American addresses - use of the £ sign?

[Cunctator]

I have to post something to the US. The address contains a £ sign, which seems a bit odd to me. Would this be correct, or is it just a typo? The address is of the form:

Mr John Smith
9999 Smith Street £H-999
Smithville
California 99999

If it is correct, what does the £ sign mean?

[Johnny L.A.]

If someone is using the UK keyboard layout on a Mac, the number sign (aka 'pound sign') is £ instead of #. It should probably be #H-999.

[friedo]

Also, the city, state and ZIP code is properly written on one line:

Smithville, CA 99999

(Note that there should be no comma between the state abbreviation and the ZIP code.)

[Cunctator]

Originally Posted by Johnny L.A.

If someone is using the UK keyboard layout on a Mac, the number sign (aka 'pound sign') is £ instead of #. It should probably be #H-999.

This address was read to me over the phone by the American concerned, so it can't be a keyboard issue. Is the # sign ever referred to as the "pound" sign by Americans?

[Jas09]

Yes, the # symbol is sometimes called "pound" (normally only in reference to telephones though).

[Ferret Herder]

Originally Posted by Cunctator

This address was read to me over the phone by the American concerned, so it can't be a keyboard issue. Is the # sign ever referred to as the "pound" sign by Americans?

Yes, that's a very common usage. I'm amused to hear it referred to as such in an address though, as usually it's for telephone keypad entry directions ("Enter your credit card number and then press the 'pound sign'.") and the like.

[vison]

Originally Posted by Cunctator

This address was read to me over the phone by the American concerned, so it can't be a keyboard issue. Is the # sign ever referred to as the "pound" sign by Americans?

You bet it is! It means "weight", though, not "currency". As in, 20# of sugar. I can't recall ever hearing an American call that symbol "the number sign". But do people REALLY use it in every day life?

One of those bizzaro things that makes you shake your head.

[Johnny L.A.]

Originally Posted by Cunctator

Is the # sign ever referred to as the "pound" sign by Americans?

Yes. Many people call the # the pound sign, as in 3# of stuff. (I grew up using 'lb.' or 'lbs.', and the # was always the 'number sign'.)

[Johnny L.A.]

Heh. Qudadruple post.

Originally Posted by vison

I can't recall ever hearing an American call that symbol "the number sign".

I don't remember hearing it called a 'pound sign' until touch-tone phones overtook rotary-dial. Late-'70s or early-'80s.

[Cunctator]

Thanks all. I'll use # in place of £.

Originally Posted by friedo

Also, the city, state and ZIP code is properly written on one line:

Smithville, CA 99999

I'll do that too.

[groman]

Originally Posted by Johnny L.A.

Yes. Many people call the # the pound sign, as in 3# of stuff. (I grew up using 'lb.' or 'lbs.', and the # was always the 'number sign'.)

You know, sometimes I call it "hash" but I have no clue why or if anybody else does it. The symbol, that is, not pounds.

[Ephemera]

I've heard it referred to as a hashmark.

[Johnny L.A.]

Originally Posted by groman

You know, sometimes I call it "hash" but I have no clue why or if anybody else does it. The symbol, that is, not pounds.

Now that you mention it, I've heard them called 'hash marks' too. Not for a while though. Probably from 'hatch'/'cross hatch'.

[Polycarp]

Technical term for the typographical character /#/ is the octothorpe.

And yes, I've heard it referred to as the "pound sign" (meaning avoirdupois, not Sterling) -- before twelve-key phone keypads, in fact.

Database entries tend to reference Room 935, Apt, H-3, or Suite 200 indifferently as #935, #H-3, or #200 -- the point being that whatever term is used for the intra-building address is some number within the structure at 200 Main Street.

Our last residence before moving south was a large old house that had been converted into two roomy apartments (upstairs plus finished attic area, and downstairs plus a cellar we never saw); we were in #2, with our mailbox on the porch outside the common entry and directly adjacent to the mailbox for #1.

[Q.E.D.]

The proper name for it, of course, is the octothorpe.

ETA: curse you, Multifish!

[KneadToKnow]

Originally Posted by friedo

Also, the city, state and ZIP code is properly written on one line:

Smithville, CA 99999

(Note that there should be no comma between the state abbreviation and the ZIP code.)

Nitpick: USPS actually prefers no punctuation commas (or periods) at all.

http://www.usps.com/send/preparemail...ress.htm#table

[Derleth]

It has many names. My favorite is 'octothorpe', but 'hash' certainly is common. From the Jargon File:

The character is usually pronounced `hash' outside the U.S. There are more culture wars over the correct pronunciation of this character than any other, which has led to the ha ha only serious suggestion that it be pronounced `shibboleth' (see Judges 12:6 in an Old Testament or Tanakh).

[Gary T]

It's an octothorp. [On preview, I see that's not news.] Can't imagine why more people don't simply call it that.

While it is also called the pound sign and the number sign, depending on context, I find it odd that someone reading an address where it obviously refers to a suite/apartment/box/whatever number would call it a pound sign. Surely he reads "#3" as "number three," not "pound three."

[tomndebb]

Willard Espy has written a poem giving the various names that the # character is given when it is used in a wide variety of applications:

 Many offices encumber
My diurnal rounds;
1. Before a digit, I'm a #;                   number
2.  After digits, #;                          pound
3. In a printer's proof, a #;                 space
 While, if at the harp
 You should pluck me from my place,
4. I would be a #.                           sharp
5. In one game, I'm #;                       tic-tac-toe
6. An # on phones;                           octothorpe
7. In business, I'm #, although               non-add
8. A # when in bones.                         fracture

"Octothorpe" is not the "proper" name, it is simply a name that either Texas Instruments or Bell Labs attempted to assign to the character years and years after it had been long employed to indicate number (count) or weight (averdupois) in groceries across the country.

[Scarlett67]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

Willard Espy has written a poem giving the various names that the # character is given when it is used in a wide variety of applications:

Damn you, tomndebb! I always think of this poem whenever a discussion of # comes up, but this time around I was too lazy to go dig out the book.

Scarlett, Espy fan

[Keeve]

Originally Posted by Johnny L.A.

... and the # was always the 'number sign'.

I don't think I ever use the phrase "number sign", though I do call it a "pound sign".

More relevant to the OP, though --- If I see an address such as "999 Smith St., Apt #2B", I would read it as "nine ninety-nine smith street, apartment number two bee".

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

"Octothorpe" is not the "proper" name, it is simply a name that either Texas Instruments or Bell Labs attempted to assign to the character years and years after it had been long employed to indicate number (count) or weight (averdupois) in groceries across the country.

Avoirdupois, as was earlier pointed out, not averdupois. Which, oddly enough in describing the English system of weights and measures, comes from the French (goods of weight). Or maybe not too oddly, since we did borrow a word or two from the Normans...

It was always the number sign (if seen alone) to me, or the pound sign if the context indicated so. "Hash mark", sometimes, but rarely.

[Johnny L.A.]

Originally Posted by Keeve

I don't think I ever use the phrase "number sign", though I do call it a "pound sign".

Yeah, well Easterners are weird.

[BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed]

In Germany, a telephone salesman called it the clash (London calling...). At least I'm pretty sure he did. He might have been referring to the asterisk, but I think it was the #. In other places in Europe I heard it called the sharp.

[rbroome]

Originally Posted by BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed

In Germany, a telephone salesman called it the clash (London calling...). At least I'm pretty sure he did. He might have been referring to the asterisk, but I think it was the #. In other places in Europe I heard it called the sharp.

Interesting.
Microsoft invented a computer language called C#
pronounced "SeeSharp"

now I know why.

I always refer to the # sign as pound sign.
But I have heard of hash mark.

[jjimm]

In the UK, it's almost exclusively called "hash".

[jayjay]

Originally Posted by rbroome

Interesting.
Microsoft invented a computer language called C#
pronounced "SeeSharp"

now I know why.

I always refer to the # sign as pound sign.
But I have heard of hash mark.

Calling that symbol a "sharp" goes back long before MicroSoft. It's the indicator in written music to increase the listed note a half-tone...instead of playing a C, you'd play a C#, which is (on a piano) the black key immediately to the right of the C.

[John Mace]

Originally Posted by jayjay

Calling that symbol a "sharp" goes back long before MicroSoft. It's the indicator in written music to increase the listed note a half-tone...instead of playing a C, you'd play a C#, which is (on a piano) the black key immediately to the right of the C.

That's just a rumor spread by Apple to discredit Microsoft.

[urban1a]

Originally Posted by vison

You bet it is! It means "weight", though, not "currency". As in, 20# of sugar. I can't recall ever hearing an American call that symbol "the number sign". But do people REALLY use it in every day life?

One of those bizzaro things that makes you shake your head.

I have always included the # sign when my address was an apartment (for instance, 999 9th st #901). I have no idea where it came from, but was probably taught to me by my parents or my teachers.

Bob

[Spoons]

I had many discussions with American business colleagues about this when I was writing technical documents. Problem was, that I was writing for an international audience; they were arguing that American usage should predominate. Calling it the "pound sign" in communications with our British/Canadian/Australian/New Zealand/Indian colleagues meant that we'd run into the problems the OP faced: thinking it was the sign that meant "pounds sterling." On the other hand, the Americans refused to believe that "number sign," "crosshatch," "hash," "octothorpe," or "sharp sign" would do. They insisted on calling it a "pound sign."

In the end, if it referred to weight, I fell back on "lbs." If it referred to number, I used "#." If it referred to British currency, I used "the stylized L with a slash through it." (Sorry, I don't know how to render the sign on this keyboard.) Everybody was happy--well, sort of, the Americans couldn't understand why the rest of the world didn't call "#" the pound sign.

[blondebear]

In my 27 years with Pac Bell/SBC/AT&T, # has always been called "pound". The asterisk is called the a "splat". (I prefer my own term, though; the "neener".)

[Sunspace]

Oh yes, the # sign. Growing up in Southern Ontario, I always called it the number sign. It was only with telephone response systems and the touch tone keypad that we started to hear the usage 'press the pound sign'. (I suspect 'pound' for # crept in, partly because so many telephone-response systems were made in the US, but also because it is a convenient one-syllable expression to balance 'star' for *.)

I never saw anyone use the trailing-# to indicate pounds of weight until I hit the SDMB. The Jargon File discusses the number sign in its entry about ASCII:

The pronunciation of # as ‘pound’ is common in the U.S. but a bad idea; Commonwealth Hackish has its own, rather more apposite use of ‘pound sign’ (confusingly, on British keyboards the � happens to replace #; thus Britishers sometimes call # on a U.S.-ASCII keyboard ‘pound’, compounding the American error). The U.S. usage derives from an old-fashioned commercial practice of using a # suffix to tag pound weights on bills of lading. The character is usually pronounced ‘hash’ outside the U.S.

.

[jjimm]

confusingly, on British keyboards the £ happens to replace #; thus Britishers sometimes call # on a U.S.-ASCII keyboard ‘pound’

That sounds unlikely; at least I've never met any of them, and I know a few.

[t-bonham@scc.net]

Go to http://zip4.usps.com/zip4/welcome.jsp and enter the address there, and it will give you the actual address just the way the US Post Office wants it.

That's your best way to make sure that will be delivered OK.

[Colophon]

Originally Posted by jayjay

Calling that symbol a "sharp" goes back long before MicroSoft. It's the indicator in written music to increase the listed note a half-tone...instead of playing a C, you'd play a C#, which is (on a piano) the black key immediately to the right of the C.

Not quite. They're different symbols, although they look similar. The hash sign (or whatever you want to call it) has slanted "verticals" and horizontal cross strokes. The sharp sign has upright verticals and slanting "horizontals".

[Sunspace]

To get around the name confusion for this symbol, I vote we call it "train track".

[Arnold Winkelried]

The "#" in the programming language C# is supposed to be a musical "sharp" sign, but because of the lack of that character on most keyboards, it is usually written with a "hash" sign.

Frequently Asked Questions About Visual C# .NET 2002 (microsoft.com)

Usually written: C#
How it should be written, according to the name: C♯

ETA:
C++ programmer joke:
Q: What do you call the "#" sign?
A: The "rap" sign, as in C# (= Crap! ha ha)

[BlinkingDuck]

Grew up in the midwest.

# was almost always called the pound sign. Sometimes the number symbol but almost always the pound sign.