WebP does everything GIF did, just better. The only problem is adoption. Maybe a similar, single-syllable name could have helped.

  • Ends the pronunciation debate: hard G in the 1987 filetype, soft G in the 2010 one
  • Looping soundless video gets a name that’s short and does not refer to a terribly inefficient format (that “gif” sharing sites often no longer use anyway), plus some wrong people have been using it already
  • Software peer-pressured into supporting it (nobody wants to hear “they don’t support JIF” about their software)
  • partial_accumen@lemmy.world
    10·
    2 days ago

    There’s a pronunciation guide in the original documentation, and that didn’t end the debate.

    Humans are even more horrible that this first glance suggests. Imagine, one day, the debate truly ends and a single pronunciation for GIF is universally established and recognized by everyone. A group of humans will start to intentionally mispronounce it (or misspell it) just for the aggravation it will generate in others or for their own amusement.

    This is where the meme-like behavior of deliberately misspelling the popular phrase (at the time) “all correct” as “oll korrect”. This was later abbreviated as “o.k.” and then eventually “ok”. A phrase we likely use dozens or hundreds of times a day is meme-speak from 1839. source