Koukam na wiki, jak je to s historii bilionu - dlouha a kratka skala. Takze - za vsechno pry muzou (jako obvykle) frantici. Ale cele je to uplna komedie. Frantici pouzili dlouhou skalu, tu prevzali britove, frantici pak presli na kratkou skalu, tu prevzali amici, frantici presli zpatky na dlouhou skalu, a nasledne britove v minulem stoleti neodolali kulturnimu vlivu amiku a presli na kratkou skalu.
A uplne nejlepsi je zapis komunikace mezi britskym ministrem a premierem z roku 1974, kdy premier obhajuje pouziti kratke skaly aby nevznikaly zmatky:
"Mr Maxwell-Hyslop asked the Prime Minister whether he will make it the
practice of his administration that when Ministers employ the word “billion” in any
official speeches, documents, or answers to Parliamentaty Questions, they will,
to avoid confusion, only do so in its British meaning of 1 million million and not in
the sense used in the United States of America, which uses the term “billion” to
mean 1,000 million.
The Prime Minister: No. The word “billion” is now used internationally to mean
1,000 million and it would be confusing if British Ministers were to use it in any
other sense. I accept that it could still be interpreted in this country as 1 million
million and I shall ask my colleagues to ensure that, if they do use it, there
should be no ambiguity as to its meaning. (HC Deb 20.12.1974 c711-2W)"
Pricemz bilion etymologicky znamena milion na druhou, takze dlouha skala.
Zdroje: meriam webster:
"Billion was borrowed from French in the late 1600s to indicate the number one million raised to the power of two, or a million million—a number represented by a 1 followed by 12 zeros. However, the French later changed their naming conventions so that a billion became a thousand million (a 1 followed by 9 zeros) and a trillion became a thousand thousand million (or a million million, the old billion). The French have since returned to the older system, but it was this new system that was adopted by American English speakers in the 1800s. In Britain, the newer system has seen increasing use since the 1950s, but the older sense is still sometimes used there as well."
Billion Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Websterhttps://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/billionThe Oxford English Dictionary: "billion, purposely formed in 16th c. to denote the second power of a million (by substituting BI- prefix for the initial letters), trillion and quadrillion being similarly formed to denote its 3rd and 4th powers. The name appears not to have been adopted in Eng. before the end of the 17th ... Subsequently the application of the word was changed by French arithmeticians, figures being divided in numeration into groups of threes, instead of sixes, so that F. billion, trillion, denoted not the second and third powers of a million, but a thousand millions and a thousand thousand millions. In the 19th century, the U.S. adopted the French convention, but Britain retained the original and etymological use (to which France reverted in 1948). Since 1951 the U.S. value, a thousand millions, has been increasingly used in Britain, especially in technical writing and, more recently, in journalism; but the older sense ‘a million millions’ is still common."
http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN04440/SN04440.pdf