There’s a bit of history to understand before you can fully appreciate the image above. The file type, GIF, stands for Graphics Interchange Format. It’s a compression algorithm that became popular for animated images on the web.
It is pronounced as GIF
What’s the big deal: Pronouncing the three letters has become a bit of an Internet sensation, since most people use a hard G sound, as in Graphics, Gurgle or Grass. However, Steve Wilhite, the man who invented the format, told the New York Times that it should be pronounced with a soft G, as in Giraffe, Giant or Geography.
"The Oxford English Dictionary accepts both pronunciations," Mr Wilhite told the Times. "They're wrong. It's a soft 'G', pronounced 'jif'. End of story."
The answer: The internet has since gone wild over it, with people both famous and not (Jimmy Fallon, anyone?) weighing in. Our own editor-in-chief, Lance Ulanoff, created a poll on Twitter to see how people pronounce the "word." Both polls overwhelmingly favor the hard G.
