Yeah you were not around when a kb of memory took up half your room. Looking back it doesn't make sense but at the time a byte was what-ever you wanted it to be. Considering number of characters in English language is 26, it is reasonable for a byte to be 5 bits, giving you a total of 32 possible states. Which leaves you with 6 values which could be used as control characters. how-ever lets not forget there are 7,164 other languages of the world, and they all have their own unique way of doing things.
Oh yeah, lets not forget that at the time you had other nationalistic countries/territories/people with their own superior technology all vying for the top position, all well trying to out do each other. Then you also had manipulative monopolies/trade embargo's and wars.
Oh yeah, lets not forget that at the time you had other nationalistic countries/territories/people with their own superior technology all vying for the top position, all well trying to out do each other. Then you also had manipulative monopolies/trade embargo's and wars.
It isn't perfect but people aren't perfect.