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What's The Correct Way to Pronounce 'GIF'? (thenewstack.io)
"Apparently we're all fighting about how to pronounce 'GIF' again on Twitter," writes technology columnist Mike Melanson:
I personally find the argument of web designer Aaron Bazinet, who managed to secure the domain howtoreallypronouncegif.com, rather convincing in its simplicity: "It's the most natural, logical way to pronounce it. That's why when everyone comes across the word for the first time, they use a hard G [as in "gift"]." Bazinet relates the origin of the debate as such:
"The creator of the GIF image format, Steve Wilhite of CompuServe, when deciding on the pronunciation, said he deliberately chose to echo the American peanut butter brand, Jif, and CompuServe employees would often say 'Choosy developers choose GIF(jif)', playing off of Jif's television commercials. If you hear anyone pronounce GIF with a soft G, it's because they know something of this history."
Wilhite attempted to settled the controversy in 2013 when accepting a lifetime achievement award at the 17th annual Webby awards. Using an actual animated .gif for his five-word acceptance speech, he authoritatively announced his preferred pronounciation. However, the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary argues that "A coiner effectively loses control of a word once it's out there," adding that "the pronunciation with a hard g is now very widespread and readily understood."
One linguist addressed the topic on Twitter this week, noting studies that found past usage of "gi" in words has been almost evenly split between hard and soft g sounds. Their thread also answers a related question: how will I weaponize a trivial and harmless consonant difference to make other people feel bad and self-conscious about themselves?
Her response? "Maybe just....don't do this."
"The creator of the GIF image format, Steve Wilhite of CompuServe, when deciding on the pronunciation, said he deliberately chose to echo the American peanut butter brand, Jif, and CompuServe employees would often say 'Choosy developers choose GIF(jif)', playing off of Jif's television commercials. If you hear anyone pronounce GIF with a soft G, it's because they know something of this history."
Wilhite attempted to settled the controversy in 2013 when accepting a lifetime achievement award at the 17th annual Webby awards. Using an actual animated .gif for his five-word acceptance speech, he authoritatively announced his preferred pronounciation. However, the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary argues that "A coiner effectively loses control of a word once it's out there," adding that "the pronunciation with a hard g is now very widespread and readily understood."
One linguist addressed the topic on Twitter this week, noting studies that found past usage of "gi" in words has been almost evenly split between hard and soft g sounds. Their thread also answers a related question: how will I weaponize a trivial and harmless consonant difference to make other people feel bad and self-conscious about themselves?
Her response? "Maybe just....don't do this."
When it stands for Jraphics Interchange Format I'll pronounce it with a soft g.
The creator of the GIF image format, Steve Wilhite of CompuServe, when deciding on the pronunciation, said he deliberately chose to echo the American peanut butter brand, Jif,
So, he's a complete moron.
He created the acronym GIF, for Graphics Interchange Format.
The G is for Graphics, not Jraphics.
The G is for Graphics, not Jraphics.
There is no such word as Jraphics.
The G is for Graphics, not Jraphics.
There is no such word as Jraphics.
How do you create an acronym and then pronounce it wrong? That's just fucking retarded.
Since, we don't give Geoff the gee sound either, although we appear to offer a phonetical alternative spelling.
Don't forget. We've deemed it appropriate to have shuggar on a Wed-nez-day in Feb-roo-ary.
It's also the way our language helps us determine when to ask, "You're not from around here, are you?" Looking at you, R-Kansas.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Wish we could downmod the article as Troll.
Mentioning or discussing something controversial and/or different from one's opinion is not (necessarily) trolling. /. moderators would learn this.)
(I wish some
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
That's easy. I pronounce it "vim".
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Huh. Somebody who thinks the way an acronym's letters are pronounced in their respective words has ANYTHING AT ALL to do with how the acronym should be pronounced... is calling somebody *else* a moron? Funny.
Once again, the ONLY points that have any relevance whatsoever are:
1. The person who invents a technology deserves the right to name it, and only a total asshole would ignore their wishes.
2. The Cabal has authorized me to reveal that, for as long as the GIF format has existed, pronouncing "gif" correctly -- i.e., like "gin", not like "git" -- has been one of the not-so-secret recognition codes by which people who have any clue about computer stuff identify each other.
David Gould
main(i){putchar(340056100>>(i-1)*5&31|!!(i<6)<< 6)&&main(++i);}
And then ignorant people keep calling every video "a GIF" even though video files are not animated/graphic files.
Stopping the widespread use of "GIF" to mean "video" should be the topic here, not the proper way to pronounce GIF.
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