud/index.p hp?32635
Try that
a $5 an hour McDonald's employee isn't going to scrutinize a 10 year old 20.
If they just made them a little bit smaller they could replace those lost bills from my kids monopoly game..
I don't know why dollar signs arent drawn properly
:)
What makes you think that they aren't drawn properly? I'm looking at an image of the $100 US Platinum coin, and though it's hard to see, it appears to me that it only has one vertical bar.
I'd say that usage on actual US money validates the use of the 1-bar $, wouldn't you?
Please send me $1,000,000 in $20s, and I and my friends will get very aquainted with them.
Thank you.
Sheesh!
2 pillars are stronger than one. Is someone trying to send us a message here about the strength of the US dollar?
All misspellings and grammatical errors in the above post are intentional and part of my artistic expression.
Wow, they could have saved all that money if they had given some of those new bills to Madonna and Britney to flash after they lip-locked last month. Since that image traveled around the internet, was shown multiple times on TV, was in all the papers, it seems that celebrity lesbian acts might be the ultimate example of viral marketing.
Hmmmm...I claim copyright, patent, and trademark on CelebrityLesbianViralMarketing. Time to go type up a business plan...
I've spent a bit of time in Canada, and they've completely replaced $1 and $2 bills with coins. The hardest part about getting used to them is thinking of a $2 denomination. ($2 bills never really caught on here, did they?) I'd happily trade away my pennies - I almost always throw them in that little cup on the counter.
... even if we say we do
(a little off on a tangent, but it's also not at all difficult to get used to Metric road signs and weights/measurements when everything is metric - The metric movement in the US died off because
a: we don't like change... not really
b:because of a, they tried to inch it along incrementally, causing more confusion than if we just went cold-turkey.
The new paper money will probably go more smoothly than getting rid of pennies or replacing $1s and $2s with coins when all is said and done though.
The Digital Sorceress
I have a pocket full of Australian currency with me right now. (I'm an American who travels to Sydney often on business.) I can tell you in no uncertain terms that Aussie money is a giant pain in the ass compared to American money.
The biggest problem is that the Aussie bills stick together in humid weather. (Not that New South Wales ever gets humid... ha!) Reach in your pocket for a $20 note to buy a newspaper or a pack of cigarettes and you have to stand at the till for a minute and a half trying to get all the bills unstuck so you can be sure you're not handing over two.
Sig Applied For
the hong kong 10 dollar bill is the coolest bill i have ever used, it looks like its from the future and you should call it a credit.
I wish i could find a picture, i have 2 around but i dont want my webspace to be hammered.
Chinese money is also pretty colorful.
Indonesia's 100000 bill is also plastic, also is the thailand 50 baht
Not actually. Hold up a bill so that the portrait is upright and call the vertical size Y and the horizontal size X. All Australian bills have the same Y. They're all the same "width," if you will. They're just all different "lengths." So bill handling machines that take and dispense bills "lengthwise" have no problem.
Not at all. Really no different from a pop machine being able to recognize the different coins you insert into it.
Why the fuck is the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing using www.moneyfactory.com as their URL? As part of the government, shouldn't they be in .gov, or at possibly .us?
I'm trolling. It's my right to burn my karma if I want to.
:-)
So what's with all the idiotic posts? I get the very sincere feeling that most people here have no idea what they're talking about.
"Counterfitter?" Sheesh. If I wanted to talk about one of those, I'd go to Home Depot.
Shut up if you don't know what you're blabbering about. Go spend a little time researching things (i.e. using google) and THEN post.
It's good to rant every now and then.
Oh, and I do realize this post isn't much better anyway.
One of the reasons the penny is still around, even though many people would like to see them go, is the zinc lobby.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
You're an idiot.
The new notes make no sense for every reason but one:
Stopping the spread of counterfeit currency, especially the currency that flows from North Korean is the aim of this new design. North Korean is able to make US $20 that are nearly identical to the current currency.
But for how long will the current $20's be honored? There are still bills of the previous design floating around. Can North Korea continue to make the current $20's for years to come?
As more of the new bills come into circulation and more of the old bills go out, percentage of old bills becomes small. Thus, if someone tries to pay you with an old bill, you can put it through more rigorous checks to see if it's fake, since you'll only need to check 1% of the $20 bills you receive instead of 100%.
paintball
Cause Its really aesthetic to have every single bill the same size, colour. Fucking moron.
Yes, I must be a moron not to want my money to look like an explosion in the Day-Glo paint factory. That means I have no taste. I'd prefer elegant, understated dignity over eye-gouging medleys of pink and purple. I sure have no aesthetic taste at all. Boy, you're sure smart.
Dignified, refined, and elegant or a second-grader's first experience with neon fingerpaint. I'll take the former, please. You can have the latter.
http://xkcd.com/386/
Anybody know where a pix of these can be found that is in a true web standard? Sorry to see (but not surprised) the government embracing proprietary formats to this degree. They've been using PDF for years of course, but PDF has no open standards counterpart (please correct me if I am wrong!) while most flash could be replaced with scripted SVG.
Peace, or Not?
Give counterfeiters a few months headstart on making our latest bill, check.
Didn't the Treasury say it would take 5 years for people to make accurate counterfeits of current 20 dollars bills, and it ended up taking only 3-4 months? Hm, 2004 is still 2 months away...can we expect countefeit 2004s by February?
The Right Reverend K. Reid Wightman,
who gives a fuck?
Not news for nerds nor stuff that matters
From the picture of on the CNN site, it looks like they changed the green part to be closer to the monopoly $20... I wonder if they'll change the $50 to blue and $100 to yellow so as to match.
It would certainly be a shame if people who didn't like the new silly-looking currency took a hole-punch and made a small hole in each new pinkish-greenish $20 that passed through their hands...
Any good ideas for an address for them to send the resulting confetti to?
You could just take that all the way and say that having different denominations and different money formats (coins vs bills) makes money handing machinery needlessly complicated. After all, having all the money be one simple denomiation in one simple format would make all the money handing machinery so much more simple, right?
There are enough benefits to having different size bills for different denominations that I'd say any complications to the machinery is not needless whatsoever.
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
Oddball amounts in the US are not the result of taxes being added to the total. Shopkeepers could easily work backwards to price things such that the taxes rounded off the total.
Our non-round prices were intentionally set to force cashiers to use the cash register. If prices were nice and easy to calculate in one's head and were likely to come to some round number, a cashier might never key the sale into the register. Since the number was round, the customer might hand over the exact amount. The cashier could pocket the amount of the entire sale.
By forcing the cashier to key the sale into the cash register, and forcing the cashier to make change, the opportunities to steal are reduced.
"...the Mint has known for years..."
The mint "mints" coins.
The Bureau of Engraving and Printing "prints" the paper money...
They are seperate govt. agencies.
I know you're kidding, but seriously, the 1-pound coins really are heavy -- not quite a pound, maybe, but heavy for a coin.
I often wondered what the hell they are made of -- I'll never forget the first time someone handed me one. Pretty weird sensation when you expect it to weigh practically nothing -- and in fact it weighs quite a bit (for a coin anyway).
Doing a quick Google...ah, a 2003 pound coin (yes, they change the design every year) weighs 9.5 g and is 22.5 mm in diameter, while an American quarter weighs 5.67 g and is 24.25 mm in diameter.
The pound coin is nickel-brass alloy (copper 70%, zinc 24.5%, nickel 5.5%); the quarter is cupro-nickel clad (8.33% nickel, 91.67% copper).
Cheers,
Ethelred
Everyone wants to be Ethelred. Even I want to be Ethelred.
this looks VERY european. Next thing you know dollars would be printed on paper, and not our superstrong cloth material we use.
prices are usually inclusive of tax so there are fewer oddball amounts to pay.
That's something that's always made sense to me. I wish we'd do that as well
Not everything is analogous to cars. Car analogies rarely work.
Check out http://www.wheresgeorge.com to find out.
Yeah, its called a credit/debit card!
moo.
I bet this isn't a problem with Linux copy machines or hold down the Window key when sending it as a fax
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
The US Government is spending $53,000,000 over the next 5 years to make sure everybody knows that this is a real note, so go get acquainted with one.
53 billion in advertising? are you kidding? why not just give some away? trickle down economics anyone?
Ok. But where does the word "Thaler" come from? I'll tell you - it is of German origin. The German word for valley is "Tal", which was written as "Thal" before a semi-recent orthographic reform of German.
And if I'm not mistaken (which admittedly happens), the term "Thaler" for currency comes from something like "Joachimsthal" which was an area in the present day Czech Republic known for its silver. This is all from memory so I may be getting the specifics wrong, but the point is that the word "Dollar" is Germanic.
A publicly traded company exists solely to make profits for shareholders.
I'd have to disagree. Have you ever looked at old US currency - like Civil War era? There is a symbol on it - a "U" with an "S" on top of it. These letters stand for "United States." Draw a "U" with an "S" on top of it. What does that look like to you? Bingo - $.
A publicly traded company exists solely to make profits for shareholders.
ObMontyPython
Good Evening. Tonight on the Money Programme, we're going to talk about money, and lots of it!
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
The problem is my paycheck often has negative, irrational or imaginary dollar amounts.
I've seen that information about the history of the US dollar elsewhere; I just used the e2 writeup because it was most convenient. Here's info from The Straight Dope if you want something more credible.
Eet ees about time americans put coulour in
their moneee.
I am... how you say... foreign. wee foreigners are so superior. yet we
do not bathe. for we like the stinkeeness.
now why you not use the metric system? ha ha ho ho. i have made such the funny joke.
In my country... and I must start every sentence
with 'In my country'... we do not like the Disneyland and McDonalds
Ha ha! I fart in your general direction and write derisive theengs in my blog about you
The only thing I use paper money for is milk shakes and lap dances.
This is not my sandwich.
Yeah, retailers were a big part of the education campaign. (Think Walmart, not Wally's Corner Market)
That pen you used was to test for the presence of wood-based paper. The old iodine-starch trick.
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
I like ours better: the Loonie.
According to the press release (scroll down),
"New designs for the $50 and $100 notes are scheduled for introduction in 2004 and 2005, respectively. Different colors will be used for different denominations..."
I have looked and looked, but found nothing about what those colors will be. Any suggestions? Is peach the right color for the twenties?
And, they just look cool.
I was half expecting to find a person on one of the notes wearing sun glasses.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
You don't even put "10" on your 10 cent piece, you name it after some chewy caramel bar instead. And is it a cent or a penny you use? Make up your mind!
When will they get it through their heads that the construction of the bill won't every solve counterfeiting? Anything they can make, others can make too. Last time, the Russian mafia had excellent fakes out almost before most people in the US had the new bills in their pockets!
The only practical solution is to surveil the money (not the people). What do I mean by "surveil the money?". Well, each bill already has a serial number. You don't have to track every bill either, just most bills. Scanners at banks, convenience stores, and other common cash exchange points would transmit the location of the bill, as well as validate the bill.
To catch a counterfeiter, just watch for the following inconsistancies: Bills moving at hypersonic speeds accross the US, serial numbers that aren't in the database, two bills with the same number in different locations, etc.
Then, just pull up the surveilance tapes from the stores where the bills are passed. Match faces. If a suspicious bill is passed by the same person more than once, you have just cause. Get warrant. Search house. You've got them.
A few crooks would still slip through now and then, but high-volume operations would be extremely difficult because the odds would catch up with these guys. They would have to control the valid bill to prevent the dupe flag from being raised, or conspire to hack the database, or launder money through stores that didn't participate in the system--activities which are much easier to investigate and track.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
> When I visit Canada, there's nothing more annoying
> than trying to cram those giant notes into my
> wallet.
Maybe I just have a vivid imagination, but I can think of worse things than cramming giant notes into my wallet. In fact, I wish I more often had to cram giant (= high denomination) notes into my wallet.
"Die Mark -- gut! Die Franc -- gut! Die Euro -- Scheiss!"
--Jolly elderly waiter in Koblenz, 2002
rj
Is it true that they can never change the $1 bill because there it is so easy to forge that there is a vast and unknown amount of forgeries out there, and changing the bill would risk a finacial collapse, if the american government had to 'redeem' all of the forgeries?
***You learn something Every day. And then you die.***
In a few years, it'll be real uncommon to see any of the older bills. So, if a retailer gets one, they'll be extra suspicious and probably check more carefully. Also alrge amounts of old bills will be instantly suspect.
It's not like it's a 100% solution, nothing it, but it helps.
And indeed, the Royal Bank of Scotland 10 note in my pocket has a very stylised, 1-bar, pound sign on it. Weird that. My old accounting textbooks, in the section dealing with funny foreign money, definitely had dollar signs with two bars down the middle.
I worked in a national bank as a teller about 5 years ago, and i remeber when the new 20's came out then. Our branch received a poster that detailed the many security features of the new bill, including the nylon strip, the off-center potrait, the colour changing numeric, the anit-counterfiet pen, the water-mark, and the ridged coat jacket of the president.
The US Government's Flashsite only details about 4 things, the only "new" thing is the background colour and the yellow tiny 20's on the back of the bill.
Does anybody else have more features the new bills would have? Few people new about the jacket thing of the now-old 20's, and it was a quick way to check those bills.
Ben, you've become an UberGeek! Take me as your padawan!!!
On your next trip to America, just remember this simple little mathmatical formula:
1 is less than 5 is less than 10 is less than 20 is less than 50 is less than 100
A lot of fake dollar bills worldwide are made just but cutting '0' out of 10-dollar bill, and sticking onto a $5 or $10 bill, thus making $50 and $100 respectively.
Works great when people in rush or the lighting is dim: it is very easy to mistake one dollar bill for another, esp. if you're a foreigner and not aware how much G. Washington portrait is worth.
And you don't even need a photocopier for that.
Lisp is the Tengwar of programming languages.
wow you really are an arrogant american
i thought they didn't exist?
[whispers from side of stage]
Ok so now i'm being told that they're pretty much all arrogant.. okay then
I admit that eurotracer.net has extensive information about Euro coins and notes, although I've usually pointed people to Wikipedia because their Euro banknotes page is also pretty good.
:)
But if you're mostly interested in tracking where your notes travel, I'd suggest going to EuroBillTracker instead. I'm suggesting this because we have about 17 times more notes than Eurotracer and thus the chances of getting a hit are much higher. Tracking the notes can be addictive, so beware
Follow your Euro bills at EBT
Well hopefully I was not the only who watched a episode on the Discovery channel that talked about the new change. In the show one of the people in charge said that there is still a "green back" but that the other colors were on top of the green ink making it a little harder to see, _READ_ still there though. The history of our paper money is very cool.
A few hours grace before the madness begins again.
Part of the power of the 'greenbacks' s that they were a standard.
Everyone knew what they looked like, what they were worth.
Now we have an endless parade of monopoly money flowing at us..
Its also in bad taste to destroy history, just to 'look cool'..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
At least color syntaxing for money!
Yeb the Oz mint now makes polymer notes for:
o nesia
Australia
Bangladesh
Brazil
Brunei
China
Ind
Kuwait
Malaysia
Mexico
New Zealand
Nepal
Northern Island
Papua New Guinea
Romania
Singapore
Soloman Islands
Sri Lanka
Taiwan
Thailand
Vietnam
Western Samoa
They even took out a partnership with a Belgium company during development & formed a joint venture (Securency)in the hope of gaining the Euro contract , but the national mints didn't want to lose out.
The polymer sheets are made in a huge rould building, like a gas storage tank, about the size of a footy oval, where the plastic's blown into balloons that fill the room & then collapse into sheets. They can be recycled too.
As you can see here the colours are very distinguishable from each other, the clear part on each note is in fact a transparent hologram.
heck, I have an even better idea that will save them 90% of the $53M....just send $5.3M to me, and I'll tell everyone.
Someone please file an ADA suit with the fed. How much longer will blind people be stuck with shitty bills? There's plenty of blind people who are perfectly capable of shopping, but can't due to lack of proper currency. No, credit is not a viable option, as there is no way to verify your purchase amount at checkout, and braille receipt printers would be far more expensive than switching the bills to other sizes.
/. Eurotrolls:) Look, how often do you put a $100 bill into a vending machine? Make it larger. Ditto from $20 on up. The only thing that might be a minor bit of hassle is changing the size of the $5 and $10.
I mean, even those heathens in Europe have bills with different sizes. Their merchants seem to be able to handle it without trouble. Perhaps the Europeans are smarter than Americans? (Here come the
That's the difference between the blind and the deaf communities. The deaf would be marching on DC if they couldn't use currency. The blind just shut up and take it. (Before you blast me or mod me down, my wife is both deaf and blind, so I have experience with both groups.)
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
There is a good reason to make notes different colours and sizes. It is so that folks who are partially sighted can easily recognise the different notes.
regards, treefrog
The problem with it was the execution, where they kept reissuing paper 1's, instead of withdrawing them and replacing them with coins. The simple solution is simply stop printing paper 1's, and start issuing coin 1's. I don't see why they went to all the trouble of minting coins, only to not get them into circulation.
Steve.
Tom Hipschen, the lead portrait engraver at the Bureau, happens to be a friend of my uncle. My wife and I once had the pleasure of having dinner with him.
I was amazed to learn that the engravings are *not* mechanically reduced. The engravers actually work at the scale you see on a note. It's pretty damn amazing actually.
I asked him how it felt to see bad (counterfeit) copies of his artwork. He said it bothered him much more to see good (counterfeit) copies of his artwork.
-- "The reward of suffering is experience." - Aeschylus
Because lord knows Australians have enough difficulty coming up with creative slang as it is... Have you ever actually heard real hard core Aussie slang (as ooposed to Hollywood interpretations on Aussie slang)? Trust me, practically nothing presents a problem with regard to creating good sounding slang in Australia.
As a side note, we have similar notes in NZ, again in different sizes and colours (though less garish colour combinations than Australia).The 5 dollar note for instance is mostly just red and orange. Once you get used to it this system is remarkably superior. Certainly the polymer notes are a brilliant idea.
Jedidiah
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
I was in Geneva in May, it was ~1.30USD. Give it some time; at the end of the day the USD is still the de facto standard (OPEC isn't going to be switching to the Euro, that's one of the tinfoil reasons for the Iraq war - put the fear of god into OPEC). Although CHFs are starting to look nice, very very solid...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
The greenback remains.
Tones of copper and peach are added but overall the dollar remains with it's green appearance.
There is no color like on the euro or canadian dollar, so relax.
What does the Mint have to do with it?
Bills are made by the BEP, not the Mint.
I'm an idiot because I called someone a racist because he said he'd use a $1 coin if they didn't have an Indian or a "Negro" on it? In other words, he WON'T use a coin with a "Negro" or an "Indian" on it. That pretty much sounds like the definition of racist to me.
Of course there's also the big sign behind the cash register that says "Right to refuse service to anyone".
Great, so now their releasing new bills every 2 years.
Here is my situation.
25 machines, each machines bill validator costs $450.00
Total cost to update $11,250. Or $468.75 per month over 2 years just to keep my machines up to date with currency standards.
This does not include extra machines that will be added over the next two years.
In some cases you can get firmware updates for bill validators ($20.00-$55.00 per machine per update), but in most cases they will only do this through 1 set of bill updates, so you may still be good for 7 years if you pick a good bill validator company.
TruePunk | Games
Ok so now i'm being told that they're pretty much all arrogant.. okay then
What? It's not our fault that the rest of the world sucks at arrogance. I mean if we held out, how would anyone know how it's done?
Where's George enthusiasts are aggressively analysing the new bill with regards to writing adverts on any cash they come across. 'Will my red ink stamp still be readable over the pink colour?' 'Think of the children; will someone please think of the children?!' etc. It's actually rather quaint that this unveiling can generate as much buzz inside small communities as the California Recall.
No, it looks like |_$. Not the same!
My other car is first.
Is it me, or has Andrew Jackson always had such a crazy, rock-n-roll do? I guess I just never noticed...
Quod scripsi, scripsi.
Now is the perfect time for counterfeiters to capitalize on the fact that 1) many people have heard that a new currency is coming, but 2) few people have actually seen or felt it. Make whatever hell kind design you want; you don't have to copy anything. Just try and spend it, and the clerks will think "oh cool, this must be one of those new bills" Make it a $10 or $5 because you'll clash with the new $20s soon.
I'm an idiot because I called someone a racist because he said he'd use a $1 coin if they didn't have an Indian or a "Negro" on it? In other words, he WON'T use a coin with a "Negro" or an "Indian" on it.
You just wanted to see it so bad that it magically appeared on your screen only.
Actually, excise taxes are extra sneaky, in that they're built into the selling price of the product, rather than added on at the end.
Everybody knows what their local sales tax rate is, but what percentage of consumers know what the federal or state taxes are on gas, liquor, or cigarettes?
Why do we honor the president who illegally deported thousands of native americans, stealing their land, and causing their deaths, with a place on our money?
Its not like he didn't know it was wrong, either. The Cherokee were a highly "integrated" group of people, and got legal representation. The Supreme Court granted them the victory in their case, Worcester vs. Georgia, 1832. Did this matter to Jackson? Not in the least. In defiance of the ruling and the constitution's separation of powers, he deported them anyway.
Why do we honor this guy? I know there aren't many saints among our presidents, but can't we pick somebody else who at least didn't kill people and steal their land?
-Zipwow
I don't know which is more depressing, that 2/3 didn't care enough to vote, or that 1/2 of those that did are crazy.
Come on! What is this adding to the discussion?
be useful as a guide.
I like it. It's multi-coloured but still tasteful.
My only complaint is about the website itself. The pictures are too small. It'd be really nice if they'd put up a larger, clearer picture. Something around 1200DPI with 32-bit colour and detailed descriptions of the inks and paper used.
That'd be a big help.
You just wanted to see it so bad that it magically appeared on your screen only.
Then I suppose I'm just imagining this. Using the word "politically correct" is not some magical talisman that makes a racist comment acceptable "dissent." And you'd better learn how to read threads that jump up and down your score threshold.
I find it ever so amusing that all of my interlocutors in this discussion are posting as Anonymous Coward while I'm risking karma on it.
I thought the original dollar sign (the S with a double bar through it) was derived from the monogram of the new nation: a U and an S superimposed.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
One of the most colourful currencies I've ever seen; surprisingly enough, a graphic designer friend of mine generally photoshops his images with exactly the same style.
More than mere navel gazing.
Dollars are actually printed on a cotton/linen blend. Unfortunately this aids in their counterfeiting. Since our money is the same size, lower denomination bills are bleached and then higher denominations are printed on. This might be too much of a sacrife to have bills fit uniformly in our wallets.
Sorry to hear that you're having trouble with our currency. There are numbers printed on them that may help you out though.
In those coins were engraved the Columns of Hercules, the symbol for the Spanish Empire, that ultimately were converted into the sign that epitomizes dollars and money everywhere: $
The encyclopedia I had as a kid listed the $ symbol as the superimposition of U and S (united states), which eventually devolved into the two-slash dollar symbol and then into a one-slash dollar.
Somebody provides a link 'proving' that it's a spanish peso and attempts to debunk the above theory by stating that a 1950's mathematician couldn't find the US symbol after looking at several manuscripts. It then goes on to say the single-slash variation is original.
That's not really fabulous research, and fails to explain why all the people I know from my grand- and great-grand- parents' generation all use the double-slash variety. The encyclopedia, on the other hand, showed several examples of the symbol changing over time. Too bad I'm not at a library now.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Personally, I like the NZ, Australian and Canadian folding stuff - it's made from some sort of reinforced plastic and you can mush the note around for hours in your pocket and it still comes out in one piece. The American toilet-paper money is like something left over from the 20th century.
Too many versions, makes it easier to pass a fake bill to the public. Most people dont evne know what 'security devices' are in the money.. or how to tell its not legit.. it all looks fake now.
.but by then, its too late its already been thru the system..
sure the feds will find it.
'sides the new look is terrible. I want the old greenbacks back.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I congratulate you on your innovative use of ascii art.
FWIW, I have seen a stylized "U on S" dollar sign on playing cards, but it is pretty awkward. You have to draw the U real narrow. Maybe some people enjoyed doing this during the Civil War, but I personally expect it is not the origin of the dollar sign.
The reason presented for this bifurcation is as a way to manage the massive capital outflows from the US to its creditor nations. I guess people in Washington are keenly aware of the disorder within the UK caused by its progressive devaluations over several generations of indebtedness in the 20th century after a century of Imperial overstretch and expansion.
Da Blog
lol...
The Eurofighter: mission accomplished!
Jesus, I wouldn't be able to tell it apart from fucking play money. Am I buying a CD or Boardwalk???
More creative than 'dollar'? What kind of stupid statement is that? "Well, we've been called Euros for a couple of hundred years... let's use that word!" It symbolizes nothing but a contraction of the word European.
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
The other issue is of course marketing. If two stores on either side of the street advertise the same product and one costs $99.99 and the other charges $100, more people will buy the $99.99 dollar product, because it seems like you're getting a deal. It feels like you're spending less even though both price points probably add up to the same dollar amount after sales tax.
Security is inversely proportional to the commitment of one desiring to circumvent it.
Hmm, most Germans would say that the Holy Roman Empire was the predecessor of the German Empire ... ;) Or at least (and probably more correct) that it was the predecessor of both.
Is it just me, or does it seem like, in an effort to make the portrait fill the larger space on the new bill, someone just extended his cloak type thing? Look momma, no arms! Just a homogeneous blob where they should be...
fsck -u
I live across the street from the S.F. Mint. Looks like it's time to do some dumpster diving...
It's a conspiracy! The Iluminati and the Free Masons in conjunction with the Mann(r) everywhere quietly slipped that on in on all of us. It is to identify what countriess are in the program and which are not.
It is symbolsim for half of what you think is yours is ours. In the US you can think of it this way... Currency was backed for gold or silver, and it said that this note can be redeemed for 1 dollar in gold. Then quietly one day... gone. backed by nothing but blind faith.
The price of freedom is eternal vigalance. Keep an eye on government for they are keeping an eye on you
I hope you have enjoyed this episode of Tinfoil Hat Time. With me, Lord Prox, your humble host.
hmmm wonder if you would care to look at the numbers 53,000,000 is only million IIRC or if they haven't changed the rules since I have been to school. What with grade inflation my 87% GPA for high school would probably be worth what?
Aw Shit I'll let the mathmaticians figure this one out.
The best way to get me acquainted with them is to send me one...
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
NACK
The unification of Germany occurred later.
where's all that Karma?
Maybe you really did pay for $150 in groceries in pennies. I mean maybe the store decided not to make a big deal about it. But in general, the store should nto be required to accept impractical monetary units.
I realize it's going to be pointless to argue with you about this because you're obviously really, really sure you're correct. I'm confident that one day in the far flung future, you'll realize that you're not correct. (Unless it turns out that you are, of course. :-) )
As an example: if your argument were correct, why can't I put 50 pennies in a soda pop machine and get out a pop? How come I can't make a phone call from a pay phone with pennies? How come I can't put a 50 dollar bill into one of these machines? Why aren't the people that make this machines required to accept pennies as well as other forms of legal tender?
Now you'll probably say, "well that's 'cause it's not practical to make the machine that way." And on that point, I'd agree with you. But I would also argue that there are various situations in which it's not practical to accept certain, specific forms of legal tender in the paying of a bill. For example, a bill of $150 in pennies. Do you realize this is 15,000 pennies! If I did the math right (questionable), that's gonna weigh about 90.9 lbs.
So I guess my question is, how did you manage to carry 90 lbs. + the weight of your groceries? I suppose you had a really good shopping cart? And why the hell didn't you just go to the bank first? And why do you seem to like being cruel to grocery store clerks?
Furry cows moo and decompress.
Yes yes yes, paper money costs more to print than coins --- But what about the cost to society? What about the wear and tear that dollar coins make on your pockets? We'd lose millions of dollars in pant replacements. And all that extra weight in our wallets would make our gas mileage even worse than it already is. But on the bright side, we would be carrying more weight when we walk -- so maybe we could spend less money at the gym.
an encredible but true Story out of NC in September about a man who passed a phoney "$200 bill" with G.W. on it at a grocery. He got $150 worth of goceries and a (real) fifty dollar bill in change.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Geez, don't you know how to research anything?
Australia uses the British Monopoly board, so you would in fact be buying Mayfair.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
Totally true. We (Australia) produce currency for many countries in our region.
I hate getting NZ change back from vending machines - if I try and spend it somewhere that requires a human to give change 5 times out of 10 they won't take it. Grrr.
If they made a movie of your life, would anybody buy a ticket?
I guess that makes everything all White then doesn't it?
Asshat!
Japan has coins for both 100 and 500 yen amounts (roughly equivalent to $1 and $5). I don't know about any other countries that may use coins for higher denomications, but it does seem like a good idea. Here's my rationale: A lot of purchases are under $10. Having only a $1 coin would result in frequently mixing coins and bills. But if you have a $5 coin too, then transactions can be done all coin.
I agree though, if you're going to try and use $1 coins, then do it and stop printing bills. Why is everything always some half-assed attempt to change things?
Either do or do not, there is no try.
Looks like a bunch of beans to me.
No, it's the new counterfittin resistant DNA codes leguminismatic technology. At least that's what the good old boy I traded with sez.
Traded with? What'd you trade for those beans? Luther? LUTHER!!!
I don't know what you've been doing to those notes, but I've certainly never had that problem.
you could choose your own icon when you spent it.
The Singularity is closer than you think
Quant
Exactly.
I can't find anything to back it up, but I think it was Tomas Bata who came up with this concept.
Certainly the polymer notes are a brilliant idea.
I agree. My main problem with Aussie money is that it looks like an explosion at the neon paint store and that some guy named 'banjo' is on it. Other than that, I think it's great.
http://xkcd.com/386/
There is a good reason to make notes different colours and sizes. It is so that folks who are partially sighted can easily recognise the different notes.
Yes, that is true. Nowhere did I say it wasn't useful to the partially sighted. However, it doesn't follow that you'd want to use colors that will cause the fully sighted members of your community to become partially sighted. My problem isn't with the "concept", it's with the "execution", and I don't believe I said anything to counterindicate that. If the colors used weren't garish and trashy looking, it'd be fine. Also, just so you know, the different size thing works just as well for partially sighted people as it does for totally blind ones. There's no need to have eye-twisting colors, if the bills are already different sizes.
http://xkcd.com/386/
wow you really are an arrogant american
i thought they didn't exist?
[whispers from side of stage]
Ok so now i'm being told that they're pretty much all arrogant.. okay then
I see. So, when I respond to a post about how American money is stupid, I get called arrogant. Nice. Non-Americans feel it is their right to be condescending and disrespectful toward all Americans, but then when we take exception we're arrogant. Don't tell me how much better you are and how much smarter you are and then turn around and say your monetary system is better because you have to have a different size and Day-Glo color for each of your notes to prevent your citizens from becoming terribly confused. You can't eat your cake and have it, too.
http://xkcd.com/386/
The unification of Germany occurred later.
Yes, but I still don't see you point.
The Holy Roman Empire existed for about 900 years, being ruled by different german aristocratic families over the time, the Habsburg family being the last one. After the empire was split the Habsburg family continued to rule the Austrian(-Hungarian) part, while the various other parts (Bavaria, Prussia...) were ruled by other aristocratic families, before they reunited again in 1871, where for several reasons the Austrians stayed outside. So the HRE is the predecessor of both.