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posted by martyb on Thursday February 27 2020, @10:11AM   Printer-friendly
from the it's-not-geef-either dept.

Peanut butter brand Jif has put forth their opinion on how to pronounce GIF.

From their website(warning, lots of animated GIFs):

When is it OK to call a Gif a "Jif"? Never.

Jif® is peanut butter. GIFs are
looping animations.
SNACK ON THAT.

That would be all well and good except for just one thing. The person who actually created the format, Steve Wilhite, explicitly stated GIF was to be pronounced with a soft "G"!

From a 1997 edition of the NetBITS newsletter, down near the bottom of the page appears:

It's "Jiff" and I Don't Want to Hear Another Word -- Logic may dictate the "g" in GIF (Graphic Interchange Format) is pronounced hard, like gift or gefilte fish, but that didn't stop dozens and dozens of readers from offering opinions, many of them hilarious.

However, several people wrote to say that they either worked with folks at CompuServe or read the original GIF specification, all of which specified a soft "g". None of us at NetBITS understand why we haven't seen the definitive word before, so here it is. Charlie Reading <charlier@kreber.com> writes:

I worked with the creator of GIF (Steve Wilhite) when I was still employed by CompuServe. Steve always pronounced it "jiff" and would correct those who pronounced it with a hard G. "Choosy developers choose GIF" (spinning off of a historically popular peanut butter commercial).

An article at Ars Technica actually queries professional linguists in pursuit of the ultimate answer.

See this Sesame Street-like GIF which mentions popular words that start with a soft G such as Giant and Giraffe.

Lastly, here is a short video (1m18s) with what is quite possibly the strongest affirmation of all. David Karp presents Steve Wilhite with the 2013 Lifetime Achievement Award at the 17th Annual Webbys where Steve dramatically uses a GIF as his acceptance 'speech' and sets the matter straight once and for all.

Not that it settles anything. The debate will rage on like vi vs. Emacs.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:19PM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:19PM (#963565)

    https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=giant [etymonline.com]

    Giant was not originally pronounced with a soft "g", but instead with a hard "g" as in "giga", latin for large.

    So "giant" is proof that people can mangle the original intent of the creator of a word.

    So, we can say "GIF" as in "Get out, we can say it how we want". Even if the creator says otherwise.

    But seriously "GIF" as in "Graphic" *sigh*... it's a dumb fight, it's never been a soft g accept in one man's imagination.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:24PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:24PM (#963569)

    But... Dr. Emmett Brown says 1.21 jigawatts, not 1.21 gigawatts.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:30PM (2 children)

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:30PM (#963573) Journal

      We've had decades to consider that one scene in a movie.

      I often suspected that the word Gigawatts was in the script. The prefix "mega" was in common (over)use in the 1980s. But I think few people, including actors, had heard the prefix "giga" back then.

      If only the alien in Aliens could have eaten the actor for such a mispronunciation.

      --
      People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:33PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:33PM (#963576)

        But the arguments like "but what about giraffe and giant?" are the only possible scientific ones, but even these aren't well founded.

        German pronouncing giraffe with a HARD G!

        https://youtu.be/tlnuMWwL9LU?t=60 [youtu.be]

        • (Score: 2) by kazzie on Thursday February 27 2020, @06:17PM

          by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 27 2020, @06:17PM (#963635)

          Whereas Welsh acquired the letter J just to be able to say it like the English do! (plus other load words, such as jam, jelly, etc.)

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:42PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @04:42PM (#963588)

      Both pronunciations are in the dictionary. But, I don't think I've ever heard anybody else use the j sound.