View source for Pronunciation of "www"

{{Short description|How to pronounce "www", "double-u double-u, double-u" or something else}}
'''WWW''' (or '''www''') is an initialism for [[World Wide Web]]. In [[Social:English language|English]], WWW is the longest possible three-letter abbreviation when spoken, requiring six to nine syllables, depending on how it is pronounced, whereas the twelve letters in "World Wide Web" are pronounced with three syllables. The English writer [[Biography:Douglas Adams|Douglas Adams]] once quipped:
{{Quote|The World Wide Web is the only thing I know of whose shortened form takes three times longer to say than what it's short for.|Douglas Adams|The Independent on Sunday, 1999}}

Tim Berners-Lee rejected suggestions to change the World Wide Web name over pronunciation issues, arguing that this peculiar feature of the name would make it memorable.{{Citation needed|date=February 2007}} As his invention gradually gained ubiquity, it came to be called simply ''the Web''.

==English pronunciation==
In [[Social:Standard English|standard English]] pronunciation, ''www'' is [[Social:English alphabet#Letter names|pronounced]] by individually pronouncing the names of the letters ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|əl|.|j|uː|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|əl|.|j|uː|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|əl|.|j|uː}} or ''double-u double-u double-u''). However, in colloquial speech the name of the letter W is sometimes shortened. In some parts of the United States, the ''l'' is often dropped and the ''u'' reduced, for {{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|ə|j|ə|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|ə|j|ə|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|ə|j|ə}}, whereas in the Southern United States W is reduced to two-syllables, {{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|j|ə|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|j|ə|_|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|j|ə}}.

The form ''dub-dub-dub'' has long been used occasionally worldwide,<ref>[http://blog.codinghorror.com/the-great-dub-dub-dub-debate/ "''...the great dub-dub-dub debate...''"]</ref> but is the most common abbreviation used in [[Earth:New Zealand|New Zealand]].<ref>[http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/business/technology/8844344/Why-a-website-still-rules "''...you can quote your address as being dub-dub-dub YourBusinessName dot co dot nz...''"], 26/06/2013, Julie South, Waikato Times</ref><ref>[http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10519571 "''...pronounced dub, dub, dub in this neck of the woods...''"], July 2, 2008, Myrddin Gwynedd, nzherald.co.nz</ref><ref>[http://downtothewire.co.nz/library-1991/ "Dub Dub Dub arrives (in practice)"], The Story of New Zeand's Internet, 1991</ref>

An abbreviation ''W<sup>3</sup>'' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|ʌ|b|əl|.|j|uː|_|ˈ|k|j|uː|b|d}} "double-u cubed") is inspired from mathematical notation for [[Exponentiation|exponentiation]] (W raised to the 3rd power). Many of the original papers describing the World Wide Web abbreviated it this way, and the [[Organization:World Wide Web Consortium|World Wide Web Consortium]] (W3C) was named according to this early usage. The original W3C logo had a superscript ''3'' and the consortium's domain name is still [http://www.w3.org/ <code>www.w3.org</code>].

==Other languages==
{{unsourced section|date=November 2023}}
In [[Social:Afrikaans|Afrikaans]], [[Social:Dutch language|Dutch]], [[Social:German language|German]], [[Social:Polish language|Polish]] and other languages, this problem doesn't occur because the letter W is already uttered as a single syllable.

In some languages, such as [[Social:Danish language|Danish]], [[Social:Estonian language|Estonian]], [[Social:Finnish language|Finnish]], [[Social:Norwegian language|Norwegian]], and [[Social:Swedish language|Swedish]] it is common practice to say "ve"(''v'') instead of "dobbelt-ve" in abbreviations, so "www" becomes "ve, ve, ve". This is also used by [[Social:Romanian language|Romanian]], [[Social:Serbian language|Serbian]], etc. In Danish, it is also usual to say "tre gange dobbelt-ve" ("three times double u").

In many languages which give the letter ''W'' a name that translates to "double V", each ''w'' is substituted by a ''v'', so ''www'' is shortened to "vvv" instead. Another practice is to use a numeric shortcut that translates ''w-w-w'' as ''triple W''.

* In Standard Mandarin of {{wipe|China}}, is called "sān double u" which means ''3 W(s)''.
* In Taiwanese Mandarin, is pronounced as "triple w" in English.
* [[Social:Japanese language|Japanese]] uses a transliteration of the English pronunciation – ''{{transl|ja|daburyū daburyū daburyū}}'' (ダブリューダブリューダブリュー).
* "vé, vé, vé" in both [[Social:Czech language|Czech]] and [[Social:Slovak language|Slovak]] (Literally means ''vvv''. The formally correct but infrequently used form has 12 syllables: ''dvojité vé, dvojité vé, dvojité vé''.)
* "vee vee vee" (commonly used) in [[Social:Estonian language|Estonian]] (correct, but used less often, is "kaksisvee kaksisvee kaksisvee")
* "vee vee vee" in [[Social:Finnish language|Finnish]] (The pronunciation of W in this context has been adopted from [[Social:German language|German]])
* "double vé, double vé, double vé" in [[Social:French language|French]]. Most French speakers prefer the "3w" form, pronounced "trois doubles-vés" (most television and radio commercials in French speaking countries use this pronunciation) or – less frequently – "triple double-vé". Some Belgians tend to use the Dutch pronunciation.
* "vé, vé, vé" in [[Social:Hungarian language|Hungarian]] (Literally means ''vvv''. The formally correct but infrequently used form has nine syllables: ''dupla vé, dupla vé, dupla vé''.) Sometimes "tripladuplavé" can be heard, too.
* "tvöfalt vaff, tvöfalt vaff, tvöfalt vaff" or "vaff, vaff, vaff" in [[Social:Icelandic language|Icelandic]]
* "dupult ve, dupult ve, dupult ve" or "ve, ve, ve" in [[Social:Faroese language|Faroese]]. Double-u is not part of the Faroese alphabet and is normally substituted by using V in its stead, leading to the latter, shorter pronunciation.
* "vu vu vu" in [[Social:Italian language|Italian]], despite being technically incorrect (it is one of the possible pronunciations for "vvv").
* "ве-ве-ве" in [[Social:Macedonian language|Macedonian]] (pronounced ve-ve-ve)
* "dablio, dablio, dablio" in [[Social:Portuguese language|Portuguese]]
* "dáblio, dáblio, dáblio" in Brazilian [[Social:Portuguese language|Portuguese]]
* "вэ-вэ-вэ" in [[Social:Russian language|Russian]] (pronounced ve-ve-ve). It may be heard in the "WWW" song by the band Leningrad.<ref>[http://leningradspb.ru/mp3/Piraty_XXI_veka_2002/01_www.mp3 Leningradspb.ru]</ref> However, the official pronunciation is "тройное дабл-ю" ("triple double-u")
* "ве-ве-ве" in [[Social:Serbian language|Serbian]] (pronounced ve-ve-ve). Another frequently used way to pronounce it is в-в-в (v-v-v) without any vowels. Correct, but used less often, is "duplove-duplove-duplove".
* In [[Social:Spanish language|Spanish]], "3w" can be either "triple doble v", "triple doble u", "uve doble uve doble uve doble", "tres uve dobles", "triple uve doble", "doble u, doble u, doble u", "ve doble, ve doble, ve doble" (Latin America), "doble ve, doble ve, doble ve" ({{wipe|Argentina}}) or "tres uve(s) dobles" (Spain).
* "dabıl yu, dabıl yu, dabıl yu" or "çift ve, çift ve, çift ve" or "ve ve ve" in [[Social:Turkish language|Turkish]]
* "Double-u,Double-u,Double-u" in [[Social:Arabic|Arabic]]
* "дабл ю, дабл ю, дабл ю" (pronounced "double u, double u, double u") in [[Social:Ukrainian language|Ukrainian]], although "дабі, дабі, дабі" (dabi-dabi-dabi), "ве, ве, ве" (ve-ve-ve) and (officially) "потрійне дабл ю" are also used.
* "vê kép, vê kép, vê kép" in [[Social:Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]].
* In [[Social:Welsh language|Welsh]], the standard pronunciation is "w-driphlyg" ("triple-w") – as w is a vowel in Welsh, it is pronounced as 'oo', so the acronym's name is only 3 syllables long.
* In [[Social:Lithuanian language|Lithuanian]]: "vė vė vė" or "trys dvigubosios vė" (formally correct but infrequent: "vė dviguboji, vė dviguboji, vė dviguboji").

==References==
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[[Category:World Wide Web]]

{{Sourceattribution|Pronunciation of &quot;www&quot;}}