It’s pronounced however the fuck you want to pronounce it.
I like to pronounce it “jif” because gin, gentle, Germany, gypsy. Others like to pronounce it “gif” because gift, good, game, girl.
Don’t pull any bullshit reasons like “it’s not pronounced jraphics”, because if that argument holds any water, JPEG is jay-feg, scuba is scuh-ba, and laser is lah-seer.
The creator calls it “jif” and wants others to call it “jif”. I don’t give a shit; if some people want to call it “gif”, that’s up to them and I’m not stopping them. English is not a prescriptive language; pronunciations will always differ according to origins and regions and accents and generations. I will not misunderstand you if you pronounce it “gif”, and you will not misunderstand me if I say “jif”.
jay-feg
Babe wake up, new pointless acronym controversy just dropped
This should be the top comment, thank you for putting into words exactly how I feel fellow jiffer
By calling it “jif” I think the creator was referencing “jiffy,” as in “fast.” It’s like a video, but it loads in a jiffy. Or: it’s a short looping video - it’s over in a jiffy then restarts again.
I think people that call it “gif” don’t intuitively get this, even at the subconscious level. If they did, I think they’d prefer “jif.” It’s much more fun IMO. Not to mention that it’s less likely to be mistaken for an existing word (gift). So it’s both more fun and more practical. What else do we have to do to convince you people :(
It’s a reference to Jif peanut butter’s ad campaign.
“Choosy moms choose Jif” was used as “Choosy developers choose GIF”.
Some arguments that people keep bringing up that are all wrong and carry zero weight in this discussion:
- The creator says it’s JIF
- It’s like Gift, but without the T
- It’s like Giraffe, but without the raffe
- It stands for “Graphics Interchange Format” so it’s GIF
- My dictionary says it’s GIF
- My dictionary says it’s JIF
- Obama says it’s GIF
- Giphy says it’s GIF
Ultimately, language is very dynamic and changes all the time. Words change their spelling, their meaning and their pronunciation too. Dictionaries tend to lag behind a little bit, but the fact that they publish a new version every year signifies how much languages change. The creator of a word can coin a pronunciation, but ultimately has zero control over whether it will be adopted or not.
So therefore whichever way most people actually pronounce it is by definition the correct pronunciation. And the polls done on this subject are pretty clear, showing that GIF is the preferred pronunciation, chosen by up to 70% in North America and over 80% in Australia and the UK. This depends on which poll you use, but in general the split is at least 2:1 in favour of GIF, and over time the usage of GIF tends to trend up over time.
So ultimately, the one true pronunciation is GIF, as decided by the people as a whole. However, most dictionaries do list JIF as an accepted alternative pronunciation, due to the not insignificant minority pronouncing it that way.
In other words, just choose which pronunciation you prefer, and use that. And try to avoid the pointless debates people like to have on the subject, filled with arguments that don’t carry any weight whatsoever.
It’s funny reading this with the soft-g pronunciation and imagining you arguing with yourself saying, “it’s gif! No, gif! No, gif!”
I wouldn’t say the arguments are all wrong and carry zero weight. How are you so sure that these arguments haven’t swayed the majority towards one side or the other? These arguments are happening between actual people (I’ve heard normal people discuss this outside of online communities), possibly shaping their opinions, and could be what’s shaping those 70/80% numbers.
I used to say JIF. Seemed intuitive and the argument about the creator made sense to me.
But I changed my pronunciation because another intuitive thing is that language does change and it’s rather democratic.
This person is exactly correct. All those other arguments are just quips. They’ve all got a counterpoint and as you use them, you damn well know the counterpoint exists. But the argument is fun so you keep at it.
Some of us just want a resolution. My view lost. It’s over.
No view lost lol what are you talking about, both ways are correct, but it’s fun to give the others shit about it, it’s just like rooting for your basketball team
We lost bruh. The election was rigged though. Everywhere I go, people are saying it. They say “hey, this was clearly rigged”. And they’re very upset they want me to do something about it. I want to, but, you know, the GIF campaign has deep roots. Nobody can get to the bottom of them. They’re yhuge.
This is actually an issue that should be solved at the English level. All words starting with a ‘g’ that are pronounced ‘j’ should be written with a ‘j’.
Girl -> Girl
Giraffe -> jiraffe
GIF -> GIFGordons Jin?
I like your way of thinking. Now, what about damned “Pacific Ocean”?
Pasifik Owshyn
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-language_spelling_reform
English has been the total outlier among (originally) European language with no body of authority over its spelling. Even the “reform” by Noah Webster never really caught on outside North America, nearly 100 years later. And even more curious, the somewhat authoritative Oxford English Dictionary disagrees in their spelling with everybody (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_spelling).
I would never correct how someone pronounces gif, but…
- Gin is a tasty drink.
- Gerunds are verbal nouns.
- Gentrification is a trend in urban environments.
- Gifs are poorly optimized internet clips with controversy surrounding their pronunciation.
Blame english instead of people probouncing the wrong way. English don’t give a fucking clue about pronounciation only using letters.
So I can pronounce Blamei as Lemmy. [B silent, a - e sound, mm and m can be pronounced same, and ei can be read as y]
I’m more interested in what probouncing is.
Well probouncing is pronounced as pronouncing
Man. I thought it was gonna be a bit more giggity than that
Jiggity?
Who fucking cares
If you don’t want to participate in a thread, move the right thumb in an upward flicking motion.
Nonono, you don’t understand, flame wars build character! 'Twere the early aughts that made me the healthy and well adjusted person I am today!
Or at least, that’s what I’d say if what actually happened wasn’t that I became a jaded bastard and if I didn’t think it was just some ploy to drive engagement to let OP feel popular for a moment… in the best case scenario
Gaded bastard
I was tired of this shit 15 years ago and it’s still “”“”“pissing”“”“” off people
Well, you see, the g in gif stands for “graphics” which is ultimately from Greek “γραφικός,” and because this is the 21st century, γ in front of a close front vowel is pronounced as neither /g/ nor /d͡ʒ/ but rather /ʝ/, which is pronounced a bit like English’s y, so in its purest rendition gif is really pronounced “yiff”, which doubles as homage to the online communities that OP frequents.
If you’re supposed to pronounce it based on the original word instead of how the person who invented it says it, then I’d like to see giff crusaders take on everyone’s terrible pronunciation of words like SCUBA (the U stands for underwater, so should be UH not EW) and NASA (the first A stands for aeronautics so should be pronounced Nair-sa).
Don’t worry, I was being 100% facetious! After all, γ is generally believed to have been a hard /g/ in Ancient Greek, which is the version of Greek that “graphic” is based on and is CLEARLY the wrong way to say gif :D
Kinda sorta un-jerking (but not really) for a moment, I don’t think that I’d include the rhotic in your hypothetical pronunciation in NASA and thus would say /neæ.sə/ over /neɚ.sə/. I also don’t palatalize the U in SCUBA (/sku:.bə/, not /sk^(j)u:bə/), but I suspect that’s just a dialectical difference.
Edit: I just saw your NZ lemmy instance name and now I understand the vowel choices. Cheers!
deleted by creator
- Geography
- Geology
- Giraffe
- Generous
Just a few examples that come to mind. Additionally, the pronunciation of the individual words included in an acronym DOES NOT determine the pronunciation of that acronym. See SCUBA as an example.
JPEG is the best direct example. Who pronounces the F sound?
do you have a problem with my ˌɡiˈʁafə
Good and very informative, thank you.
…
…
…
I’m still gonna pronounce it (G)IF though.As long as you don’t shame others with reasons that don’t make sense, you can pronounce it gif for all I care
Sure, agree to disagree.
This, and Gig Git Girl Gibbon Gift Gill Giddy Gigahertz Gimmick Gizzard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iafa959JvY - Literally this but with any example either way depending on what side you’re on.
It’s GIF. Just because you create something doesn’t mean you aren’t fucking dumb. Eventually, it’s no longer yours anyway lol.
OBJECTION!!
First and foremost, pronounced Gif there
Graphics Interchange Format. Not Jraphics. Unless you spell it out as Jee-Ai-Eff
Also, git isn’t spelled “jit”, it’s not “jit gud”, nor “jit hub”. Other examples that would be wrong: jirl, jirth, jiddy, jirder, jingko
Most of the ‘ji’ sounding words are rooted from other languages, mostly French (some of them brought over from Latin). Finally, languages where ‘ge’ and ‘gi’ sound like ‘je’ and ‘ji’ say ‘Gif’
By that logic, “scuba” should be pronounced scuh-ba, and “laser” should be pronounced lah-seer.
Also “jee” is also how you say the letter “G”.
Gin, Germany, giraffe, gypsy, gib, giblet. Raising examples of words that start with hard and soft Gs is absolutely pointless when both exist and are equally valid.
Why are people arguing about how an acronym is pronounced in the English language anyways? Who gives a shit? When you point out a “rule” in English, there will always be exceptions, many exceptions, to that rule. Even English doesn’t even agree with English: “entree” means appetizer in Europe but main course in the US.
So why do you care so much?
So why do you care so much?
Because it’s always fun to poke fun at how chaotic, anarchic and directionless the english language is. Besides, some of its rules feel more like suggestions
Gesus Christ
Yeah, that’s what I said. Gif.
Is this one of those me me’s I’ve heard of?
We stray further from Jod
Blood of Eden likes this.
Is this one of those reposter bot people?
No. The OP has posted in other topics.
Ah K
The creator of the format, Steve Wihite, says it’s pronounced as JIF, but personally I still say GIF out of habit.
https://www.cnn.com/2013/05/22/tech/web/pronounce-gif/index.html
I’ve had similar arguments with people over the pronunciation of Linux, with one person saying it’s “Lie-nicks” because it’s named after “Linus”, but Linus himself has said he pronounces his own name differently depending on the language he’s speaking at the time, but Linux is always pronounced “Lynn-icks.”
Why isn’t this higher up? Thanks for the real info, I was going to post this if no one else did.
It’s like hearing people who work at Asus call it Asus instead of Asus.
The only reason they’re saying it’s Asus is because they have to. They say Asus like everyone else at home.
Also, after a certain amount of time, the word you made up is no longer yours. That be how language works yo.
At this point GIFs in their original form as .GIF files barely exist anymore. GIF basically just means “short clip”. Why would the author get any say at all at that point?
I hate the way it’s pronounced. It should be like Line-ix, but the creator of it decides so as ugly as it is to say it’s lih-nucks.
gust jet over it.
Juys gust jet over it
