• m0darn@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    In English the correct way to pronounce something is the way that will most reliably communicate to your intended audience without ambiguity or distraction.

    Since my intention is usually to convey my superior knowledge of trivia and/or to stir shit up, I pronounce it with a soft g.

    • Cryptic Fawn@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 year ago

      He didn’t tell anyone it was pronounced jif till a great many years later, after most people were pronouncing it gif.

      He lost the right to dictate how everyone else pronounces it for that reason alone. So fuck him. =)

      Edit: It was made in 1987 and he waited till 2013. Lmao, he lost that fight long ago.

      • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        I understand that some people feel very strongly about pronunciations. So be angry about the correct pronunciation, heck, don’t use the correct pronunciation, who cares?

        But Wilhite made it, so he gets to name it, regardless of the popularity of later pronunciation debates that largely take place in a forum where you can’t actually pronounce the word because we’re all typing. It’s pretty funny.

        • bustrpoindextr@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Gerrymandering was named after Elbridge Gerry, but his name is pronounced Gary: https://youtu.be/Rp0Qz19nlG4

          Popularity of pronunciation does actually matter, regardless of origin.

          There are plenty of pronunciations that have changed from the original and are now generally accepted as correct. Here are some examples

          https://linguisticus.wordpress.com/2014/12/07/10-words-whose-pronunciation-has-changed-over-time/

          Anywho, if you have any recommendations for birthday jifts for kids, lemme know

        • Cryptic Fawn@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          So be angry about the correct pronunciation

          I’m not angry about the correct pronunciation, since I and most people already do pronounce it correctly. As Gif, not Jif.

          But Wilhite made it, so he gets to name it

          You’re right about one thing; he named it. But he doesn’t get to dictate how it’s pronounced many years later after the majority had already been pronouncing it a certain way. If he wanted it called Jif, then he should have said so from the very beginning. Why wait till 2013? Doesn’t that seem odd to you? Dude likely doesn’t even care and only declared that in 2013 to start an argument over it.

          regardless of the popularity of later pronunciation

          I’m sorry but the popularity of how a word is pronounced does in fact actually matter. Plus, the English language is changing all the time and how we pronounce certain words also changes. People will say what feels most natural to them.

          that largely take place in a forum where you can’t actually pronounce the word because we’re all typing. It’s pretty funny.

          I’ve used the word Gif in real life, multiple times. Everyone I know pronounces it the same way. 🤷🏻‍♀️

          • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            However, you want to pronounce it is fine, but it doesn’t make it correct.

            I don’t think there’s a time limit on announcing the way a creator prefers to pronounce the name of his creation.

            It became an internet sensation, people asked him about the correct way to pronounce guf, he said how he prefers to pronounce it.

            I prefer to pronounce it that way as well, as the original pronunciation by the creator. That’s more correct to me, but nobody’s forcing you to pronounce it any particular way.

            • Cryptic Fawn@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              1 year ago

              but it doesn’t make it correct

              Except it does. This isn’t the first time to happen with the English language, and it won’t be the last.

              I don’t think there’s a time limit on announcing the way a creator prefers to pronounce the name of his creation.

              Sure, but the most popular way to pronounce a word wins, and it isn’t his way.

              people asked him about the correct way to pronounce gif, he specified how he prefers to pronounce it.

              Yea I’m aware, I read all about it back in 2013 as well.

              That’s more correct to me, but nobody’s forcing you to pronounce it any particular way.

              That’s nice. Now you know why the majority continue to pronounce it as Gif and not Jif, because it’s the most popular and comfortable way to pronounce it. The creators opinion on the matter is inconsequential.

              Cheers!

              • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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                1 year ago

                This is interesting, you’re kind of proving yourself wrong. If “The most popular way to pronounce a word wins”, as you say, then why are you and others still so ardently supportive of one pronunciation(deemed correct by the inventor) or the other(deemed incorrect by the inventor)? Seems like if you had won, there wouldn’t be any debate.

                It just sounds like you’re making the case that coba-bola should be the new name for Coca-Cola. That can definitely be your name for it, and you can try to convince as many people as you want of a name that you prefer. But it doesn’t change the original and correct name of that beverage.

                Sure, follow the majority. While majority rule often turns out to be incorrect and it doesn’t seem like the right way for me to make decisions or judgments, it’s certainly your prerogative to pronounced jif the same way many other people do.

                For you, a hard g is more popular and comfortable, and that’s great. Doesn’t make it correct, but it’s still great.

                • Cryptic Fawn@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                  1 year ago

                  I got to be honest with you, but I’m already over this topic, so I’m not even going to read your latest response to me. There really isn’t anything new either of us have to share; you pronounce it one way, the majority pronounce it another. The end. Have a good evening/night/morning/etc.

                • bustrpoindextr@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  For you, a hard g is more popular and comfortable, and that’s great. Doesn’t make it correct, but it’s still great.

                  Actually that’s exactly what makes it correct, language is democratic. The more popular way to convey ideas is the correct way, as that is the entire purpose of language (to convey ideas to other individuals) and that’s why language changes over time.

      • Hyperi0n@lemmy.film
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        1 year ago

        Most people pronounced it correctly. Hard G was mocked on many tech sites and sites like 4chan.

        • Cryptic Fawn@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          You mean “jif” was openly mocked, and still is for the most part. Anyone referring to it as Jif is typically viewed as pretentious.

          But you are correct about people pronouncing it correctly; as Gif. =)

    • blackbrook@mander.xyz
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      1 year ago

      If he didn’t want people to pronounce it two different ways he should have spelled it differently.

      • Lightor@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Right? And people get mad at me for saying gur-affe at the zoo. They should have spelt it different if they wanted me to say jir-affe.

        Anyway, back to work on my jithub project.

      • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Yea, should have. As another commenter posted, Wilhite should have called it the jraphics interchange format.

      • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        That’s what the inventor chose, so yup. Unfortunately, jif is the correct pronunciation.

        My favorite example of this is aluminum. Twice now, I’ve spoken to British English speakers that insist aluminum is pronounced the British way. And when I point out aluminum is an American invention, they check their phone, roll their eyes, and accept that I can say it that way, but they never will.

        And euphonically they’re correct, the British pronunciation of aluminum sounds way cooler. I used to use gif until I looked up the usage history specifically for these moments, hahaha. But that’s not its name. So I use jif.

        • DulyNoted@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          There’s a concept in linguistics known as descriptivism vs proscriptivism. We either accept that things change meanings and pronunciations regionally and over time, or we try to absolutely state that there’s one correct way, and every other way is wrong.

          A major issue with the “I’m right you’re wrong” approach is the in-group decides who is right and wrong. Regional slang is just wrong, not an equally valid way to speak. Those with formal educations are inherently more correct, and thus their grasp of their native language is more correct. This doesn’t really make sense when you think about it, other than to put down groups perceived as lesser.

          Additionally, academics can convince themselves of one thing, and totally fail to be relevant to the real world. This leads your average person to become disenfranchised with academia and talk about how academics in their ivory towers have no understanding of how the real world works.

          Anyway, that’s why I pronounce it joeff.

          • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            Very nicely put. I always noticed this phenomenon but ascribed it to people clinging to schemic security blankets, but it’s good to know that there’s a term that describes the illogical dependence on evolving correctness.

        • agent_flounder@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Aluminium sounds cool if you’re British and aluminum sounds cool if you’re American. How do the other English speaking countries say it?

  • This comment section is killing me lmao.

    You have people saying that language is fluid, and that one person cannot decide which pronunciation is correct. Then, in that same comment, they say that their preferred pronunciation is obviously correct.

    Hard g, soft g, you do you. It really doesn’t change much.

  • DarkMessiah@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Gif stands for “Graphics Interchange Format”. If it were pronounced “jif”, it would be “Jraphics Interchange Format”.

    It is a Graphics Card, not a Jraphics Card!

  • Gilberto@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    English is phonetically inconsistent, you can find examples to support both ways of pronouncing it.

    • penguin@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      The only real rule is that words come and go and change organically. People don’t just decree that a word needs to change like some king of language.

    • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      There are some consistencies in letter patterns, just not in individual letters. For example, no word that starts with go-, ga-, or gu- pronounces the g like a j (except for the archaic gaol, and there’s a reason the spelling was changed to jail). It’s mainly limited to ge- and gi- words.

      Inconsistencies with the other options are probably due either to how the term came into English (English is practically built on loanwords) or some other subsequent pattern of letters I’m too lazy to try to identify.

  • dreadedsemi@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    The author calls it JIF. He intended it as Jif because he has butter fingers and like butter brand JIF.

    I’m used to hard G though.

    • mookulator@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I know he says it’s pronounced “jif”, but I just don’t care. It’s like “gift” without the t

      • EmoDuck@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Let’s be honest here, English does not have that level of consistency. “Women” is pronounced with an “i” for christ sake

        • tryptaminev 🇵🇸 🇺🇦 🇪🇺@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          Because the a in woman is pronounced the same way the e in women is pronounced…

          Probably that was originally introduced by some medieval swinger society, so they could say that they are faithful to their women and technically not be lying about it. When the church figured out they introduced the o as an i thing.

          • Pyro@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Because the a in woman is pronounced the same way the e in women is pronounced…

            woman = wum-en
            women = wim-in

            Yeah I’m gonna have to disagree with you there, chief.

      • Raiden11X@programming.dev
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        1 year ago

        Say the word “though” in your head. Then add a “t” to it. Would you really argue that “though” and “thought” are pronounced the same simply because they’re the same spelling save for a final “t”?

        The easiest “rule” is that the creator can decide how to pronounce and spell it lol. Taking English rules that don’t even apply 100% of the time to its own words and trying to hold made-up words to the same standards just sounds silly to me haha

        • penguin@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          There are no rules to how new words come into being or how old ones change.

          If everyone says a word a certain way with certain meaning, then that’s what it is. One person doesn’t get to decide.

    • MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      This makes no sense. It stands for “Graphics Interchange Format”, do they pronounce it jraphics too?

      • Raiden11X@programming.dev
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        1 year ago

        There are so many examples in this thread alone as to why this rule doesn’t work.

        SCUBA: the U is for “underwater” and the A is for “apparatus”. We don’t pronounce it “SC-uh-B-ahhh”.
        JPEG: The P is for “photographic”. We don’t pronounce it “JayFeg”.
        LASER: The E is for “emission”. We don’t pronounce it “Lay-See-R”.
        RADAR: The second A is for “And” (lol). We don’t pronounce it “Ray-Day-R”.

        The easiest “rule” is just the guy who made it up can dictate how they want it spelled and to pronounce. The word is made up anyway, and isn’t subject to rules that actual English words have been subjected to for however long the language evolved.

        • omega_x3@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          The guy that came up with with the acronym for unidentified flying object also wrote that it should pronounced you-fo but everyone spells it out because that is less confusing. So there is an example of the creator being ignored.

        • MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Yep, I take your point

          Seems an odd choice in gif’s case still, as you can use the starting letter sounds from each word and it doesn’t sound weird.

          Not the same for jpeg. P by itself doesn’t make a ph sound.

    • nothing@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Yeah, I always read it as “Jif” then came the correctness police of Reddit and I was bullied into “Gif” by guilt.

      And now some 8-40 years later, I feel anything but “Gif” is wrong. Help!

    • QuadratureSurfer@lemmy.world
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      I’m sorry, but he waited 26 years to tell everyone how it’s pronounced… at this point you can go with the majority, or stick with however you want to pronounce it.

      • zefiax@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Ya and in English, we pronounce things like giant, giraffe, gin, etc. with a “j” sound.

          • zefiax@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            English doesn’t work that way. Man is the closest work to woman. Doesn’t mean you pronounce the “m” “a” “n” in the two words the same way.

            • penguin@sh.itjust.works
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              1 year ago

              English works like all languages. It’s organic and full of exceptions. New words pop up, old ones die, pronunciations change and differ between similar words.

              Most people chose to say gif like gift. One person doesn’t get to change it just because of who they are. Otherwise celebrities can start changing things.

              This is all like the Mean Girls scene where the girl was trying to make “fetch” happen and the other girl shot her down.

      • tryptaminev 🇵🇸 🇺🇦 🇪🇺@feddit.de
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        1 year ago

        Nobody made english, nor is a language static. It is an everchanging result of millions of people using and evolving it.

        A language that doesn’t change is dead, like latin is. So any rule of how something is supposed to be in a language is subject to time and place, but never absolute.

        • penguin@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          That’s my point. If everyone pronounces a word a certain way, THAT is its correct pronunciation. The first person to say a thing doesn’t get to tell everyone else they’re wrong.

          Everyone started using the word “literally” to mean figuratively, so the official definition changed to mean either or.

          Everyone says GIF similar to gift, then that’s the proper pronunciation. Creator has no say.