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> The real question I have is ... who really cares

Me, when the term “degrees” is used without further clarification.

I just read the material for context and convert if I need to. This publication is a US publication written for a US audience. In that context their choice makes sense. I can easily convert it to C.

Fair enough. I’m just of the opinion that a single byte of extra data (assuming ASCII) conveys an awful lot of contextual information, and can see few reasons to exclude it.

Read TFA. The celsius measurement is in the first sentence, listed before the farenheit equivalent.

"A weather station in Sicily may have set an all-time high temperature record for all of Europe on Wednesday, when the temperature climbed to a scorching 48.8°C (119.8°F) amid a regional heat wave that has shown few signs of relenting."

It’s a single byte of information, maybe 4 at a push. It doesn’t take much to include and avoids a lot of ambiguity.

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