"I have a mind like a steel... uh... thingy." Patrick Logan's weblog.

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Sunday, March 08, 2009

If Douglas Crockford Don't Care Why Should I?

At the end of this nice Google Tech Talk about Javascript good parts,
listen as Douglas Crockford (creator of JSON) pronounces "JSON"
incorrectly! (i.e. "Jason")

Also listen as various audience members pronounce if correctly... "Jay-SAHN".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQVTIJBZook

Of course I am kidding - can't you PLEASE stop pronouncing it "Jay-SAHN"???

But why doesn't this bug Douglas as much as it does me???

2 comments:

somebody said...

It should really be "JON", anyways.

Rory said...

I can't figure out why it doesn't bother him, either. I think he might be avoiding alienating the devs who mispronounce it.

It's perfectly reasonable to accept his pronunciation as de facto given that he coined the term.

In other words, I agree with you - on all points:

1) It bothers me that it doesn't bother him (mainly because his laissez-faire attitude has given devs permission to say it in a stupid sounding way).

2. It bothers me that devs try to "correct" him on the pronunciation of his own term.

3. j-SAWN sounds stupid. The least people could do is choose the pronunciation that seems the most natural and that sounds the best and that seems to have been the intended pronunciation from the beginning (it's good dev marketing - give the thing a name that's reognizable and personal (at least in parts of the world where Jason is a common name)).

I feel the same way about "bruschetta" - the "ch" is hard, as in "school." Italian has a straightforward, insanely easy set of pronunciation rules, but whenever I pronounce it correctly, someone in the room has to "correct" me (usually a server at a restaurant: "Ah, yes... the bru*sh*etta," to which I reply, "Yes: the brus*k*etta" - it never ends well - but I can't let that one go - people screw up French all the time, but Italian is *so* easy that I can't sit there passively while someone snottily and incorrectly corrects me on it).

So, high-five for taking a stand.

Second high-five for being a Portlander.

Third high-five just for kicks.

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Portland, Oregon, United States
I'm usually writing from my favorite location on the planet, the pacific northwest of the u.s. I write for myself only and unless otherwise specified my posts here should not be taken as representing an official position of my employer. Contact me at my gee mail account, username patrickdlogan.