That’s dumb, It’s “Graphics Interchange Format.”
Comment on It's canon now. And so is a certain image format.
EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de 6 months ago
The creator of the GIF format says it’s pronounced like Jiff, like the peanut butter.
He’s wrong, even though he created the format.
spudwart@spudwart.com 6 months ago
dogslayeggs@lemmy.world 6 months ago
How do you pronounce the U in SCUBA? How do you pronounce the two As in NASA? The A in BASE jumping? The O in POG juice? The O in SONAR? The I in SIM card? The A in LASER?
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 6 months ago
I went looking for it, and apparently you’re right. He said “Jif”. He’s either trolling or an idiot. People don’t see it that way, especially seeing as it’s the hard “G” from “Graphical” in the acronym. So he’s applying a pronunciation rule of soft G when followed with “i” when used in a word to an acronym - and acronyms aren’t words (noted: they can become treated as such).
GIF is not a word. So soft “g” when followed by “i” does not apply.
lazerCovenant@lemm.ee 6 months ago
Acronyms are words. They’re words formed out of the initial letters of a phrase or name.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 6 months ago
I went and looked it up.
Acronym is the most correct term. GIF can be an initialism or an acronym, however it becomes an acronym when we pronounce it as a word.
I’m not going to get into a debate over it obeying word rules when it starts as an initialism. That’s for scholars and asklemmy shenanigans.
Electromechanical_Supergiant@lemmynsfw.com 6 months ago
There is no such thing as a “hard g” or a “soft g”. There is a g sound, and there is a j sound.
Yes, I will die on this hill.
LowtierComputer@lemmy.world 6 months ago
How do you pronounce bridge or baggage?
zalgotext@sh.itjust.works 6 months ago
Brij
Baggaj
Yeah, a soft g is kinda just a j
Electromechanical_Supergiant@lemmynsfw.com 6 months ago
With J sounds, of course.
Bajjaj
Rhaedas@kbin.social 6 months ago
The funny thing is that even though there are people on both sides dead set they are right, if they hear someone say the opposite pronunciation they still understand what the speaker is referring to. So there's absolutely no context lost, it's just preference, and I have a feeling given the age of the name GIF those preferences are very regional, as the internet had not become a national/international thing yet.
dogslayeggs@lemmy.world 6 months ago
It’s almost like there is no rule when pronouncing acronyms and people choose to pronounce them however sounds best to them. How do you pronounce the U in SCUBA? How do you pronounce the two As in NASA? The A in BASE jumping? The O in POG juice? The O in SONAR? The I in SIM card? The A in LASER? None of those are pronounced like the composite letters, so why is GIF so rigid?
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 6 months ago
It isn’t rigid.
The soft G with the following i is common. There are exceptions to that rule, so it really isn’t always a rule.
Also, GIF is an initialism, and an initialism pronounced as a word becomes an acronym. I really don’t want to debate whether an acronym has to obey “real” word rules.