How do you pronounce Nikon in your part of the world?

[BeBu Lamar]

I'm not fussy about Nikon, although I subscribe to the "Nick" pronunciation myself. I'd have slightly lower blood pressure if everyone would get that the creators of GIF intended it to be a joke (based on the cleaning product, I believe) and pronounce it like "giraffe" or "gin" rather than trying to re-derive it from graphics. Which if I'd not just got back from SIGGRAPH I might be calling "giraffics" out of protest.

 

If you want Brits to disagree, ask about "bath". Everyone except the locals pronounces Newcastle NEW castle (the locals say new CASTLE). We can all enjoy tourists pronouncing Loughborough ("can you show me the way to loogabaroogah?"), most people including myself struggle with with Welsh loss of vowels (Llansantffraed-Cwmdeuddwr and Llanwrthwl are both near my sister), and famously "fish" should be spelled "ghoti" ("rouGH", "wOmen", "staTIon"). But it's all fairly consistent so long as you remember which of thirty or so languages English borrowed the word from.

 

Those stateside who haven't seen it might enjoy this.

Welcome back Andrew! Like to see your comment on the Zet.

[mike_halliwell]

There is no t in Zet, it's a D...........ZED!

 

No one says Zet........;)

[erik_christensen3]

In Denmark it is Nickon and here in Vietnam it is Nykon, as they are very American -:)

[mike_halliwell]

Nykon like Python?

 

......but with no Y, just an I....;)

[Andrew Garrard]

Welcome back Andrew! Like to see your comment on the Zet.

 

Thank you! *Cracks knuckles, starts to compose...*

[Moving On]

I call it "NYkon" in the US but everyone says "Kneekon" in Asia. Think Nikon should come out with a statement: "No Kneekon, no Nikon Zed camera for you".

“Come back, ONE YEAR!”

[WAngell]

The frustrating part about English is its inconsistency of pronunciation.

It may go a bit beyond that. Parking in driveways, driving on parkways?

[heimbrandt]

In Sweden it is [Nickon].

[rodeo_joe1]

Does a scone rhyme with stone or with gone? Except when it's a Scottish stone, when it always rhymes with soon.

 

Never knew the 'correct' pronunciation of GIF, Andrew. I've always pronounced it with a hard G and never been winced at. Perhaps its inventers should develop a funnier sense of humour. And the cleaner Jif doesn't exist anymore, it's turned into an abreviated STI!

 

I do pronounce Linux with short I though.

[Andrew Garrard]

I'm surprised, Joe. I stick to the pronunciation chosen by the developer; I defend the right of others to mispronounce it, so long as I can wince - I imagine the Japanese staff of Nikon feel similarly. Oh, and apparently my memory was wrong: it was a peanut butter brand. (The renamed - presumably because of the clash - cleaning product "cif" can now cause a nice debate about whether it's kiff or siff. And all Brits know that Snickers is pronounced "Marathon".) To an extent, after CompuServe tried to go after people for the LZW patent, I have limited sympathy. But it's still a mangled joke, even if a poor one - like pronouncing gnu "gunoo" because of the song.

 

Linux... There used to be a guide saying that Linus Torvalds was annoyed at people saying "linnucks", because his forename is natively closer to "leenus" and most people butchered it. The guide suggested pronouncing it however you would natively say "Linus", which for me is "lie-nuss". The position has since changed to "it's not worth arguing about", so I say "lie-nucks" but don't correct people.

 

Computing has a wide selection of this kind of thing - "SQL" being pronounced "sequel", "PNG" being pronounced "ping" (which I rarely remember to do), "Firefox" being pronounced "Mozilla"... The tiddlywinks club I'm a member of has "qwxcl", pronounced "fernag". Also, I've never met a Brit who pronounces "kludge" with a long u, and was a bit shocked to find Americans do. But then they only seem to have one kind of router.

 

Generally I'm happy when people say "fewer" for "not as many", use apostrophes correctly (the template for work's canteen menu has "hot side's" and "chefs freshly prepared pudding"; they refused to fix it, even before I tried to discuss the difference between ragu and ragout, but then our VPN system has been saying "regretful to give inconvenience" for the last five years, so...) and know the difference between an adjective and an adverb. One of my finest moments was a conference call where someone said "we don't need this kind of pedanticness", and I got to say "I think you mean pedantry..." One day I might get a "hail the fewerer, grammar Nazi" t-shirt made, but I really want to add a swastika made of semicolons, and I suspect it may limbo under the line of taste.

 

Apparently Lara Croft, of Tomb Raider, was Laura until they got sick of their US office being unable to pronounce it. This confuses me, because I've never met anyone who can't.

 

As the well-known Jedi prime minister, Yoda Churchill, once said: "type of English this is, up with which, put we will not, hmm?"

 

Incidentally, I suppose I should mention that it's "GARR-ARD" with roughly equal emphasis - or "GARR-add" at a push (but that tends to make people spell it Garrod, which is more common). I've yet to meet an American who, being told my name, won't regurgitate it as "garr-ARD". On the basis that I answer to everything from "oi gitface" up, I only usually correct people who've done this for more than three years of me weekly giving my name on a conference call and them reading out the attendance.

Edited August 29, 2018 by Andrew Garrard

[BeBu Lamar]

I'm surprised, Joe. I stick to the pronunciation chosen by the developer; I defend the right of others to mispronounce it, so long as I can wince - I imagine the Japanese staff of Nikon feel similarly. Oh, and apparently my memory was wrong: it was a peanut butter brand. (The renamed - presumably because of the clash - cleaning product "cif" can now cause a nice debate about whether it's kiff or siff. And all Brits know that Snickers is pronounced "Marathon".) To an extent, after CompuServe tried to go after people for the LZW patent, I have limited sympathy. But it's still a mangled joke, even if a poor one - like pronouncing gnu "gunoo" because of the song.

 

Linux... There used to be a guide saying that Linus Torvalds was annoyed at people saying "linnucks", because his forename is natively closer to "leenus" and most people butchered it. The guide suggested pronouncing it however you would natively say "Linus", which for me is "lie-nuss". The position has since changed to "it's not worth arguing about", so I say "lie-nucks" but don't correct people.

 

Computing has a wide selection of this kind of thing - "SQL" being pronounced "sequel", "PNG" being pronounced "ping" (which I rarely remember to do), "Firefox" being pronounced "Mozilla"... The tiddlywinks club I'm a member of has "qwxcl", pronounced "fernag". Also, I've never met a Brit who pronounces "kludge" with a long u, and was a bit shocked to find Americans do. But then they only seem to have one kind of router.

 

Generally I'm happy when people say "fewer" for "not as many", use apostrophes correctly (the template for work's canteen menu has "hot side's" and "chefs freshly prepared pudding"; they refused to fix it, even before I tried to discuss the difference between ragu and ragout, but then our VPN system has been saying "regretful to give inconvenience" for the last five years, so...) and know the difference between an adjective and an adverb. One of my finest moments was a conference call where someone said "we don't need this kind of pedanticness", and I got to say "I think you mean pedantry..." One day I might get a "hail the fewerer, grammar Nazi" t-shirt made, but I really want to add a swastika made of semicolons, and I suspect it may limbo under the line of taste.

 

Apparently Lara Croft, of Tomb Raider, was Laura until they got sick of their US office being unable to pronounce it. This confuses me, because I've never met anyone who can't.

 

As the well-known Jedi prime minister, Yoda Churchill, once said: "type of English this is, up with which, put we will not, hmm?"

 

Incidentally, I suppose I should mention that it's "GARR-ARD" with roughly equal emphasis - or "GARR-add" at a push (but that tends to make people spell it Garrod, which is more common). I've yet to meet an American who, being told my name, won't regurgitate it as "garr-ARD". On the basis that I answer to everything from "oi gitface" up, I only usually correct people who've done this for more than three years of me weekly giving my name on a conference call and them reading out the attendance.

 

Sorry I pronounced it Garage.

[Andrew Garrard]

Sorry I pronounced it Garage.

 

So do I (ish), but the problem is so do people who pronounce garage differently from how I do (and more like the French), which may be the problem. I almost brought that one up. But then "the problem with the French is that they have no word for entrepreneur", as a president once said.

 

Meanwhile, Randall is watching me again.

[Albins images]

I call it "NYkon" in the US but everyone says "Kneekon" in Asia. Think Nikon should come out with a statement: "No Kneekon, no Nikon Zed camera for you".

"Kneekon" is what I say in the Netherlands too!

[denny_rane]

In usa "English".......Knee - Cone

Accent on the first syllable of "Knee", quickly followed by a softer "Cone"

[Andrew Garrard]

In usa "English".......Knee - Cone

Accent on the first syllable of "Knee", quickly followed by a softer "Cone"

 

Wait, "cone"? Really? Not "con" as in "gone"? I don't think I've heard that one before. Mostly I've heard "Nick-on" near me in the UK and "Nigh-con" from Americans - and I rarely hear the Japanese version, but I believe the reported "Knee-con". But I didn't know anywhere expanded the "o".

[m42dave]

Wait, "cone"? Really? Not "con" as in "gone"? I don't think I've heard that one before.

 

See my earlier comment about Paul Simon. :)

[Mary Doo]

Watch this guy explain why it is "Nykon" - sounds rather logical but the "Nikon CEO" he refers to in the video is actually speaking Cantonese Chinese about something unrelated to Nikon or photography - :rolleyes:

 

[Andrew Garrard]

See my earlier comment about Paul Simon. :)

 

Oops. Sorry, I missed that. But I stand by "odd". :-) (And I've not heard the song.)

[chulster]

Watch this guy explain why it is "Nykon" - sounds rather logical but the "Nikon CEO" he refers to in the video is actually speaking Cantonese Chinese about something unrelated to Nikon or photography - :rolleyes:

 

 

He's right that every pronunciation is correct—Nikon is a global brand. But his explanation of why "nigh-kon" is justified is wrong. The "Ikon" in Zeiss Ikon, a German brand, would have been pronounced as "ih-kon", not "eyekon". So it doesn't make sense to say that Nikon is "nigh-kon" because it was a mashup of "Nippon" and "Ikon". That actually argues in favor of "nih-kon".

[Vincent Peri]

In usa "English".......Knee - Cone

Accent on the first syllable of "Knee", quickly followed by a softer "Cone"

 

Uh, I live in Louisiana, and everyone down here says Ny-kon. Back in the late 70's / early 80's, I was friends with the regional Nikon sales representative, and he said Ny-kon too.

[Mary Doo]

In the Paul Simon song "Kodachrome," he pronounces it more like Ny-cone, which is kind of odd. o_O

It's common for singers to modify the pronunciation of some vowels to make it sound smoother to the ear in the overall scheme. In this case Paul appears to rhyme "Nykon" just slightly closer to Kodachrome.

[Albins images]

I'm starting to feel all Monty Peehton'ish because of this conversation..

Knights Who Say Ni - Wikipedia

[Andrew Garrard]

I've been trying so hard not to resort to the knights! (This? It's just a scratch...)

[Sandy Vongries]

Shrubberies!

[chulster]

I fart in your general direction!