The Origins of a 16 Z

i have to ask about the origin of a 16 z i know that there are 16 letters between the a andries and and the z and harowitz how did that come about. When i was an engineer like way back in the stone age it's such a geek thing to doYeah we used to have to internationalize code um to make it work you know make it go from like whatever single to double byte uh strings and all this kind of thing  and so we called that internationalization and we abbreviated it i 18 and i 18 letters in the mansion I was like oh this will be great book ought a 16z, he says.