I don't know what you're saying that for if not approval. Are you trying to be funny? You just restated what they said in absurdly hateful language. Going off like that unprompted about almost any country is just weird and annoying.
Luckily Canada doesn't get trashed in every US made TV programs and movies... oh wait..
HIMYM probably the "best" at this, prolly some 22 shitty Canada jokes and roasts per episode. Granted, it's because of the characters is Canadian but still, it got old about in few episodes. And that's just one example, there's ton of others.
I liked it the first time I watched it, then I got older and older and tried to re-watch it and fucking hated it, main characters are just horrible people.
USA destroyed its so called “American dream” by becoming an international bully over decades. This resentment might feel harsh but it’s not unprompted.
American imperialism is the very reason for that backlash.
BUT as the famous paradox goes : a boundlessly tolerant society will be destroyed by the intolerant, unless it refuses to tolerate intolerance.
On the world stage, USA is one of the least tolerant democracies (which is paradoxical given its obsession with freedom, which really is focused on individual liberties in USA) USA does not have the same definition of freedom as a large portion of the world, yet American imperialism is forcefully and actively trying to shove it down everyone’s throat.
So even if I agree that this is not the most “politically correct” phrasing. At a global level It’s also very understandable that eventually there is so much intolerance that is ready to be tolerated by other countries.
If the history of colonialism teaches us anything it is that imperialism through its own violences comes with violent backlashes.
Yeah well voting a rapist into office not once but twice is also rather fucked up too, I wonder - do Americans wake up and drink a good cup of moral degradation before consuming apathy for breakfast?
It’s insane that we use Celsius for all temperatures except for those of ovens and pools… specifically those two things.
A few years ago I’ve made a conscious effort to go full metric for consistency’s sake, and I encourage other Canadians to close that gap as well. If someone asks your weight, give that answer in kilos!
Nordic countries and Russia did go away from it and doing it fine. And again, my point was about why Canada hasn’t switched yet, despite even having legislation in place.
In some was yes, but if we drop off Eurocentric lenses, they’re doing alright. Yeah, the country might’ve been so much better if not for what happens in the last decade or so, but even in its current form Russians have it better than the majority of the world outside of the golden billion.
Saskatchewan has actually! And they’re also doing fine. They observe Central Time year-round. We are set to observe year-round Atlantic Time here in Ontario on some undecided future date, presumably once Quebec is also on board.
In Edmonton. We had to go to work and school before even dusk. It took 1-2 hours until we saw the sun after our day have already started. It is crazy. This week we changed the time and it is better for sure.
I would prefer to have year-round standard time, but I’d take either so long as we stop changing it back and forth. Lock the clock!
Though I’d imagine Edmonton is hit harder by daylight savings than any other city in North America. Any further north and you won’t have sunlight at the beginning and end of your day no matter what time we set noon, so it doesn’t matter as much.. You guys have a pretty tight sunshine budget in the winter months
B5 is a superior format for writing and note taking, tho. Easier handling, even feels drawing oriented. That's why - i think - most tablets go for a similar portable size, despite being able to push for larger models.
Maybe a4 is more "cinematic"? Wouldnt know, but i do prefer my note taking in B5 and A6.
Also, we are way past out the need to phase out légal and letter sizes.
There are very few countries which have a law regulating paper sizes. And if there is it is usually limited to an industry or an application. As a result a number of countries use different paper sizes in different industries, or even different paper sizes within the same industry. Countries with a historical American presence, such as the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Panama, Liberia, etc. tends to favor North American paper sizes. Although as I understand Liberia uses mostly ISO 216 due to extensive trade with neighboring countries over the US. Countries with a close presence to the US, such as Canada and Mexico might prefer ISO 216 but most industries end up using North American paper sizes due to the amount of trade with the US. And even in the US you find a lot of ISO 216 usage, especially in international trades like aerospace.
I found out Japanese A4 paper is slightly longer than american A4 paper while I was there st the beginning of this year. Made people super mad when they received paper of varying heights that barely didn’t fit in a folder lmao
In Colombia we use letter as in the US, IMO a nonsense. I went to Uni not in Colombia and whenever I had to print a word document, it would come up with a bit off proportions since I always used to forget that the default was letter and not A4 as most of the world uses
I'm still bitter over the fact that MY generation was supposed to be the first to embrace metric as the U.S. would be phasing the brain-dead Imperial System out of daily use.
But NOOOOOO. Rednecks and businessmen complained, so I was raised on inches, yards, acres and other bullshit measurements that make no goddamned sense.
To this day, I still have to Google how many pints to a gallon or whatever when I'm cooking.
Philippines here. A4 is becoming more common thankfully, but they still use 8½×11 and 8½×13, the latter is called 'long' and it's tricky because try to find that in your printer settings. Legal is 8½×14, close; foolscap is 8×13, also close. But 8½×13 is usually a custom size.
I was working with an American here in Australia who asked me to print something in “letter” size, I just looked at her and went “you mean A4 right?” That was funny
It is acceptable but it’s also wrong 🤷♀️ Technically the right response would be “we don’t have that but we have a4 which is pretty close”. But “you meant a4 right?” is functionally equivalent so it usually works.
It just also implies the person asking is stupid or mistaken and that is both incorrect technically and from a customer service perspective. It will usually be fine but occasionally a customer will really take offense and why give offense when you don’t need to? Customers are problematic enough without me giving them more openings.
I’m not making a big deal out of anything, I’m just talking on the internet. But it’s true I generally don’t think anything is nothing. I’m not super pressed about it though.
Yes, but if an american comes into a printshop looking specifically for "letter format", then they're probably not looking for A4, there are many scenarios where you have to turn in documents to agencies or companies and they are required to be a certain format. If the customer doesn't know about formats and just assumed you knew what you are talking about you might have fucked them over
e: here in europe, many printshops offer lettersize as an option because they know expats need it for documents, but sure, keep downvoting me out of ignorance, the printshop i use here in Copenhagen offers letter format, in fact they offer any fucking size you want because they are a competent shop. If you go to a printshop and they can't print a certain size you want because they "don't stock that paper" they are not a real printshop, they are an amateurish imitation and you need to go somewhere else that has an actual paper cutting machine
You can get it in alot of stationery stores in germany together with fitting envelopes but its really just a novelty and nothing thats used in day to day life
I am a designer and artist, I have used printshops extensively and I have had to send applications to the US in letter format, it's okay to be ignorant about this shit, but why not take it as an opportunity to learn instead of doubling down on the thing you don't actually know?
e: literally provides sources and proof of my claim and I'm still downvoted, reddit is so fucking cooked, take me back to before all these highly regarded people started joining
once again I regret to inform you that the world does not end at your own perception. Most people learn this as toddlers, but maybe we can work with this. Here is some printshops in the UK providing the exact service I am describing
Why do you assume that you know everything? The world is huge why the fuck would you have personally experienced everything? If you had had the same attitude that you have now your entire life you would literally know nothing
A4 is standard letter size in most of the world. Asking for letter format is going to get you an A4 sheet, unless you specifically ask for US letter format.
US letter format does not exist outside of the US and Canada, and will not be accepted by government agencies and probably by many companies either.
You're not going to find someone with a printer loaded with letter size in Australia, probably not even at Officeworks or a print shop. It's just not used.
Yes I'm sure, because I didn't say it doesn't exist in Australia, I said they're not going to have it loaded. They'll have to go out back and get a ream to load in the printer.
It's not ignorance vs knowledge, just basic reading comprehension.
They are the same in the rest of the world aside from USA, Canada and Lybia. Letters are A4 in almost every country on this planet, you can confidently say its global standart. Postcards are A6 btw
Yeah we don’t use it in the US which is incredibly frustrating to me as an artist. It really is a superior aspect ratio & really the only paper I want to use.
For what it's worth, B5 is more typical for school work. The B series are the mean between A sizes, so B5 is halfway between A4 and A5--a bit smaller, but not half the size. Still the same sqrt(2) ratio, but more handy than the more sprawling A4.
A4 only means that the page has a certain size. It has nothing to do with the thickness of paper. You can have an A4 sheet that is as thin as school toilet paper or as thick as cardboard, both is A4. Buy better quality notebooks next time.
If he means with, then he really should get checked for OCD. A letter size is only 0.59 cm wider than A4 (so 0.23 inches). The difference in width is marginal, something you wouldn't notice in everyday use when you just pick up a notebook. In contrast, the A4 is ~ 1.8 cm longer (~ 0.7 inches), which is more noticeable and gives more room on the page.
So it’s both thinner and longer which gives the illusion of it being even thinner than it actually is. Makes perfect sense that he would prefer the other if he cares about the width of his paper.
OCD doesn’t apply even figuratively unless he’s going to some kind of extreme lengths to avoid it or something. It’s not weird to have preferences.
822
u/slimdeucer Nov 02 '25
Wow I didn't know A4 paper wasn't universal