• A polarizing foray into a non-political matter •
[1½ MIN READ]
As a former academic librarian, I can do information pretty well. This Cerebrun is a case in point.
Retroactive to publishing the 04’09’W Cerebrun, I created a GIF of me finishing the featured DE Marathon and posted it after the fact. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to show off my newly self-taught skill at the next run. The skill wasn’t what generated the attention, though; it was my pronunciation of “GIF.” Not-me: “It’s pronounced like ‘gift’, not ‘jiff’” Me: “I’ve been corrected once already. It’s ‘jiff’.” Not-me: “People would confuse it with the peanut butter.” Me: “I can’t help that one.”
I had started off with the hard-g pronunciation when I first started learning about the file format. Then I underwent merciless correction by my college-aged kids who insisted the developer of the file format was their source. A little bit of online searching confirmed the soft-g pronunciation. Not-me: “It would be hysterical if you misremembered the wrong and right pronunciations, because ‘giff’ is the right one.” Me: “I’ve misremembered things before, but not this one.” Then I promptly went home and double checked.
There was more than one source commenting about ‘jiff’ being the preferred pronunciation, even though many >cooouu… naïve …ough< people choose to say ‘giff’. But my preferred source was the actual peanut butter company who clearly gave permission for one intrepid marketing person to publish a piece (Jif vs GIF) about the identical pronunciations. They even provided a link to a more rigorous literary source (A Brief History of the GIF, From Early Internet Innovation to Ubiquitous Relic).
So there. In closing, though, it’s interesting to consider that no matter what the preferred pronunciation is, the fact can’t stop people from adopting the non-preferred pronunciation and standing firm about its correctness. We live in polarized times. Let’s agree on running.
-CtCloser (Calvinthe), “Negative split or positive splat” #dothedue
FINE PRINT ¶Likeness used with permission. ¶Text and photos (unless otherwise stated): Calvin Wang (Wäng), CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. ¶Cross-posted: (1) Facebook JRC Growlers Group Run (2025’04’23’W Run Message), (2) GGR email list, (3) Cerebruns by CtCloser. ¶This website posting: Cerebrun with added caption.
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