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Jod made the Jiraffes and the Giraffes and they were best friends. But then one Jiraffe found God and he spited Jod and all the Giraffes with all his might.
Did Jeorge of the gungle come by too?
Would that by any chance have cast a young Steve Buscemi?
Sounds great, to be honest (Frasers shitty default face and one eyebrow was always off-putting)
Attempting to parse this comment is what I imagine having a stroke to be like
Given that there’s also a .jif format, the J pronunciation makes even less sense.
.gif came first and no one uses .jif anymore because there are better options.
I mean gif has also widely been replaced by webm. Go to r/gifs and you won’t find a single actual gif.
.jif was named to follow .gif.
Its also .jfif to be accurate, and no one really used .jif or .jfif.
The “G” stands for “Graphics”. Why would anybody pronounce it “jif”?
The P in JPEG stands for photographic so I guess we shall pronounce it “jayfeg” based on that logic.
/s
Descriptive linguistic opinion: both the hard and soft G pronunciations are used, with the hard G being more common, but I like the soft G and use it myself.
id vibe with jayfeg if it meant everyone pronounces gif correctly
Steve Wilhite (engineering lead on the team that created GIF) said the soft g is the right pronunciation.
The only argument is that the guy who invented and named the GIF originally pronounced it that way, but he was a computer scientist, not a linguist. Thankfully the inevitable and uncontrollable evolution of language corrected that mistake fairly quickly.
Because at the origin of the format, “choosy graphic designers choose .GIF”. Which is a direct reference to JIF, the brand of peanut butter, and their tagline.
The pronunciation of an acronym often has little to nothing to do with the words themselves they represent, and more to do with the acronym itself as though it were a word.
So they decided how it should be pronounced based on a cheap marketing ploy, even less reason to care how the creators said it.
but there’s already .jif!!!
Reverse that.
.jif (jpeg interchange format) came out 5 years after .gif.
It was an homage to GIF.
Edited to add: Also no one ever really used it.
If you pronounce gif based on the word itself, it would clearly have a hard “G”. I don’t think it’s decided by the creator anymore then by the words making up the acronym either.
Imo, word pronunciation and meaning depends on whatever “takes” in society. Most just say it like it would sound, the creators pronunciation clearly lost.
That’s just incorrect. Multiple studies have shown that how you think a word is pronounced is based on other words you know, not what the actual pronunciation is. When I first saw the word gif, I pronounced it with a soft g. Turns out that’s the correct pronunciation (because it’s a product name, not a random word) but if I had happen to have heard a hard g word more recently then I probably would have thought it was pronounced the wrong way.
I don’t think it’s decided by the creator anymore then by the words making up the acronym either.
I mean, they got to name it… How it sounds is part of that…
Most just say it like it would sound, the creators pronunciation clearly lost.
How long have people been talking about how to pronounce gif?
I don’t think there are any winners or losers here.
You know I daresay that basically your exact comment is what OOP was responding too on reddit.
Wouldn’t doubt it.
Some folks get unreasonably mad about what they consider “right”.
That’s, exactly what it sounded like you were doing…
I’m pointing to the lead of the team that created it. They get to name it, not me.
I’m also not oddly mad about it like the person replying to me with lots of exclamation points, the user in OPs image, or the person using their alt that has only been used to downvote people they are in conversations with for the past few months.
All I said was the people responsible for it say its a soft g, not a hard g.
We already pronounce it correctly.
And if it would be spelled “jpheg”, that’s how we would pronounce it.
Jyp heg would be my pronunciation for that.
But if the creator of jpeg came out tomorrow and said "it’s actually supposed to be pronounced “jayfeg”, would anyone change how they say it? I highly doubt it.
The only argument is that the guy who invented and named the GIF originally pronounced it that way, but he was a computer scientist, not a linguist. Thankfully the inevitable and uncontrollable evolution of language corrected that mistake fairly quickly.
Nope that is far from the only argument.
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It is how the word was originally said and intended to be used. Evidence: the literal first advertisement for the format: “choosy developers choose GIF”, a pun on the advertisement for JIF peanut butter.
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the pronunciation of g before a vowel is not always hard. Giraffe. Gin.
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the pronunciation of the individual words in an acronym don’t define its pronunciation. NASA - Aeronautic, Association - do you pronounce it NÆSÂ? ASAP - do you say ÂSÂP or AySAP?
It’s fine to say it however you want, but to act like one way is definitively correct, for the reasons you cite anyway, is bad
I didn’t cite any reasons and I didn’t say that there is a correct and incorrect way to pronounce it now, just that the way they chose to pronounce it originally was arbitrary and unintuitive. Add a “t” to the end, what does that spell? The pronunciations of giraffe and gin are equally unintuitive to modern American English speakers, they’re just old words that have been well-established in the lexicon so no one thinks about that. If someone came up with the word gin today, we’d probably be having the same argument about it.
And when I said it’s the only argument, I meant it’s the only one that holds any water. It’s still leaking all over the place.
They’re not unintuitive. Just because you think that doesn’t make it true. Tom Scott has a whole video on the topic, essentially however you first associate that word is how you think it should be pronounced. That doesn’t make it unintuitive, as would be evidenced by the pretty much 50/50 split of usage for soft g vs hard g for years. I had huge arguments about this back in like 2016/7 and it literally was a 50/50 split. Might have changed since then, but that doesn’t mean jack shit about intuitiveness.
Both pronunciations already had solid handholds in the zeitgeist by 2016, it was named 30 years before that. I’d argue the 50/50 split you provide nothing but hearsay for is proof that the hard g pronunciation is more intuitive as it was originally marketed and advertised with the soft g (and a pronunciation guide for the slogan as folks have helpfully pointed out). By your and Tom Scott’s reasoning, everyone exposed to it then would use the soft g, but people in the decades after who knew nothing of the cheap marketing stunt would inevitably pronounce it however made the most sense to them. Thus the hard g pronunciation.
Now for my own personal hearsay, it’s never been anywhere close to 50/50 and it’s gotten more and more unbalanced towards the hard g over time. In 2011 it was maybe 70/30 hard g/soft g, now it feels like 95/5 🤷♂️. But again, that’s all obviously irrelevant due to it’s subjectivity.
By your and Tom Scott’s reasoning, everyone exposed to it then would use the soft g,
No by Tom Scott’s explanation (not reasoning, he was stating actual science and scientific studies) exactly what has happened would have happened. People hear the word with a hard g and they forever associate it that way, even if it isn’t correct. It has nothing to do with how people think it should be pronounced or even the way that makes most sense to them. It’s about former associations with other words grabbing your mind at that moment and clicking. Doesn’t matter if you look back at it later and think (oh soft g makes sense cause it’s the peanut butter). You’ll already have the hard g stuck.
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It’s an acronym. There’s no linguistic requirement for any of the letters to match any part of the pronunciation. NASA, scuba, I can list a hundred acronyms that have absolutely no connection to their expanded pronunciation.
And no, it wasn’t just the dude who invented it. It was the entire company, CompuServe, because they were trying to sell a product. “Choosy developers choose gif”. It’s literally got a tagline that tells you how it’s pronounced.
There’s no linguistic requirement for any of the letters to match any part of the pronunciation.
I made no statements to the contrary, not sure why you directed any of that first paragraph at me and not the person I responded to. Regardless, the only “correct” pronunciations of any words are the ones that find purchase in the cultural lexicon. The fact that the soft g pronunciation was chosen by a corporation trying to cash in on the success of a different corporation is even less convincing of an argument. Fuck those soulless money-grubbers, they can take their advertising slogan-based neoligisms and shove them in their arse, but pronounced like “ass” because language evolves. You have to evolve with it or you won’t understand it.
I mean, the pronunciation of proper nouns doesn’t follow other rules of language. If the creator is still alive and is telling you the correct pronunciation then that’s the pronunciation. It’s a product, a proper noun, not a simple word.
It’s not a proper noun any more than granola is. Even if that point stood, when you get down to it, there simply are no “rules of language,” there is just making noises that other people understand or making ones that they don’t. You think proper nouns can’t have multiple pronunciations, well what do you call those little yellow, orange, and brown peanut butter candies? How do you say the capital of South Dakota? Speaking of SD, did you know there’s a town there called Sinai, pronounced “sigh-knee-eye” by its residents? I legitimately know a guy named Jurgen, one of his parents pronounces it with the J sound and the other pronounces it with the Y sound! It may be infuriating at times but that’s just how spoken language works. I urge you to embrace it as fighting it is fruitless. It’s also easier to get used to cringey new slang when you realize it’s a universal constant.
You’re absolutely correct, regardless of who defined the sound, it’s how it’s generally pronounced in public that becomes the status quo and therefore “correct” way.
I’ve never heard anyone in real life use the soft G. Doesn’t mean people don’t, but regionally it’s “JIF” for me.
The funny thing is, regardless of how it’s said people who know anything about computers understand what you’re talking about, so the argument is really a useless one. Maybe if .jif was used more then it would matter, but I can’t say I’ve seen a .jif file in the wild myself.
Right? If the creator of jpeg came and said “It’s actually pronounced ‘Jay-pej’,” people would just laugh at them.
Because the words inside an acronym have no bearing on how the acronym is pronounced. And in this case, it’s not just as acronym. It’s a product name, where the creators get to choose to name it whatever the fuck they want. “Choosy developers choose gif”. So there’s plenty of reasons it should be using a soft g and zero reasons it should be using a hard g.
You just gave a reason for a hard G.
No I didn’t, you’ve misread.
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The U in scuba stands for underwater yet people pronounce it scOOba
The E in hepa stands for efficiency yet its pronounced HEPA with a short E
The A in nato stands for Atlantic and the O stands for organization
The first A in ASAP is for as
The Os in POTUS, SCOTUS and FLOTUS all come from of and the Us comes from United
Acronyms don’t need to sound like the word they are from
And words don’t need to sound the way they did when they were coined
But if you are talking about the correct way to pronounce something shouldn’t that be the way the creator named it?
It’s like if you named your dog Aaron and they went by the name for a while and all of a sudden people start calling him Ay Ay Ron because they saw the two As and assumed that was how to pronounce it.
What pronunciation would you consider correct the one the creator came up with or the one an uninformed consensus came up with?
Ever heard of dialects? Accents? Creoles? There are no correct or incorrect pronunciations, just functional and non-functional ones. Gif currently has two functional pronunciations. That doesn’t make one more correct than the other just because the guy who said it first said it that way. If you are able to accurately relay the information you’re trying to relay, you are “correct”. If the dog responds to ay-ay-ron, that is functionally its name.
It’s not the guy who said it first it’s the guy who made a file format and chose a name that was the same as the peanut butter company…
Are you seriously this narcissistic that you can’t admit the way you say something is technically wrong? A product was made with a specific name and you choose to say it contrary to that way because it conveys the information it’s a perfectly acceptable way of pronouncing it but if you can’t admit that you are technically wrong in something so stupid and benign as a pronunciation of an acronym then you might have a problem.
I’ll even go first and announce to all the people on this thread that I am in facts not gods gift to the world and sometimes pronounce words differently than their correct pronunciations because the correct ones are less fun.
Hey I’m the one who said it’s the only argument that holds any water, I just already have water. I lost this argument to my brother over a decade ago and have admitted I was wrong since then. Language is only valuable insofar as you’re able to make your point understood to the people you’re talking to. There is no correct way to say anything except the way that your audience understands. I’ll give you that the 1987 CompuServ file was pronounced with a soft g (seemingly due to lazy marketing), but the word has gone beyond that product. As others have mentioned, most “gifs” are not even in that format anymore and haven’t been for years and years. The majority of people using the word don’t really know what it means and certainly don’t know or care how it was coined. But if it makes you feel better, I promise the next time I’m buying a .gif in 1987, I’ll use the soft g.
How do you pronounce CD?
Cee-Deez nutz
🐿️
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Sidik. There are more than one languages.
As the initialism it is. It’s impossible to mispronounce, or have multiple competing pronunciations for initialisms as the names of letters are contextually static. Yes C can make different sounds in words, but if you’re just saying the name of the letter, there’s only one way to say it.
It always surprises me when people can spend this much time writing something up and miss the greater point even if the specifics can be challenged. The greater point, of course is the ‘c’ changes based upon phonomes.
Your point is valid, but ‘c’ is also has competing pronunciations in an acronym. Here’s an example.
CERT - Computer Emergency Response TeamThe larger
gifpronunciation has nothing to do with with the fact that thegstands forgraphic. It is irrelevant to the larger topic and is a tangent.
That would just confirm my suspicion that God is a moron.
You understand it actually is pronounced jif right?
it’s pronounced jod right
I dunno about that, but seems like a lot of people aren’t aware of the intended pronunciation.
and the beautiful thing is, language does not work that way.
I’m not sure what you mean. Are you some sort of cunning linguist?
a sort. you can intend people to use a word you made up or pronounce it a certain way, but how it’s used or pronounced is how it’s going to be in the language regardless of its creator’s intent.
Language is not completely a democratic process. A 30:70 split on pronunciation doesn’t indicate that one version is going to fade into oblivion. Pronunciation can evolve but so can definition. The word “literally” no longer means what it used to mean in common vernacular. Not everyone should be expected to accept these majority trends though. Many of us still want “literally” to preserve its original definition for example.
There’s already a file format by the name
.jif!And it’s pronounced ’gif’ (probably).
‘Hiff’
Smooth or crunchy?
It’s an acronym, people! Say it right:
“Gee” “Eye” “Eff”
…or impress us all with your knowledge: Graphics Interchange Format.
Make CompuServe proud.
pronunciation of the words that make up an acronym have nothing to do with how you pronounce an acronym. see: atm is ay tee emm not aw tel mah nor is it atom. it’s just however it would make sense as a standalone word. some make a single sound and some require letter by letter and some combine.
soft ‘g’ jif makes perfect sense and is what the creator said is the the way it’s pronounced. hard ‘g’ gif sounds like someone saying ‘gift’ got candlejacked, thank you for coming to my ted tal
NASA, not NAySA, SCUBA, not SCUBbA, LASER, not LASsER. Many such cases.
ATM is not an acronym, though, just an initialism, so the letters are pronounced individually.
It’s ireelevant anyway since the english pronounciation is so inconsistent.
If it’s an acronym it wouldn’t be pronounced like that, that would be an initialism.
Into heaven you mean, because you passed the test.
What about this fucking radio station in Germany?:
That’s french tho :) NRJ ~ energie
That’s not written there. I see a Y at the end.
Jraphical
Yes, but how would Jod pronounce PNG?
Pee en jee
Gif of Akhnai
