• 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.

    • Nora
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      1 year ago

      And British people made English, but they don’t say anything right either.

    • 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
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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
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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.

    • 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!

    • jscummy
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      1 year ago

      Can you really just drop a hard G like that though? Thought that was only okay for them to say

    • penguin
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      1 year ago

      He made the format, not English.

      • 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
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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.

      • 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.

        • penguin
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          1 year ago

          Find me a closer English word than “Gift” that uses a J sound for the G

          • 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
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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.

    • QuadratureSurfer@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      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.

    • 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.

    • MilitantAtheist@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I don’t really give a fuck what he intended. If he wanted it to be pronounced JIF he should have named it that.

  • nxfsi@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    G in gif stands for graphics just like how P in jpeg stands for poto

  • 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.

    • 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.

    • penguin
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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.

  • betheydocrime@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Hard G and soft G are both acceptable pronunciations, the only way to be wrong in the situation is to insist that your preferred way to pronounce it is the only correct way to pronounce it

    Oh, except silent G. Silent G is wrong.

  • 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.

      • Cyanogenmon@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I hate you feel that way. Can I get you a jift to make you feel better?

        It will be a guygantic jift. A large external drive that can hold MANY jiggabytes. Just be careful, it will take a lot of power. 1.21 jiggawatts at least.

    • protist@mander.xyz
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      1 year ago

      But the g in gif stands for “graphical,” not “giraffe!” You silly goose

      • SuperIce@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        That’s easily the worst reasoning for the hard-g considering how we don’t pronounce the letters of most acronyms based on the phrases they come from.

        • Nora
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          1 year ago

          Tell that to Qantas, the abomination of all acronyms. WHERE IS THE U??? AAAAAAAAA

      • TommySalami@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        yeah man, just like you go scuba diving oo-nderwater.

        it’s a dead end. We can’t pretend that “g” can’t also be pronounced as “j”, or that the words making up the acronym matter. It’s all preference and since GIF’s dad called it “jif”, I’m gonna call it “jif”. At least that’s based on something beyond my own hubris.

        • Instigate@aussie.zone
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          1 year ago

          Saying it with a hard G because ‘graphical’ has a hard G is a reason based on something beyond hubris.

      • MeDuViNoX
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        1 year ago

        The guy-ant ger-raffe jave me a jift on his jondola.

      • pythonoob@programming.dev
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        1 year ago

        See, the one thing I consistently see from the hard g side is a lack of understanding of fundamental phonics. Like, say it how you want, but at least make cogent arguments.

  • 𝕄𝕒𝕡𝕝𝕖ℂ𝕠𝕗𝕗𝕖𝕖@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    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.

  • Yawweee877h444@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    It’s pronounced gif with a hard G.

    When I rise to power anyone who disagrees will be immediately found guilty of thought crimes and sentenced to castration, followed by execution, in that order.

  • maporita@unilem.org
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    1 year ago

    Next thing people will be pronouncing SQL as “sequel” and then where will we be?