"Andrew Gabriel" wrote in message
...

BS1363 family is the most recently designed domestic plug and
socket system in the world. It was the result of some 10 years
of competition between manufacturers to design a new standard.
It has been adopted in whole or part by more countries in the
world than any other domestic plug and socket standard.

The US plugs are used in North and South America and other countries too.
Also because of the large population in the US more people use their systems
than ours. Those who adopted the British systems tend to be ex empire
countries, choosing a mother country system rather one on technical merits.