How do you pronounce .gif?

[Stupot]

GIF - I personally pronounce it the way it's written.  I remember once hearing someone on YouTube call it a Jif, but I thought he was just wrong and I felt superior for a few minutes.  But it turns out there is quite some debate, and a lot of people say it that way, including the guy who invented it the 'Jraphics Interchange Format'.  That's almost like spelling your child's name 'Fred' and insisting it be pronounced 'Wilma' :-/

[Gilbert]

I call it jif and there is nothing wrong with it.

[m0ds]

Haha, that article about this made me laugh. Personally:

Gif. Because I've always believed jif is another format entirely after using 90's graphics software (jpg, jif, jfif, jpeg)

So if I said jif I could mean a gif or a jif file. If I say gif I only mean gif.

[Armageddon]

Jif is never going to happen, it's delicious peanut butter brand, it does not deliver quick motion boobies or kitties. Gifs do that.

[Eric]

I favor the soft G myself, because it makes sense phonetically. We drink jin, work out at the jym, covet jems, like the cut of peoples' jibs, wear jel in our hair. I think you get the jist. When followed by e, i, or y, G usually takes on the J sound.

And we do pronounce acronyms phonetically. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is not Gnat-oh, it's Nate-oh. Or, really, it's Nay-Toe. We don't pronounce a short-A in laser, radar, nor sonar.

In short, all of you are wrong.

[MiteWiseacreLives!]

Wow, what a moment of clarity you've just provided Eric. I have always said jif, but for a few moments thought there might be something very wrong with me. I suppose I can call my boss and tell him I *will* be in today...

[Andail]

I think there are enough exceptions to Eric's rule that GIF can safely take the hard G as well.
Gilbert, gimmick, guitar, give, girl, gift.

We also have "gimp", which is incidentally another graphics-related acronym, and an existing word, pronounced with a hard G.

Case re-opened.

[m0ds]

Hehe. More to the point is the initial assumption that people say this word at all. I mean, unless you're talking about an "animated g/jif" (which I doubt anyone does on a basis more regular than once a decade) then I'm pretty sure no-one ever says this word other than in their head I don't think it matters what people say to themselves in their head personally But for some reason such things are newsworthy... I suppose cassette tapes are said to be coming back into fashion, is the gif jif cif pif next? Teh lol

[Radiant]

Since I'm Dutch, I pronounce it with a hard "GGG" sound that is unpronouncable to the average English speaker. Also, "gif" is the Dutch word for "poison", so there

[veryweirdguy]

I pronounce it "gay-peg".

But for reals, the creators of the format went with soft G: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_Interchange_Format#Pronunciation

Both are acceptable and we can all get along in this GIF/GIF world.

[Stupot]

As Mods said, unless you're in the business of trading gifs, you're unlikely to say it out loud too often.  And despite the protestations of the inventor, if enough people are recorded using a g-sound, then it has to be an accepted pronunciation. The dictionary-makers are concerned with what people ARE saying (or have said) not with what people should say.

Okay, here's another one then.
I've often heard people pronounce GUI as 'gooey', like a sticky oozey substance.
I prefer to just say the letters: gee-you-eye
(or jee-you-eye, as the case may be)

[Crimson Wizard]

Okay, here's another one then.
I've often heard people pronounce GUI as 'gooey', like a sticky oozey substance.
I prefer to just say the letters: gee-you-eye
(or jee-you-eye, as the case may be)

This heavily depends on the native language, I guess people usually try to pronounce acronyms as it would be easier to do with the speaking habits that evolved from using that language.
I would never say "gee-you-eye", because that will sound too awkward in the middle of the sentence spoken in my native language (and more difficult for me if said often).

[Snarky]

GIF - I personally pronounce it the way it's written.

if enough people are recorded using a g-sound

So how do you pronounce "g-sound"?

To put it another way, you're aware that the letter "g" is used (among other things) to represent two different sounds in English, right? (Usually called "soft g" and "hard g.")

[monkey424]

JIF is a fucking cleaning product!



Everyone knows real life is dirty. And there's no point in pretending it's easily taken care of â€" it has to be cleaned. JIF cleaner deals with even the toughest dirt without harsh scratching.

You can rely on JIF because it removes the most difficult dirt while taking care of your surfaces, keeping your home in pristine condition. It is available in Original Fresh or Lemon Fresh fragrance.

Buy JIF now!

[Khris]

I once went to a company dinner, and a guy from New York was there. I asked him about the "spy-neck". Turns out it's pronounced spinach

Also, I say "pnnng", not pee-en-gee. No I don't.

[Ghost]

Great. Now I'm all self-conscious about saying gif aloud! Bummer!!!
Know what I'll do from now on? I'll just hold up a SIGN whenever I talk about gif. Or png. Or maybe I'll just switch back to bitmap. At least that's an actual WORD!

[Darth Mandarb]

I have always used the hard G because, in my head, I'm thinking "Graphical" for the G sound and since I'm phonetically speaking an acronym so I take into account the word the initial comes from. 

I don't much care what the creator of the file format calls it because, until yesterday when I read about this on Reddit, I didn't even know the guy's name. 

20+ years of me, and millions of others, calling it GIF (hard G) makes it a valid pronunciation IMO (as valid as JIF). 

I have never had issue (aside from slight teasing to make myself feel superior) with those that do the soft G.  It's not like I don't know what they're referring to!

[kaput]

I'm going to have to agree with monkey424 on this one. When life get's tough, mean and dirty, Jif is the only possible option. However, if you want to watch a couple of seconds of funny, that's a Gif.

Plain and simple.

[Slasher]

According to the inventor of the Gif, Steven Wilhite, it's pronounced with a 'soft' G as in "Germany" or "gin" or "Gee".

slasher

[Stupot]

if enough people are recorded using a g-sound

So how do you pronounce "g-sound"?

To put it another way, you're aware that the letter "g" is used (among other things) to represent two different sounds in English, right? (Usually called "soft g" and "hard g.")

I thought about typing '/g/' but changed it because not everyone is familiar with IPA.  Note that the latin symbol g is used for the "hard G" in phonetics.
Clearly in the context of this conversation I was using 'g-sound' as opposed to 'j-sound'.  You obviously knew what I meant.