[BC] need a NON-technical explanation

[donroden at hiwaay.net]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hertz

History

The hertz is named after the German physicist Heinrich Hertz, who made  
important scientific contributions to the study of electromagnetism.  
The name was established by the International Electrotechnical  
Commission (IEC) in 1930.[5] It was adopted by the General Conference  
on Weights and Measures (CGPM) (Conférence générale des poids et  
mesures) in 1960, replacing the previous name for the unit, cycles per  
second (cps), along with its related multiples, primarily kilocycles  
per second (kc/s) and megacycles per second (Mc/s), and occasionally  
kilomegacycles per second (kMc/s). The term cycles per second was  
largely replaced by hertz by the 1970s.

The term "gigahertz", most commonly used in computer processor clock  
rates and radio frequency (RF) applications, can be pronounced either  
/?????h?rts/, with a hard /?/ sound, or /?d????h?rts/, with a soft  
/d?/.[6] The prefix "giga-" is derived directly from the Greek "?????."

from another antique radio site :

The change from cycles to hertz took place in 1965 ( ? ) and was  
widely resented among practicing radio engineers. Common usage was to  
drop the "per second" and say "cycles", "kilocycles" or "megacycles".  
Saying "cycles" when "cycles per second" was meant may not have been  
technically correct but the "per second" was understood by all who  
heard or read it.

Quoting Donna Halper <dlh at donnahalper.com>:

> This may be an old-radio query, but I know some of you are hams so  
> perhaps you can help me explain something.  I am finishing up my  
> dissertation for my PhD after all these years (I always wanted a  
> Doctorate, and you're never too old to study something new) and am  
> struggling with how to explain in non-technical terms why radio  
> stations of the 1920s moved away from using meters and embraced the  
> term "kilocycles".  (I know they did it beginning in 1923, and it  
> basically seems to have become fait accompli by around 1927.)  I  
> believe hams still use meters, do they not?
>
> But to further confuse the neo-Luddites like me, today's radio  
> receivers are in kilohertz-- I grew up with using "kc" and it all  
> changed further at some point to "kHz", but I never understood that  
> change either.  Soooo, if somebody could explain these changes and  
> the reasons for them, in English that the average non-techie could  
> understand, I'd be grateful.
>
>