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This thread has gotten really stupid. Apple is an American company, but they're not trying to force anyone to use the iPhone in a strictly "American" way.

As for the accuracy of the two different systems, neither can be said to be more "accurate" because they are just measuring the exact same thing and coming up with the exact same distance. They just call it something different.

Would you argue that the Chinese language is more "accurate" than English or French or Russian? I wouldn't, but you could use the same, flawed logic you're using to make the argument that it is.

no kidding.

i wouldnt expect a foreign company to bend over backwards to make me, a person in a foreign country to them, happy in every possible way
 
I think when the original poster said "more accurate" s/he actually mean't "easier to convert" ie. 1 KM=1000M vs 1 Mile=5280 feet.

If you want to get technical the metric system IS more specific in that they go from centimeters to milimeters, as always with a multiple of 10 (ie 10mm=1cm). Whereas the imperial system goes from inches to "thou" which is 0.001 of an inch. That's quite an unreasonable jump.
 
I think when the original poster said "more accurate" s/he actually mean't "easier to convert" ie. 1 KM=1000M vs 1 Mile=5280 feet.

If you want to get technical the metric system IS more specific in that they go from centimeters to milimeters, as always with a multiple of 10 (ie 10mm=1cm). Whereas the imperial system goes from inches to "thou" which is 0.001 of an inch. That's quite an unreasonable jump.

:confused: Inches to thousandths? I thought it went:
.1 = tenths
.01 = hundredths
.001 = thousandths

That's all the same as cm, mm, etc. The next lowest is one tenth of the value. It only changes when you go over inches; 12 inches in a foot, 5280 feet in a mile.
 
How are miles not accurate? u "non-Americans" need to suck it up. we made the phone, ur gonna use are system of measurement. god forbid u people broaden ur horizens


And Americans wonder why people from other parts of the world think we're cocky and think we're better than everyone else :rolleyes:

And I also bet that you're the same type of person who would buy a phone made from a European company and complain that all of the measurements are metric and that they should accommodate Americans if they're going to sell their product in America because Americans are better than everyone else and don't use the sissy European measurements and only stick to the real imperial system because it's as American as baseball and apple pie....and freedom fries and freedom toast. :rolleyes:
 
And Americans wonder why people from other parts of the world think we're cocky and think we're better than everyone else :rolleyes:

And I also bet that you're the same type of person who would buy a phone made from a European company and complain that all of the measurements are metric and that they should accommodate Americans if they're going to sell their product in America because Americans are better than everyone else and don't use the sissy European measurements and only stick to the real imperial system because it's as American as baseball and apple pie....and freedom fries and freedom toast. :rolleyes:

fuuny how that outlook is essentially what this thread is about in reverse
 
How are miles not accurate? u "non-Americans" need to suck it up. we made the phone, ur gonna use are system of measurement. god forbid u people broaden ur horizens

And us British invented the Imperial measurement system that you colonials still use. Of course you didn't actually manage to use what you were given correctly which is why your pints are smaller than they are meant to be.

Perhaps you should broaden your horizons and realise that people in other parts of the world use other measurement systems?
 
And us British invented the Imperial measurement system that you colonials still use. Of course you didn't actually manage to use what you were given correctly which is why your pints are smaller than they are meant to be.

Perhaps you should broaden your horizons and realise that people in other parts of the world use other measurement systems?

Happy 4TH of July!
 
fuuny how that outlook is essentially what this thread is about in reverse


Not really....it's my understanding that the iPhone will use metric or imperial depending on what country your international settings are set to. Since the UK uses imperial, it's using imperial. If he switched it to Canadian it would probably do metric. The iPhone is accommodating, using whatever is used in the country you set it to, in this case the OP wants to use a system not commonly used in his country.
 
in this case the OP wants to use a system not commonly used in his country.

Sort of. Here in the UK we are taught the metric system (only) in schools: we are not taught how many feet in a mile etc. All our products are sold in Kg/Litres in supermarkets. But beer in the pub is sold by the pint, speed limits and distances on roads are in miles. Basically it's a mess.
 
Sort of. Here in the UK we are taught the metric system (only) in schools: we are not taught how many feet in a mile etc. All our products are sold in Kg/Litres in supermarkets. But beer in the pub is sold by the pint, speed limits and distances on roads are in miles. Basically it's a mess.

Not to mention that silly kickball game you are all forced to watch growing up!

J/K robbie. Wouldn't a conversion app solve all this?
 
Sort of. Here in the UK we are taught the metric system (only) in schools: we are not taught how many feet in a mile etc. All our products are sold in Kg/Litres in supermarkets. But beer in the pub is sold by the pint, speed limits and distances on roads are in miles. Basically it's a mess.

Fair enough...it's not Apple's fault that your measurements are a complete fustercluck :p

I was playing around and Maps doesn't use your current international settings, it uses the system in whatever country you're getting directions in. I'm in the US, with my phone set to US and....

Directions between 2 points in Canada, metric (even though 90% of the driving is in the US :rolleyes:):
IMG_0020.PNG

2 points in the UK, imperial:
IMG_0021.PNG

2 points in Germany, metric:
IMG_0022.PNG
 
Not to mention that silly kickball game you are all forced to watch growing up!

Nah, I grew up playing rugby!

J/K robbie. Wouldn't a conversion app solve all this?

Yep, or simply a setting to allow the user to choose what they wanted. I just noticed you can set the regional settings to Cornish (United Kingdom) which is a pretty minority choice...
 
In my understanding, UK had already changed to SI unit (metric) by law. The only nation using American unit (imperial) in the world is now the U.S.A. (5% of the world).

SI unit is more accurate than the American unit. 1 meter is a light distance of 1/299792458 second in vacuum by the special theory of relativity. American unit? No scientifical definition.

Americans don't know 1 acre = ??? square feets, 1 miles = ??? inches, my car of 3,500cc = ??? square inches....

However !!, even the U.S.A is going to change the unit to SI unit in the future :eek:. It's on the way. Really. I'm not joking. ? :D
 
SI unit is more accurate than the American unit. 1 meter is a light distance of 1/299792458 second in vacuum by the special theory of relativity. American unit? No scientifical definition.

what makes light the end all be all reference in the first place

how does that make it "more accurate" in any case

seriously...
 
what makes light the end all be all reference in the first place

Physics. The speed of light in a vacuum is (currently) considered to be an/the absolute constant.

It is true: S.I. units are more accurately defined than their Imperial counterparts and are getting more tightly defined over time. Of course it's very easy to define Imperial units in terms of their S.I. counterparts which, for most non-anal users, will be more than enough.
 
Fair enough...it's not Apple's fault that your measurements are a complete fustercluck :p

I was playing around and Maps doesn't use your current international settings, it uses the system in whatever country you're getting directions in. I'm in the US, with my phone set to US and....

Directions between 2 points in Canada, metric (even though 90% of the driving is in the US :rolleyes:):
<snip>

OMG you area a saviour - sort of... i never realised that gmaps did it according to the country you are looking at. it does it on the browser app as well (maps.google.com). bah google's fault for not letting you:p o well. also there are only three countries in the world that have not changed to imperial system.
 
what makes light the end all be all reference in the first place

how does that make it "more accurate" in any case

seriously...

Because it is constant no matter what it's source. No matter if it's the sun, the moon, a flashlight, or a match.

It's the 'C' in E=MC²
 
Because it is constant no matter what it's source. No matter if it's the sun, the moon, a flashlight, or a match.

It's the 'C' in E=MC²

i know...

in other news, all sound travels the same speed in the same medium

what makes light in a vacuum any more special than the speed of sound through water at a specific density when defining a unit of length? and why then decide that a meter shall be the distance that light travels in 1/299792458 of a second second in vacuum?

regardless, there is a DIRECT conversion between metric and imperial and vice versa meaning that neither one can be more accurate than the other
 
in other news, all sound travels the same speed in the same medium

For a given observer. This is not a universal constant: two observers of the same sound in the same medium may observe different apparent speeds of sound based on their own motion (I think). This is not true of light.

General Theory of Relativity innit.
 
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