
Ask HN: How do you pronounce 'data'? - antiviral
How do you pronounce the word &#x27;data&#x27;?<p>I have always pronounced the word &#x27;data&#x27; as &#x27;dādə &#x27;, with a long a, and I&#x27;ve noticed that many people with some kind of technical training do the same.<p>However, I also have noticed that there is a recently growing contingent of people who pronounce it as &#x27;dadə&#x27;, with a short a. Most of these people are either in sales, or senior management. It drives me crazy to hear it pronounced this way, almost as much as when I see the word &#x27;lose&#x27; spelled as &#x27;loose&#x27;.<p>Is there a pronunciation that you prefer?
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greenyoda
The varying pronunciations of "data" are recognized in the dictionary, and
I've heard knowledgeable technical people using all of them:

[https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/data](https://www.merriam-
webster.com/dictionary/data)

According to the above reference, "data" first started being used in English
in 1646, so I'm not sure why technical people in the 21st century should get
to say what the "correct" pronunciation is.

(Spelling "lose" as "loose" is clearly an error - they're two separate words
with entirely different meanings - so that's a poor analogy.)

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Ayesh
Dayta.

This is how every Text-to-speech software pronounced it, and every news/media
from native English speaking countries pronounce it.

This is a quite common mispronounciation and we all understand what it means,
so I wouldn't sweat much about it.

English is weird.

