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Pronunciation of GIF

[edit]
This is the archived discussion of the TFAR nomination for the article below. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/requests). Please do not modify this page.

The result was: scheduled for Wikipedia:Today's featured article/June 15, 2022 by Wehwalt (talk) 06:29, 4 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Steve Wilhite's slide at the 2013 Webby Awards
Steve Wilhite's slide at the 2013 Webby Awards

The pronunciation of GIF has been disputed since the 1990s. GIF, an English acronym for the Graphics Interchange Format, is popularly pronounced as a one-syllable word. The most common pronunciations in English are /ɪf/ (with a soft g as in gin) and /ɡɪf/ (with a hard g as in gift), differing in the phoneme represented by the letter G. Many public figures and institutions have taken sides in the debate; Steve Wilhite, the file format's creator, gave a speech at the 2013 Webby Awards arguing that only the soft g pronunciation is correct. Polls show that the hard g pronunciation is more common, although the frequency of each pronunciation varies by region; in addition, some regions enunciate each letter in GIF, making it / ɛf/ . Modern English dictionaries generally accept both main alternatives as valid, and linguistic analyses show no clear advantage for either main pronunciation based on the frequency of the pronunciation in other English words. (Full article...)

  • Most recent similar article(s): The article's nicheness makes it pretty much sui generis, especially among FAs.
  • Main editors: theleekycauldron et al.
  • Promoted: 2022 March 31
  • Reasons for nomination: It's a pretty wacky article, honestly- i tried to write it for the people who read it and go "damn, i can't believe someone took the time to write 2,000 carefully-researched words on a topic this stupid". So- I think it'll make a good TFA.
  • Support as nominator. theleekycauldron (talkcontribs) (she/they) 00:42, 1 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If it were promoted earlier we could have make it as today's TFA. Sadly we don't have that time. Oh well.
Will Support having it featured at any time. ZKang123 (talk) 01:00, 1 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]