jeremyparker

Is that supposed to be an argument? That there are two ways to pronounce the letter g? I was actually already aware of that - even before I'd ever heard of gifs.

So your argument is actually that people who pronounce it with a hard G have just never heard anyone say it.

And we're taking about dot-g-i-f, the format that is hugely shared as memes and as reactions in chats, a form so well known that it's at Kleenex level of awareness - awareness that exceeds itself - ie, all other variants of this format (apng, animated webp, even webm) are called gifs.

And you're saying that most people, which is, given the prevalence of gifs, probably most of our species at this point - most of the sentient life forms in our solar system are aware of this format's name... But we've just never heard anyone say it. Except for a small, vocal minority - who exist mostly on the Internet and are deeply online. Those are the only people who have heard it said out loud.

And, in that impossible scenario, most of our species - who have, again, never heard it said it loud - billions of people - all, independently, came up with the same, supposedly incorrect, pronunciation.

That's your argument? I feel like your case would be stronger without it.

It's like intentionally taking a Principal Skinner stance - everyone else on earth is wrong. Except, at least Skinner was oblivious.

There's simply no justification for the jif pronunciation. There's an explanation - ie, because the creator of the format wanted to float his success on the back of a peanut butter brand. And it didn't even work - no one calls it "jif" and yet it's probably got better name recognition than the peanut butter. But - even as weak as that explanation is, an explanation is not a justification. A justified pronunciation - even if it's different from the original pronunciation, is one people natively come up with, and yet is always the same.

Pronunciation of words is decided by consensus - and while of course people mispronounce things, what that means is, they pronounce it differently from the accepted cultural norm.

We don't get all in a knot because Americans prove things differently from British people - even though they originally set the rules for English. And we don't pronounce things the way we do because George Washington (being analogous to wilhite (or whatever his name was)) told us to; we pronounce things as we do because of cultural consensus.

Wilhite's intention was literally to use the name recognition of the peanut butter to further his own success - which, like, who cares - but the simple fact that he made that decision (and to be clear, regardless of our opinion on copyright, is a bad way to make the decision) strongly implies that he was aware that his pronunciation was unnatural.

The fact that this conversation even comes up is proof that culturally we reject wilhite's pronunciation. It's a lost battle - the only reason I get involved in these threads is because I have a hard time watching the same 3 talking points (on both sides) and the same 3 rebuttals - all of which attempt seem to use facts and logic to determine "correct" pronunciation - when the truth is, the pronunciation has already been decided, and soft-G pronounces deserve to understand it.

Except in gift which is the linguistically closest word to gif

Also, don't misunderstand English: as the hybrid of two very different language sources (Germanic and Latin - among many others since), there are basically no rules that don't have exceptions.

Really, my ess cue ell? I say mysequel 100% of the time. But I'm trying to get into the Primagen's My Squeal pronunciation

The creator of the Gradual Interface Forget wanted people to pronounce it with a J literally because he wanted it to use the name recognition of the peanut butter - and I don't exactly care about their profits or about copyright, but it's a bad reason.

Gift is closer to gif than giraffe....

So wealthy people exploit vulnerable people and coordinate to fill the airwaves with anti-human propaganda because some people mistakenly use a J sound?

The fact that this conversation exists is proof that the word is intuitively pronounced with a hard G.

The only reason to pronounce it like a J if because the creator liked it - and the reason he liked it was literally because of the (copyright-infringing) similarity to the peanut butter.

He made a huge contribution to the Internet by creating the format, and he deserves it gratitude. Mispronouncing gif is not the best approach to that.

I feel like you're implying people should look into things before making accusations. Like, find out if what they're saying is true before they say it. And that's why no one asked you to the prom.

The danbooru aspect of the "AI" moral panic is what annoys me.

So many of my friends - many of whom are amateur artists - hate computer generated images because the copyright of the artists were violated, and they weren't even asked. And I agree that does kinda suck - but - how did that happen?

Danbooru.

The art had already been "stolen" and was available online for free. Where was their morality then? For the last decade or whatever that danbooru has been up? Danbooru is who violated the copyright, not stable diffusion or whatever.

At least computer generated imagery is different, like, the stuff it was trained on was exactly their art, while this stuff, while might look like theirs, is unique. (And often with a unique number of fingers.)

And, if "copyright" is their real concern, them surely they understand that copyright only protects against someone making a profit of their work, right? Surely they'll have looked into it and they already know that "art" made by models that used copyrighted content for training are provided from being copyrighted themselves, right? And that you can only buy/sell content made from models that are in the copyright clear, surely they know all this?

No, of course not. They don't give a shit about copyright, they just got the ickies from new tech.