Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!uwvax!oddjob!gargoyle.uchicago.edu!sphinx!cjdb
From: cjdb@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Charles Blair)
Newsgroups: comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: smail pronounciation (or in this case '#')
Message-ID: <1237@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 6-Mar-87 22:52:18 EST
Article-I.D.: sphinx.1237
Posted: Fri Mar  6 22:52:18 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 8-Mar-87 12:12:43 EST
References: <6905@clyde.ATT.COM> <246@roosta.btnix.uucp>
Reply-To: cjdb@sphinx.UUCP (Charles Blair)
Organization: University of Chicago Library Computer Systems
Lines: 22

In article <246@roosta.btnix.uucp> winton@btnix.uucp (Neil Winton) writes:
>
>Hmmmmm.... at the risk of seeming pedantic (but why should that bother me,
>no-one else seems TOO worried :-), here in the UK, where it actually matters
>how we represent our currency, a `#' is most definitely NOT a `pound' sign.
>A real pound sign looks rather like this [drawing follows]

By "real pound sign" you mean the sign for pounds sterling (or Italian
Lire, as you indicate later). I have actually _seen_ pounds, when
indicating weight, being abbreviated by a nurse in a U.S. hospital as
"#" (placed after the numerals). This made me somewhat more tolerant
of calling "pound sign" what I too call the "number sign." So I
suppose there is a trade or professional origin to "#" being used to
mean "pounds."





-- 
"... ain't nobody's business if I do."		..!ihnp4!gargoyle!sphinx!cjdb  
	-- Billie Holiday     			    PMRCJDB@UCHIMVS1.Bitnet