Global Conflict

Gwynzer will be happy, but I still say logically, the "jif" pronunciation makes no sense. Graphics doesn't start with a soft G, so why would the acronym be pronounced with one...

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/2 ... tw-nytimes

gif (hard g) is an animated image. jif is peanut butter. stop playing word games.

If you've never seen these videos before watch some other ones to see why this is funny.

Personal favorite

It doesnt matter what you think. If he is the creator, hes got the last word on the matter.
Accept it as an honor to the maker whos work you use.

How to you say giraffe?
Its also with a soft g that sounds like a j, isnt it?

I have used the fact that the creator of the format says it's a soft G as one of my primary arguments for saying it correctly.

Soft GIF even just sounds nicer to come off the tongue than hard GIF, I don't see why anyone has a problem with it.

Jokerle wrote:How to you say giraffe?
Its also with a soft g that sounds like a j, isnt it?

Giraffe isn't an acronym
GIF stands for Graphics Interchange Format

How do you say Graphics? Jraphics? No.

TheYonderGod wrote:

Jokerle wrote:How to you say giraffe?
Its also with a soft g that sounds like a j, isnt it?

Giraffe isn't an acronym
GIF stands for Graphics Interchange Format

How do you say Graphics? Jraphics? No.

I am saying that the "i" after the g makes the g soft. As does usually the "e", i.e. in the name George.
As a made up word it is debatable what kind of rules apply and what is used most by people (languages evolve constantly).
If both version soft and hard are used by people than both are correct. However, historically[1] the soft g seems to fit better into the picture.


[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_G)

This alternation has its origins in a historical palatalization of /ɡ/ which took place in Late Latin, and led to a change in the pronunciation of the sound [ɡ] before the front vowels [e] and .[1] Later, other languages not descended from Latin, such as English, inherited this feature as an orthographic convention.

If you want to pronounce it letter by letter, sure. Acronyms are pronounced as per the word they create, not on the original word.

GUI - Interface is soft i, we see "ee".

DIY, pronounced as letters. The I is a hard i, but the word "it" is soft.

ETA, E and T are soft in the full version, not the acronym.

ASAP. The first A is hard, the second is soft, despite both A's standing for the same word.

GIF has a soft G, but Graphics is a hard G.

Jokerle wrote:If both version soft and hard are used by people than both are correct.

Not quite. The soft G has been deemed the correct term by the creator who has said that hard G is WRONG. Just because a large amount of people say it a different way, it doesn't make them correct. It's like for "all intents and puproses." Anyone who says "For all intensive purposes"(Which is a substantial amount) when trying to use the former is wrong, despite the large volume of people who say it that way.

@Gwynzer: One can distingish between initialisms and acronyms
http://www.lyberty.com/encyc/articles/abbr.html,
though the classification is not always clear.

Using wrong words is different than using another pronouncation. The spoken language adopts much faster than the written one, and it constantly changes. I am sure one can find examples in English were it did in the last 50 years.

I've never heard of an initialism. TIL.

Is it a real word? It doesn't show up in my dictionary.

Gwynzer wrote: Is it a real word? It doesn't show up in my dictionary.

Buy a new one?
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definitio ... initialism

TheYonderGod wrote:

phpBB [video]

Damn right! This is the correct and only way to pronounce it