Exit through the gif shop
May 5, 2022 4:11 AM   Subscribe

The Gif Gallery claims to contain (very nearly) 100,000 gifs. Related: a 2013 FPP on the pronounciation, a Stephen Whilite obituary, the giphy repository (FPP), and a 2010 Slate article.
posted by Wordshore (38 comments total) 23 users marked this as a favorite
 
That title pun sounds perfect!
posted by fairmettle at 5:52 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


Wow, that old pronunciation thread. Such a throwback to the days of old Meffy, when Meffits would have Me Fights about how to pronounce things.
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 6:01 AM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


I think it was Leonard in Big Bang Theory who pointed out that the "g" stands for "graphics", therefore the acronym should also be pronounced with a hard g. Case closed, in my view.
posted by Paul Slade at 6:05 AM on May 5, 2022 [5 favorites]


Discovering my preferred option is espoused by Big Bang Theory causes significant self-doubt.
posted by zamboni at 6:33 AM on May 5, 2022 [21 favorites]


A french friend pronounces it "zheef", which I believe implies that we have to collect pronunciations from all over the world and then settle this in a single-elimination tournament.
posted by mhoye at 6:38 AM on May 5, 2022 [9 favorites]


That title pun sounds perfect!

I don't get it. Is it there some sort of pop culture reference about a peanut butter shop I'm missing or something?

GIF is a hard G and I swear I will stab you about this and it's not up for debate. It's been a hard G back into the 80s. I never, ever heard soft G GIF until long after the Eternal September and "normal" people started invading the internet.
posted by loquacious at 7:18 AM on May 5, 2022 [5 favorites]


Big Bang Theory didn't invent that bit of reason, it's been around for a long time. Big Bang Theory also references (e.g.) the big bang, and I still accept THAT.

me, for years: "It's not Giraffe Interchange Format for godsakes."

Also, proof by counter-hypothetical. If "gif" is pronounced "jif", then how would you spell a word pronounced with a hard 'G'?
posted by Horkus at 7:23 AM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


oh my fucking god both pronunciations are well-established and both are broadly understood so they are both correct because that is how language works how can this possibly still be fun for you people
posted by wreckingball at 7:28 AM on May 5, 2022 [17 favorites]


wreckingball, I'm beginning to question your commitment to Sparkle Motion
posted by elkevelvet at 7:32 AM on May 5, 2022 [13 favorites]


Big Bang Theory didn't invent that bit of reason

I wasn't suggesting it did. Just happens to be where I first heard it set out, that's all.
posted by Paul Slade at 8:01 AM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


But this isn't about GIFs, it's about animated GIFs. When did the image format come to mean only its animated constructs?
posted by Rash at 8:29 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


both pronunciations are well-established

Untrue. Pronouncing it with a soft "G" causes endless confusion in the US, where a food main-stay is JIF peanut butter.
posted by Rash at 8:32 AM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


I love all the surprises on this site.

Example: The door isn't animated? Click on it. Makes a sound and takes you to another room... one that is a bit noisy with all the animations and sounds.
posted by schmudde at 8:52 AM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


"So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Gif—because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth."
posted by AlSweigart at 8:52 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


In several countries, Jif is a cleaning product.
posted by zamboni at 8:52 AM on May 5, 2022


Since I live in the Netherlands now I just get around the whole issue by pronouncing it ɣɪf.
posted by antinomia at 9:02 AM on May 5, 2022 [4 favorites]


Not expecting to change anyone's mind, but the argument about deriving pronunciation of an acronym based on the sound of the source words would mean everyone is mispronouncing SCUBA and LASER.

TBH I would applaud any of the hard-G gif folks if they also insisted on a short 'u' in scuba and short 'a' in laser.

BTW, the prefix "giga" is a soft g as well, thanks to the Ancient Greek root. We can debate that sometime as well. :)

I'm in the "person who invents a word gets to decide how it's pronounced" camp.

Of course people will do as they will, for reasons.

And yeah, when did GIF come to refer by default to animations?
posted by Ayn Marx at 9:09 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


(meanwhile, wreckingball is huddled into a little ball in the corner of a dark room make it stop make it stop please god make it stop)
posted by elkevelvet at 9:09 AM on May 5, 2022 [4 favorites]


These days I skip the controversy by pronouncing it "meme". Because I like being halfway-incorrect in a different way from everyone else
posted by ook at 10:02 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


You left out my favorite one, Ayn Marx: JPEG

Is it Jay-feg? Or Jay-peg? Because "Hard G" logic would dictate "Jay-feg", which sounds dumb
posted by MengerSponge at 10:05 AM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


this thread is like the scent of prey for "wordies" and language nuts throughout the internet realms.. heads are raising to scan the aether savannahs, eyes are squinting and nostrils are flaring to catch the intoxicating smells and sounds of word pronunciation opinions

and the feast begins!
posted by elkevelvet at 10:09 AM on May 5, 2022 [5 favorites]


JPEG. Is it Jay-feg? Or Jay-peg?

That's pronounced Gee-Pej. Or G as in G-spot, followed by Pej as rhymes with hedge.
posted by Wordshore at 10:18 AM on May 5, 2022


I'm in the inventor-gets-to-name-it camp. My wife hates when I pronounce the stripey horsey as zebbra, citing Trevor Noah's argument that if you don't have them you don't get to name them.

Is the hard G a regional thing, or maybe a class-related thing? Growing up lower class in the Southeast US I never heard anyone pronounce it with a hard G.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 10:56 AM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


Is it Jay-feg? Or Jay-peg?

A lot of you have never worked in multilingual offices, and I feel sorry for you. There's something magical about the phrase "envwahyay mwah le zhapeeg", it sounds like something you want to yell at somebody manning a trebuchet.
posted by mhoye at 11:02 AM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


The worst part is that I keep reading this as "EXIF through the GIF shop", and my brain goes "but GIF isn't an image format with EXIF!"
posted by straw at 11:14 AM on May 5, 2022 [4 favorites]


So I thought I'd diverge from the crowd here and actually talk about the linked site. (First thing I noticed is the sign saying "Visit Melonking.Net" which made me wonder what melonking is and how many people are regular melonkers.)

And I must say, the site itself is delightful - so old school, with such great little period touches, like the angly smiley in the Info :^] link.

Oh, and the rooms have names! The Kismet Nesbitt Room

And all the gifs on a page are so varied (and yet MOSTLY so similarly pixellated!).

Gosh. I could watch the turning TV and bird in the Ludwig Lynch Room all day.

(I'm really curious about those URLs, too. ... Looks like the doors go to random rooms, so no two tours will be the same.)

And all the details at the info page are so wonderful, and so imbued with the generous spirit of the early web - want to use one of these gifs? Here's how! Want to use the random name script? Here it is!

It's all delightful.

Thanks so much for posting this, Wordshore!
posted by kristi at 11:48 AM on May 5, 2022 [3 favorites]


this debate will be fun for me FOREVER. i still look for opportunities to advocate for freehand over illustrator.
posted by rude.boy at 12:23 PM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


I just want to make it known to certain people that I have located my bush knife and machete.
posted by loquacious at 12:44 PM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


I'm embarrassed to say I don't know the difference between a hard and a soft g. So I never know which sound people are advocating for. I also don't care, I have other pedantries.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 12:58 PM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


So I thought I'd diverge from the crowd here and actually talk about the linked site

How dare you interrupt this perfectly good derail with something on topic. Have you no shame good sir
posted by ook at 1:41 PM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


TBH I would applaud any of the hard-G gif folks if they also insisted on a short 'u' in scuba

If it were pronounced with a short "u" you'd need two B's to reflect the pronunciation, though. (And forgive me, but I'm not going to take pointers on pronunciation from a guy who decided he didn't need a covid vaccine and ended up dying of it.)
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 1:56 PM on May 5, 2022 [2 favorites]


I'm embarrassed to say I don't know the difference between a hard and a soft g.
Neither do I. I have never been able to wrap my mind around the hard/soft long/short notation of sounds.
But this isn't about GIFs, it's about animated GIFs.
I've noticed this too. GIF to many people now means "moving/animated picture" which is weird to me.

This site is pretty fun and I like that a huge number of the images are older looking and some are even static pictures! I also clicked on melonking.net and found that it's part of a webring of low tech sites. That's was just icing on the cake.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 2:01 PM on May 5, 2022 [1 favorite]


What about other image formats? Is there a Gay-peg Jallery as well?
posted by otherchaz at 4:46 PM on May 5, 2022


I have a hard time listening to audiobooks in British English, because schvle drives me up the wall
posted by Jacen at 5:05 PM on May 5, 2022


I was astonished recently by some clarified butter. I said, “Ghee? Gee!”
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 5:42 PM on May 5, 2022


So I thought I'd diverge from the crowd here and actually talk about the linked site.

Weirdo.
posted by Paul Slade at 11:42 PM on May 5, 2022


Awww, the bench where you can take a break if you're overwhelmed! More websites should have that.
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:28 PM on May 7, 2022 [1 favorite]


I was astonished recently by some clarified butter. I said, “Ghee? Gee!”

Gee? No, GTE!
posted by loquacious at 3:58 AM on May 9, 2022


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