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Alan Turing to feature on new £50 note
- jeffwass 7y agoTitle should probably be updated to explicitly say it’s Alan Turing who will feature on the note.
- napolux 7y ago#nospoiler :-)
- dwardu 7y agoAnd lose clicks?
- quickthrower2 7y agoOr gain clicks, given the audience. They’ll care more about Alan Turing than about a fiat currency.
- rolltiide 7y agothey using bootleg Photoshop 6 at the Bank of England? yeesh
- random42 7y agoHow do you know this?
- rolltiide 7y agojust a reference to the low quality look of the composite image
- C1sc0cat 7y agoProbably deliberate don't want to give forgers a high quality image to work on.
- dx7tnt 7y agoIt's only a mock-up. I'm sure the finished article will be reassuringly expensive looking. I love that Turing is on the fifty, but almost no normal people will ever see this note. They're not really in general circulation outside of the pockets of those selling drugs to City traders, and in foreign exchanges.
- ginko 7y agoI sort of agree. The photograph seems cheap. What happened to engraved portraits on banknotes?
- rvz 7y agoI am going to have to agree with this, the other notes look professionally engraved and what we have here looks like it is rushed and a airbrushed photoshop crop for us to see.
- ddalex 7y agoAwesome recognition! I just wish people weren't such dicks to Turing in his lifetime.
- mathieubordere 7y ago+1 It breaks my heart when I think about what they did to him.
- whatshisface 7y agoIt might make you feel better to know that he was convicted under the age of consent law, which was 21 at the time. (The kid was 19.) It wasn't entirely fair because they made the age of consent higher for gays (edit: I had it wrong, the age of majority was 21 in all cases), but at least he wasn't convicted purely for being gay. The teenager was not punished.
- edanm 7y agoDo you have a source for that? I'd never heard that, and it doesn't fit with everything I have read about Turing. According to most articles I find in a quick search, they say he was convicted for "Gross indecency" because homosexuality was illegal at that time.
- whatshisface 7y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing It says 19 on his Wikipedia page. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing_law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing_law This says his conviction was in 1952. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_young_people%27s_rights_in_the_United_Kingdom#20th_century https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_young_people%27s... This page says the age of majority was actually 21 for both genders until 1970. So, I had it wrong, Turing would also have been considered as having a relationship with a minor if he had been with a 19 year old girl. Supposedly the actual law he was convicted under was written in a very vauge way due to "Victorian morals" (Wikipedia), and he was convicted under "Gross indecency" without much description.
- dalbasal 7y agoWell deserved. War hero (possibly the greatest of the war) & science hero of the highest order. Mistreated terribly by the state for his efforts.
- arcturus17 7y agoHate to be that guy, but the Great War is WWI
- dalbasal 7y agooops, fixed
- jermy 7y agoOn a point of technicality - he was only two years old when the Great War started! (I think you meant the 2nd World War)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- codeulike 7y agoThe formulae and the binary ticker tape are a nice touch.
- thom 7y agoShame he didn’t make it onto the £10 note tbh.
- mises 7y agoIs there any thing that makes the $10 more prestigious than the $50? Not an Englishman, so I may not know something about this.
- thom 7y agoI was more continuing the binary digit theme, but at the same time it is a more common note. £50 notes are generally for doing crimes, buying cars or making shopkeepers stare exasperatedly at you.
- fortydegrees 7y agoI think the OP was making a point about the £10 being binary: a 1 and a 0
- Symbiote 7y agoI think it's a joke, "£10" could look like a binary number. Alternatively, there are a lot more £10 notes in circulation, and the previous £10 note had Charles Darwin.
- wlll 7y agoIt would at least get seem more. Last time I saw a £50 note was I think around 1998.
- travisjungroth 7y agoAll these comments about how rare £50 notes are really make me want one.
- Someone1234 7y agoAlan Turing is a good choice. There were many good candidates on the shortlist (Paul Dirac, Rosalind Franklin, Dorothy Hodgkin, Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, James Clerk Maxwell, etc) that hopefully get their day. I will say Stephen Hawking absolutely deserves it, one day, but I feel like the notable person should be dead for a certain period before we throw them on currency (certainly longer than a year). Conceptually I like the "50 year rule." Helps mitigate populism or overly politicizing it. That results in the Queen (or King) being a remark on today, and the Scientist or other note-worthy contributor being a remark on our history (and values?).
- balzss 7y agoI totally agree with you. This is sad news for Stephen Hawking though because I'd be surprised if we still had physical cash in 50 years time.
- cameronbrown 7y agoI _really_ hope you're wrong.
- marble-drink 7y agoThe wheels are already in motion. It's been that way for decades now. Look around you. The banks will start pushing even harder to get rid of physical currency soon. Except strong discouragement. You already can't do many things with physical currency. Like downloading music or films. This list will just keep growing until eventually physical currency just won't be accepted in most places. This is perfect for the banks.
- Angostura 7y agoExcept that Mark Carney has said very publicly that he sees absolutely no chance of physical cash going away.
- 7y ago
- arethuza 7y ago“This is only a foretaste of what is to come, and only the shadow of what is going to be.” What a great quote.
- golergka 7y agoAside from the excellent choice of Turing, this is some godawful design, with all the worst Photoshop cliches from the 90s.
- suaveybloke 7y agoIt's just a rough mock-up, the final design should be much better (at least that's what happened with the redesigns of the £5/£10 notes).
- smcl 7y agoJust a shame that this bank note is basically unusable
- maffydub 7y agoCan you elaborate on why they're unusable?
- jotm 7y agoNobody uses them in day to day life. Many people have never even seen one. Most cash machines only have £20 notes as the highest denomination.
- maffydub 7y agoI agree they're rarely used by locals. Having said that, when I have friends visit from Singapore, they often seem to carry £50 notes... and most places seem to accept them (although maybe this is less true outside London).
- marsRoverDev 7y agoWhen I first moved to London my Australian bank changed about $1000 AUD for me to british 50s; I think in that part of the world the banks/money changers get shipments of 50s to save space/weight. Took me a good year to shift those though, 3/4 of places would outright refuse to accept them and the other quarter would handle them with a mix of confusion and distrust.
- shrikant 7y agoLots of shops (at least in my neighbourhood in London) flat out refuse to accept £50 notes.
- maffydub 7y agoInteresting! My neighbourhood in London (NW6 - not particularly upmarket) seemed to accept them fine... as well as most places in Central London.
- jgrahamc 7y agoMark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England, came to the Cloudflare London office opening party recently and he told me that it was entirely the Governor's discretion to choose who is on the bank notes. This was the first time the public had been solicited for ideas, and a committee had whittled the suggestions down to a short list. Ultimately, Carney made this call. Thanks!
- chongli 7y agoMark Carney is Canadian and was previously the governor of the Bank of Canada. We've been doing this sort of thing with our money for a long time now. Looks like he brought the tradition to England.
- hanoz 7y agoIf you mean the tradition of choosing historical figures to feature on bank notes, rather than the tradition of boasting about it at office parties, we've been doing the former sort of thing a long time before Mark Carney's arrival. Probably the latter thing too.
- chongli 7y agoNo, I mean the tradition of having a public consultation of which historical figures to include on the currency.
- Zeebrommer 7y agoThe article states that "In 2015, a total of 30,000 people nominated 590 famous visual artists for the £20 note, before JMW Turner was selected with the help of focus groups." so this doesn't appear to be the first time the public is involved.
- dreamcompiler 7y agoWhen I saw the headline my first thought was JGC must have had something to do with this! Thank you for your efforts on behalf of Turing over the years.
- bufferoverflow 7y agoGood choice of Alan, but what a trainwreck of the design and the typography. Ugly as hell.
- jw1224 7y agoPretty sure this is only a mockup — the note itself won't be out until the end of 2021. I remember seeing a preview of the redesigned £5/£10 notes a few years ago and thinking exactly the same thing — seeing Trebuchet MS on a bank note was a bit of a surprise, but thankfully the end result looked far better.
- robert_foss 7y agoIt is funny how the article doesnt mention him committing suicide as a result of being chemically castrated by the UK authorities for being gay.
- dschuetz 7y agoYes, exactly. Doesn't even feel like an apology.
- Luc 7y agoYou already knew about it, so obviously there was no need to mention it. Again.
- mises 7y agoI'm not sure it needed to? I don't think they tried to exclude it, and more that "by the way, we castrated this guy decades ago" doesn't naturally come up in the article. Plus, they did actually issue a formal apology. I would hope they're doing this to honor Turing, not to apologize for what they did to him. Face on a bill is nice, but doesn't make up for ruining some one's life, so it would be a lousy apology any way. So I kind of hope the media more covers what Turing accomplished than the things Engkand did.
- mike-cardwell 7y agoThe short paragraph which talks about his mistreatment, links to a much longer article regarding his pardon, and his alleged suicide. This seems totally reasonable to me.
- brighter2morrow 7y ago>It is funny how the article doesnt mention him committing suicide as a result of being chemically castrated by the UK authorities for being gay. Yeah I agree, I assume this is actually the main reason he is so well known and celebrated today. Mere obsession with computers would make Godel, Alonso Church, and others with equivalent models of computation just as famous.
- edanm 7y ago
- billpg 7y agoFor context, the £50 note is worth around 63 USD. (Used to be around $80 a few years ago. Thanks Brexit!)
- raverbashing 7y agoAnd even funnier how there's a quote there how the 50 note is being targeted as an elitist/laundry note It might have been a big amount of money 20/30 yrs ago but today it's a bit weird that's the biggest denomination.
- criddell 7y agoDo you know if the bank sells new notes specifically to collectors? I'd love to buy one of these if I can get one that is in great shape.
- travisjungroth 7y agoIn the US, you could just walk into any bank and ask. I’ve done it before with other notes. Bring 50 quid with you if it’s not your bank. If you’re getting it right when it comes out, it will almost certainly be uncirculated. Go at a quieter time (not a Friday or first bank day after the 1st or 15th).
- cr0sh 7y agoSo you're saying I could walk into Bank of America, say I wanted the current 50 pound British note in proof condition, pay the current exchange rate ($63.00 USD currently), and walk out with one that same day? Doesn't seem possible. I mean - could you potentially get 50 pounds worth of physical British currency at the current exchange rate from a US bank? Certainly - but it won't be proof condition - not by a longshot. I think if you wanted proof condition (uncirculated) for any note, you have to contact the treasury of that country - which I believe (and correct me if I am wrong) for the 50 pound note, is going to be the Bank of England (I've linked to it above in another reply). In the US, I believe you have to contact the US Treasury Department; but you could probably just go to a bank for such a note (or an entire filled band if you wanted it) - but for certain things you would likely need to contact them directly I think. For instance, you used to be able to get uncut bills; IIRC, one of the Steves of Apple fame used to pay things as a joke with these, in the one dollar denomination - he would get the sheets, then have them professionally perforated, and then punched to put them in a binder, and when he'd pay for stuff, he'd open the binder, and tear out the money - it was perfectly legitimate cash, but it threw a lot of people for a loop - I believe it was Woz who did this; Jobs was a bit uptight for that kind of hack - which is what made them a perfect pair - it's just too bad that Woz didn't get to really share in the "fame" of Apple (I think that was his choice, though - from what I know of him, that's how he is mostly). To get those uncut bills, though, I think you had to travel to the US Treasury and purchase/pick-up in person; it wasn't something you could just easily grab at your bank. Today, they don't sell them at all, probably due to counterfeiting (bleach the paper and re-print higher-denomination bills all at one shot).
- arctangent 7y agoFor the benefit of some below, the design shown in the news article is only a concept image [1]. The final design will be revealed nearer the time the new note is issued. [1] https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2019/july/50-pound-banknote-character-announcement https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2019/july/50-pound-bank...
- tripzilch 7y agoOh, good! :) because the white glow looks like a really bad photoshop cutout job ...
- duiker101 7y agoThe more surprising thing is that they are making a new £50 note at all. I haven't seen one in a very long time and many shops don't even accept them any more.
- Symbiote 7y agoThat just depends where you live and work. In a part of London with many tourists, I saw them used by people ahead of me in the queue daily. There are some cash machines somewhere in London that dispense them -- possibly in Canary Wharf, I forget. Conversely, I don't think I've seen a cash machine with fivers. https://imgur.com/a/sJu9y https://imgur.com/a/sJu9y (cash machine showing it has £20s and £50s).
- philbarr 7y agoYou'll generally see cash machines with fivers in the poorer parts of the UK.
- physicsguy 7y agoAlso around Universities in my experience.
- iforgotpassword 7y agoThat's interesting. In Germany I might get a strange look if I pay for my coffee with a 50€ bill but it's usually accepted unless they actually don't have enough change. It's certainly no problem at a supermarket, even paid with 100€ bill a few times (because there is this stupid ATM near my workplace that doesn't ask which bills I want and just gives me 100 if I chose that amount and I forget almost every time). Judging from other comments here it seems outside London you really have trouble paying with that 50£ bill. I have seen one supermarket had a sign up saying they don't accept 200€ bills so far. I'm curious about other countries now because I never really gave that a thought. I was surprised though when I was in China for the first time and learned the largest one is 100rmb which was around 10€ at that point. It's now more like 15€ and China is rapidly changing to a completely cashless society anyways but it was really weird back then; since using the ATM included a fee, you would get like 4000 bucks at once (depending on how long you stayed) and run around with 40 bills in your pocket.
- folli 7y agoThe £50 note was described (...) as the "currency of corrupt elites, of crime of all sorts and of tax evasion". I recently dealt with a 1000 CHF (= £811 = $1018) banknote in Switzerland. It's not very commonly used, but it exists.
- sigwinch28 7y agoAlthough not commonly used, it seems the Swiss do not have such skepticism of high-value notes. I would routinely pay for things (groceries, electronics, etc.) with 100CHF and 200CHF notes without the cashiers batting an eye, while I used the 1000CHF note once or twice for large purchases.
- julianwachholz 7y agoDown payments with 1000s on big things like cars is very much accepted here.
- interestica 7y agoWhere's here?
- travisjungroth 7y agoSwitzerland. They’re talking about 1000 CHF (Swiss Franc) notes.
- aunty_helen 7y agoA Swiss friend of mine (who granted is a little old fashioned) said he would use them to pay bills for his business and would often use 10x 1000CHF notes for a monthly bill. Another interesting point around the money laundering aspects, he was talking with one of the central bankers and it was now considered unpalatable to introduce any bigger sized notes. My friend's point was that when the 1000CHF note was introduced in the early 1900s, adjusting for inflation it was worth a lot lot more.
- 7y ago
- schnable 7y agoNice, but a click baity headline for HN...
- julianwachholz 7y agoIt's fixed now
- DominikPeters 7y agoThe table on the mock-up banknote shows a fragment of a Turing Machine, taken from his paper introducing TMs (https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/Turing_Paper_1936.pdf#page=11 https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/Turing_Paper_1936.pdf#pa...). Unfortunately, the chosen fragment is just used by Turing to establish notation and is otherwise meaningless. I hope in the final version they use better formulas, for example from the construction of the universal machine.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- wlll 7y agoThe last time I saw a £50 note was in about 1997. I pay with cash a lot. I think it's fair to say they don't get used all that much.
- epanchin 7y agoWhy would you receive a £50 paying in cash? There’s larger note for which you could be receiving it as change.
- travisjungroth 7y agoIf they pay for lots of things in cash, they must also receive lots of cash somehow. Otherwise they’ll be out of cash pretty quick!
- epanchin 7y agoCash machines don’t often dispense 50s though, so unless they’re going into a branch they would never encounter one. I know people who get out their cash for the month from a branch and do get 50s.
- wlll 7y agoIf I recall correctly it was when I was a bartender and someone paid using one.
- colordrops 7y agoIronic considering some countries have already transitioned to mostly digital payments.
- physicsguy 7y agoIt’s cool, but the circulation for these notes is really low - I only ever used to see £50 notes when working in a shop that sold timber to builders!
- jacknews 7y agoPerhaps shows the state of Britain's economy/relative worth compared to the rest of the world, since I used them (true, only occassionally) late 90s/early 2000's, but they must be worth much much less now, due to inflation, not to mention that referendum thing. It's not because prices are low in Britain aka Treasure-Island, that's for sure! $100 bills are more than common, for example, and similar (actually quite a bit more) in value.
- aembleton 7y agoWhere would you even get a £50 note from? I've never seen a cash machine dispense them.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- jacknews 7y agoThat's just what I'm saying though - if £50 ($65?) is still considered excessive value for a single note, it's perhaps a reflection on the relative wealth of Britons. I'm British but have been expatriated since early 2000s
- xxs 7y agoAlternatively it can be a shift to cashless transactions for a bit larger sums.
- tobylane 7y agoNo, we would usually take/be given a stack of twenties. If it’s too much to be in that then it would be a cheque or bank transfer. We’ve paid most handymen recently by agreeing to transfer money later.
- henntipular 7y agoIs it a picture of before or after the government betrayed and mutilated him in a homophobic witch-hunt? Thanks for helping win that war.. shame about your sexuality tho
- _bxg1 7y agoNot only is he an important historical figure, but England owes him a great debt (and reparation). Previously they'd only "pardoned" him; this is a stronger gesture.
- sygma 7y agoA bit off-topic: last time I tried to use a 50 GBP note in London I got strange looks and it was refused. Apparently anything beyond a 20 GBP note is seen as "too high". A worrying turn of events…
- drcode 7y agoI think this is true in most countries now, in that ATMs are more and more designed to just spit out a single denomination, which raises the statistical likelihood that any larger denomination note could be counterfeit.
- kitd 7y agoWait for a few months after Oct 31st, then it should be fine.
- byziden 7y agoSome shops will do extra verification, such as rubbing it against paper to ensure the ink comes off, and use a UV light to see the hidden symbols. Even though it might be legal tender, sadly there's no obligation to accept it. Just as they might refuse Pokemon cards as payment too. https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/knowledgebank/what-is-legal-tender https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/knowledgebank/what-is-legal-...
- ptah 7y agothat picture of him is remarkably high-res for a £50 note
- sytelus 7y agoIsn’t this unusual for British tradition? If I understood correctly, the bank notes are issued under the authority and guarantee of monarch which is why they carry her picture. This applies to any country which has also accepted her as their queen as well (Canada, Australia, New Zealand etc). It is being said that the queen doesn’t carry passport or banknotes because both are issues under her name. So there is big symbolism there which will be gone?
- tobylane 7y agoIt’s said she carries cash. She gives money to the collection plate at Sandringhams church at Christmas.
- npad 7y agoThe Queen is on the other side of the note.
- civicsquid 7y agoIt really isn't that unusual. The five pound note for example has Churchill on one side and the Queen on the other.
- twic 7y agoAs others have mentioned, it's quite normal to have the queen on the front of the note, and some other historical figure on the back. As far as i can tell, this started in 1970, with a £20 note with William Shakespeare on it: https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/withdrawn-banknotes https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/withdrawn-banknote...
- danharaj 7y agoChuang Tzu with his bamboo pole was fishing in the Pu river. The prince of Chu sent two vice-chancellors with a formal document: We hereby appoint you prime minister. Chuang Tzu held his bamboo pole still.Watching the Pu river, he said:“I am told there is a sacred tortoise offered and canonized three thousand years ago,venerated by the prince, wrapped in silk,in a precious shrine on an altar in the temple. What do you think? Is it better to give up one’s life and leave a sacred shell as an object of cult in a cloud of incense for three thousand years,or to live as a plain turtle dragging its tail in the mud?” “For the turtle”, said the vice-chancellor,“better to live and drag its tail in the mud!” “Go home!”, said Chuang Tzu.“Leave me here to drag my tail in the mud.”
- lern_too_spel 7y agoHow does this story apply? Turing has no life to live whether he is on the notes or not, and somebody will be put on them.
- danharaj 7y agoIt would have been better for Turing if the government left him alone instead of chemically castrating him and driving him to suicide, then venerating him.
- pinkfoot 7y agoYou do realize it’s a completely different government? Indeed, it’s a completely different population - the castrators are quite dead. Unless inherited guilt is your thing.
- danharaj 7y agoIt's not about guilt or justice. That's not the point. But, of course, you're wrong. It's not a "completely different government", unless you think you're a completely different person because most of the atoms in your body have been replaced by now since your birth.
- dannykwells 7y agoWonderful choice!! Hoping for Rosalind Franklin next!
- dwighttk 7y agoThey should put "There's no such thing as The Turing Test" somewhere on there.
- univalent 7y agoGreat recognition!!! Excellent design as well. Well done 'Bank of England'.
- anticensor 7y agoAdolf Hitler could have been a good choice.
- panpanna 7y agoPeople on Reddit wanted him on the £10 notes instead. Makes sense to have ones and zeros for the father of electric computers...
- lamby 7y agoGiven the hostile stares of disgust and suspicion that result from trying to pay for anything with a £50 note, the tragic irony that it will now be adorned by the face of a man who suffered homophobic discrimination is not lost on me.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]