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JIF x GIPHY - Limited Edition Peanut Butter that ends the debate.

GIF or GIF?

  • GIF (JIF)

    Votes: 111 18.6%

  • GIF (Graphics, because Graphics Interchange Format)

    Votes: 485 81.4%
  • Total voters
    596
Ignatz Mouse

Ignatz Mouse

Member
Oct 27, 2017
10,741
Hard G, but not because of the acronym. Because the most common words in English that start with "gi" are hard-g words-- girl, give, gift.

Either is acceptable, but that's probably why hard G gif took off.
 
Ignatz Mouse

Ignatz Mouse

Member
Oct 27, 2017
10,741
Pineapple Pizza said:
Anyone trying to use logic to find the correct pronunciation is automatically wrong. Linguistic prescriptivism is bullshit, meaning follows usage, as does pronunciation. Any pronoucitation that is commonly used and understood is correct.

Hard G is winning the poll, therefore it's the most "correct." Soft G is at 20 percent and most people will understand what you mean, therefore it is an acceptable alternative.
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And, curtain.

They're both fine.
 
Jon Carter

Jon Carter

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,746
Qwark said:
Can we stop with this Jraphic argument? That has no bearing on acronyms, just ask SCUBA, NATO, JPEG, and a ton of others. It's irrelevant.
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I agree the "Jraphic" argument is flawed, but just look for the closest neighbor if there is one. Like, you just have to make up a pronunciation for something like JPEG, because there's no word like it, so you just go with the easiest pronunciation in your language. GIF though is incredibly close to gift.
 
Qwark

Qwark

Member
Oct 27, 2017
8,030
Jon Carter said:
I agree the "Jraphic" argument is flawed, but just look for the closest neighbor if there is one. Like, you just have to make up a pronunciation for something like JPEG, because there's no word like it, so you just go with the easiest pronunciation in your language. GIF though is incredibly close to gift.
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I'm fine with that argument. I don't agree with it, but I can respect it.
 
Ignatz Mouse

Ignatz Mouse

Member
Oct 27, 2017
10,741
The story here is that the creator didn't make any kind of real effort to make his pronunciation known, despite the internal slogan "choosy developers chose gif" with a soft g, ala the old Jif peanut butter slogan.

The tech world, not being awash in youtube in the late 80s, saw this primarily in print and most people (though not all) went with the more intuitive* pronunciation with a hard g.

And usage is king. The hard g isn't going away, and the soft g is just fine.


* Most of these (but not all) start with a hard g, and if people had the word "graphics" in mind, that might have also swayed them subconsciously.
www.thefreedictionary.com

Words that start with gi | Words starting with gi

words that start with gi, words starting with gi, words that begin with gi, words beginning with gi
www.thefreedictionary.com www.thefreedictionary.com
 
Last edited:
OP
OP
spad3

spad3

Member
Oct 30, 2017
7,125
California
Jon Carter said:
I agree the "Jraphic" argument is flawed, but just look for the closest neighbor if there is one. Like, you just have to make up a pronunciation for something like JPEG, because there's no word like it, so you just go with the easiest pronunciation in your language. GIF though is incredibly close to gift.
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I personally always use gift as the example. you don't say "jift" right?

Hey i got you a couple christmas jifts.
reddit has this secret santa jifting program.
i jifted a lego set for white elephant.

etc.
 
Htown

Htown

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,320
hard g, on account of the fact that the soft g sounds stupid

also "gift" is the closest english word and it uses the hard g



that said, I assume the JIF peanut butter company is only keen to push the hard G pronunciation because it helps them protect the Jif trademark
 
Sobriquet

Sobriquet

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
9,891
Wilmington, NC
Ignatz Mouse said:
The story here is that the creator didn't make any kind of real effort to make his pronunciation known, despite the internal slogan "choosy developers chose gif" with a soft g, ala the old Jif peanut butter slogan.

The tech world, not being awash in youtube in the late 80s, saw this primarily in print and most people (though not all) went with the more intuitive* pronunciation with a hard g.
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If you mean tech world as in people who worked in tech, then it was entirely soft g. The hard g came from the unwashed masses.
 
RPTGB

RPTGB

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,189
UK
Don't forget, it's Pancake day today, kids.

933255930a5f45c0a9a0e95b0641c97a.ashx
 

Deleted member 6056

Oct 25, 2017
7,240
Wait two threads on this? Sigh...okay posting it again I guess
(not juess).
giphy.gif
 

Deleted member 2802

Community Resetter
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
33,729
spad3 said:
Both_sides_2.0.jpg


In the strangest crossover marketing event of the year (and possibly the decade), the GIF website GIPHY has partnered with the peanut butter brand JIF to release limited edition "GIF" Peanut Butter labels, ending the seemingly eternal debate on the pronunciation of the word, siding against the GIF creator Steve Wilhite who chose the soft g pronunciation (which sounds like jif) rather than the hard g pronunciation (like the word graphics).

Amazon had these limited edition labeled jars available for purchase but they're currently sold out.

Source
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Need to eat this with Supreme Oreos and red bananas
 

Deleted member 46958

User requested account closure
Banned
Aug 22, 2018
2,574
The metric upon which I measure whether or not I'll like someone is based purely on whether they say gif or jif.
 
Schrade

Schrade

Member
Oct 25, 2017
109
Geoffrey the Gigantic Ginger Giraffe says the people who use a hard 'g' for GIF are wrong. It's an Acronym not a word. The creator of the Acronym gets to choose the proper pronunciation.
 
Beef Supreme

Beef Supreme

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,073
Hard G. The word that the letter "g" represents in the acronym literally beings with a hard G. This isn't rocket science.
 
Raskol

Raskol

Member
Sep 5, 2018
690
I know this is a losing battle but my brain will only accept the soft g version. In conversation I just say the acronym as letters because I don't want to be looked down on.
 
Nome

Nome

Designer / Self-requested ban
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
3,312
NYC
I work in the same building as Giphy. They don't wash their hands after they pee, so I would not trust them on the pronunciation of Gif.
 
UCBooties

UCBooties

Avenger
Oct 26, 2017
2,311
Pennsylvania, USA
MattWhite924 said:
Soft G is the objectively correct version. The guy who invented the word said that's what it is.

Hard G people are just too proud to admit they're wrong. Doesn't matter if you don't like how it sounds. Your sad arguments based in laughable assumptions about how English and acronyms work just make you look like a fool. Soft g exists in other words, and acronyms don't have to be pronounced the same way as the words they represent.
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Pronunciation is dictated by common usage, so you're just a grumpy pedant.
 
FeenixRisen

FeenixRisen

McDonalds looks really average next to Wendys
Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,487
It's crazy, for a long time I was adamant on the hard G.

As time passed, I started using soft G..... what happened to me??

Ja Rule pls help.
 
Dan-o

Dan-o

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,893
Era: corporations are evil!
Also Era: this peanut butter corporation agrees with me so they're good!

I kid, I kid...

But soft G is correct, not just because the creator says so, and he's right, but also because like 80% of the hard G folks are so obnoxiously wrong about it. Everyone who just replaces the g in random words with a j, as a "point", should be banned from the internet. Make better jokes, nerds. ;)

Also this:
Schrade said:
Geoffrey the Gigantic Ginger Giraffe says the people who use a hard 'g' for GIF are wrong. It's an Acronym not a word.
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Exactly. So many acronyms ignore the sound of the original word, because it's not the only factor.

Or, like, whatever. Fuck the peanut butter overlords.
 
TheWooniestWoona

TheWooniestWoona

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,802
UCBooties said:
Pronunciation is dictated by common usage, so you're just a grumpy pedant.
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Isn't pedantry what we're all engaged in here anyway? Multiple pronunciations can exist for words, so we're all just doing dumb internet arguing for no reason.

This is just one of the few topics where arguing is just harmless fun.


But yes, I am grumpy, though it's mostly cause of those dang kids on my lawn.
 
Odrion

Odrion

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,148
the soft g is reserved for jpeg, the weak & frail meme format for betas

while the hard g is meant for gif, the format made for alpha memes
 
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