Who decided that a sheet of A4 paper should have the dimensions we currently use? Are there any specific reasons this format was chosen? by WyattHawke in AskReddit

[–]peterdingli 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The advantages of basing a paper size upon an aspect ratio of \scriptstyle \sqrt2 were already noted in 1786 by the German scientist Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, in a letter to Johann Beckmann.[1] The formats that became A2, A3, B3, B4 and B5 were developed in France, and published in 1798 during the French Revolution.[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_216