Comments on: No comic sans...

No comic sans...

fearfulsymmetry — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:43:17 -0800

By: griphus

griphus — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:45:43 -0800

So it turns out that once you see that the Olympic logo looks like Lisa Simpson performing fellatio, you can never unsee it.

By: MangyCarface

MangyCarface — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:51:03 -0800

What I Learned(C): The 2012 olympics are being held in London

By: Xoebe

Xoebe — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:52:08 -0800

Fonts are like prescription medicine. Off label usage should be discouraged, and for good reason. Except that Olympic font. It should never be used.

By: lomcovak

lomcovak — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:53:11 -0800

ugh. font |= typeface. Probably the worst thing to happen to type since the advent of the computer. I'm pretty sure these folks are talking about the design which would be the typeface. The physical implementation of any typeface (such as in a specific size on webpage like this one) is a font. /typedidacticnerd

By: darksasami

darksasami — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:53:52 -0800

Nobody, but nobody, disses my Souvenir. Because it brings back the heady, feeling of reading a new Choose Your Own Adventure book, that's why.

By: darksasami

darksasami — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:55:13 -0800

Hello, stray comma. Where did you come from?

By: Foci for Analysis

Foci for Analysis — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:57:16 -0800

The 2012 Olympic Font is hilariously bad.

By: The Card Cheat

The Card Cheat — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:57:26 -0800

> The 2012 Olympic Font Wow, that's awful. I would have printed my wedding invitations in a combination of Papyrus and Comic Sans before I used that.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:57:50 -0800

NO LISA THAT'S NOT A SAXOPHONE

By: Zed

Zed — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:58:13 -0800

I tried skipping ahead to the list, saw Garamond, and was about to get all fighty.

By: penduluum

penduluum — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:59:12 -0800

If I could straight-up delete one typeface from collective human memory for all time, I think it would be Brush Script. Even more than Comic Sans. I'm glad that one made it.

By: swift

swift — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:59:38 -0800

Neuland Inline is also used on every pack of American Spirit cigarettes.

By: svenni

svenni — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:59:41 -0800

It should be called the "8 uncoolest fonts in the world", since that seems to be about the depth of the critique. I'll agree that some of those are bad, but others are just over- or misused. And yeah, if you're gonna define someone else's work as "the worst in the world", you'd better have better reasoning than that.

By: griphus

griphus — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 09:59:48 -0800

The Card Cheat's wedding print shop manager is a) a MeFite and b) just got to yell "STOP THE PRESSES" for the first time ever.

By: crapmatic

crapmatic — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:00:53 -0800

I would bet Ottawa might have been in this list, had not it become an oddly forgotten typeface. It's a nice sans-serif selection when used sparingly, but not when you set a whole damn book in it. And back in the 1980s it seems that this was all the rage with publishers... I bet I can pull 20 or 30 examples off my bookshelf and they'd all have 1982 or 1983 copyrights.

By: hattifattener

hattifattener — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:01:00 -0800

Meh, weak rantsauce. Like so many font gripes it says very little about the font or why it might be "the worst", just that it has some vaguely annoying association for the author and maybe someone made a snarky quip about it once.

By: DU

DU — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:01:18 -0800

Calling Ransom Note a terrible ~~font~~typeface seems like pretty low-hanging fruit.

By: The Card Cheat

The Card Cheat — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:01:21 -0800

I don't even remember (or care, really) which font we did use. But I know terrible work when I see it.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:01:57 -0800

Anyway he's wrong cause seeing Ransom Note means I'm 18 and about to go get shitfaced in a basement bouncing around to loud music in the near future

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:02:40 -0800

I support any "bad fonts" list that includes Papyrus and Brush Script, but I'm going to climb back up on this old hobby horse and ask: WHAT?? NO REMEDY??

By: clvrmnky

clvrmnky — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:03:42 -0800

Oh god, I just do not fucking /care/ about this any more. Use whatever typeface you like for your lost cat poster. Yes, intent and clarity in design is important. But it is important to only the smallest segment of the working public. The rest of us can just set the typeface we like and be done with it.

By: mrgrimm

mrgrimm — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:04:15 -0800

Papyrus is horrible and overused. But we already knew that.

By: penduluum

penduluum — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:04:19 -0800

Dance like nobody's watching, Devils Rancher.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:04:57 -0800

2012 is going to be a good year to ber out of London, isn't it? Course, I'm stuck in America, where electoral lunacy will nio doubt bring up it's own design horrors.

By: swift

swift — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:05:02 -0800

Tannenberg Fett is the worst in its own way.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:06:06 -0800

WHAT?? NO REMEDY?? FOR USE ONLY WHEN THERE IS A PICTURE OF A CAT.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:08:54 -0800

WITHOUT NO REMEDY HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO CONVEY THE FREEDOM AND SIMPLE JOY OF OUR DAILY SPECIALS?

By: gompa

gompa — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:09:42 -0800

Oh god, I just do not fucking /care/ about this any more. No offence, but this is not what not caring about something generally sounds like. Also, I'm glad for this chance to revisit the horror that is the design motif for the 2012 Olympics. It has not only negated every pound spent on 20 years of "Cool Britannia" marketing, it has set back the idea of London as a stylish capital city for a generation. It's the official font of Empire's final end. It should be called Collapse. If you squint a bit, you can actually see London Bridge falling down between the lower-case i and j. It truly is that bad. There can't be too many threads discussing its utter shite-itude.

By: Smart Dalek

Smart Dalek — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:11:13 -0800

SO pUNK muSt Be DEaD iF rANsom NOte tYPefACes aRE CoNsidERed unCOOl GeT oFF mY LaWN

By: arm's-length

arm's-length — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:13:19 -0800

crapmatic: The "Ottawa" you linked to is actually Hermann Zapf's Optima - a gorgeous typeface at display sizes. (But you're right, it's terrible as a book face.)

By: Slack-a-gogo

Slack-a-gogo — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:13:20 -0800

Back when I was battling my out-of-control "free font site" addiction I quickly grew a deep hatred of any "font" named after a band, TV show, or movie. Those probably made me appreciate well crafted fonts and typefaces more than anything else.

By: koeselitz

koeselitz — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:13:35 -0800

Ridiculous. Just ridiculous. People still use fonts and typefaces? How awful and utterly messy. Like all people who truly care about design and the beauty of letters, I have my computer read every web page via text-to-speech and then carefully copy down all the text in fine black India ink with my own hand-cut quill from the left wing of a rare albino ostrich. Then, when I want to post a comment, I carefully scan the exquisite document and use my own hand-coded OCR to translate the fine letter-forms into electronic text again. I find it laughable that there's anybody who doesn't do it this way, as it's the only way for people who really take the appearance of texts seriously. Keyboards are all well and good, but they're really magnets for novices.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:16:20 -0800

Most of these really have a 80s novelty Letraset/90s birth of desktop publishing feel to them... For a modern horror I submit that fake japanese looking font you see on games and comics sites all the time.

By: Thorzdad

Thorzdad — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:19:37 -0800

Some good surprises in the list. As a designer trained in the 70's, I had just about totally blocked memories of Souvenir from my mind.

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:20:39 -0800

Lets turn this conversation to a positive note Some nice Pay What You Like fonts

By: GenjiandProust

GenjiandProust — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:20:49 -0800

I suspect that the worst font in the world is always the one you are reading right now. I mean, how often do you stop and think "that is a good looking font!"? I am far more likely to notice a font when it is ugly, it seems. Part of the beauty of a font is that it gets out of the way when I am reading....

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:21:14 -0800

As a designer trained in the 70's Cooper Black triggers my PTSD.

By: Slack-a-gogo

Slack-a-gogo — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:22:55 -0800

I better clear my browser cache before Mrs Agogo sees that I'm spending my afternoons reading about fonts again. Otherwise there's a good chance she'll cut off my serifs.

By: The Tensor

The Tensor — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:23:58 -0800

Anybody else seeing horrible aliasing on the pull-quotes in this article? All the round letters have little rectangular nipples on top! (Windows 7, Firefox)

By: swift

swift — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:24:19 -0800

This is the worst font.

By: ymgve

ymgve — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:27:00 -0800

Is the top one the one used in the article, which looks completely broken because stems are fatter than the rest of the characters?

By: The World Famous

The World Famous — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:27:19 -0800

WHAT?? NO REMEDY?? FOR USE ONLY WHEN THERE IS A PICTURE OF A CAT. Remedy is actually really useful for when you are a robot detective who has to go back in time to 1995 so that you can save the world by making fliers for someone's introspective yet humorous folk music gig at a coffee shop. Cooper Black triggers my PTSD. Cooper Black is the worst thing ever created by humanity.

By: hal9k

hal9k — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:28:11 -0800

As a designer trained in the 70's Cooper Black triggers my PTSD. Peignot GAH! Ultra Bodoni! Busorama AIEEEE! Tango! Frankfurter! EEK!

By: griphus

griphus — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:31:35 -0800

Peignot GAH! Ultra Bodoni! Busorama AIEEEE! Tango! Frankfurter! EEK! Some Manchurian Candidate-style Soviet sleeper agent just got triggered.

By: crapmatic

crapmatic — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:34:51 -0800

You know, I wouldn't mind throwing Impact on the list: the same font used in all those tiresome Internet meme posters.

By: Sauce Trough

Sauce Trough — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:37:10 -0800

Nobody, but nobody, disses my Souvenir. Because it brings back the heady, feeling of reading a new Choose Your Own Adventure book, that's why. I think Souvenir was also used in the 1981 Moldvay / Cook D&D boxed sets. When I saw the plus-sized sample on the linked website I was instantly happy but it took me a moment to figure out why. Fuck those people who hate Souvenir. Fuck them.

By: Postroad

Postroad — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:39:31 -0800

It makes more sense to be positive: The ten best fonts etc etc

By: Slap*Happy

Slap*Happy — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:41:54 -0800

Brush Script, as an accent on retro '30s, '40s and '50s flavored layouts, really works. (A motto on a diner menu below the art-deco logo, for instance.) Comic Sans is dead to everyone forever, tho.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:48:22 -0800

Comic Sans is a perfectly fine font in the correct context... That context being a defunct 90s UI experiment that went nowhere.

By: fearfulsymmetry

fearfulsymmetry — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:50:31 -0800

By: Halloween Jack

Halloween Jack — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:53:08 -0800

The worst nerds in the world: font nerds. If I had a choice between ridding the world of either Comic Sans or all the people who bitch obsessively about it... well, I'd hope that certain MeFites weren't in the latter group, but I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

By: Bunny Ultramod

Bunny Ultramod — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:54:15 -0800

Ransom Note is the typeface used in Lebowski by the nihilists to demand money from Lebowski, the other Lebowski, Jeffrey Lebowski, the millionaire. What have you done that is nearly as cool?

By: infinitewindow

infinitewindow — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 10:54:54 -0800

Ah 70's typefaces. For me, Cooper Black will always mean Foxfire and Optima will always be my decrepit twenty-year-old driver's ed textbook.

By: Zed

Zed — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:00:12 -0800

For me, Optima will always be the alien name when typesetting my own Cosmic Encounter alien power cards. (Yes, I know it wasn't a perfect match for the published ones. But it was what I used.)

By: Typographica

Typographica — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:05:47 -0800

The typeface they show for the 2012 Olympics is an amateur knockoff derived from the logo. It is not used on organization materials. The official font family is in the same angular vein but is properly crafted by a real type designer, Gareth Hague.

By: oneswellfoop

oneswellfoop — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:06:01 -0800

When I took a job in the 1990s, designing billing systems for non-standard engineering contracts, I reached the point of designing invoices, cringed at the standard Times New Roman and, looking for something more readable in the limited selection of Microsoft Office fonts of the day and found Bookman Old Style. As relatively mediocre as the implementation of Bookman Old Style may have been, I was pleasantly surprised at the utility of something that was pigeonholed as "that '70's font with the swashes" (disclaimer: I've used a swashy version in logos ever since 1979, when it gave me a fun-looking 'w' for a newsletter). It seemed perfect to me for documents that used both columns of numbers and text descriptions longer than one line. During my several years at that job, I got more and more comfortable with Bookman, at one point convincing a Times-loyal manager to use it on all invoices produced by the company. I'm still using Bookman wherever possible - it's the user-defined font I use here a MetaFilter (thank you Matt & Co. for that beautiful pony). Only recently, the folks at Veer offered a version of Bookman that is the only font I have ever paid more than a couple bucks for. That version's not good for screen text display (too bold in its standard weight), but if you ever want strong title text (but less overwhelming than the semi-related Clarendon) and a change to toss in an occasional alternate character (like my swashy 'w'), it can be too much fun. Please don't hate it just because the Heritage Foundation uses it.

By: liza

liza — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:10:27 -0800

ooh! font wank *breaks out the pop corn*

By: PostIronyIsNotaMyth

PostIronyIsNotaMyth — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:13:34 -0800

I was totally hoping I'd click on comments and the font for everyone's comments would be Papyrus, just like that epic comic sans post we had a few years back. Oh well...

By: liminalrampaste

liminalrampaste — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:14:05 -0800

This made me so angry. I love all of these fonts. They produce such poignant sensations. Ecofont is like CHECK IT OUT, I AM THE AREA AROUND A MIRROR Souvenir is like, "Hi baby you're home I made fajitas." Gill Sans Light Shadowed is like, hey man sorry to bother you man that's a nice hat man do you know where I could score some hydro around here man? Brush Script is like "That's a pretty racy postcard, Carrie Fisher!!" Papyrus is like "Ancient people had, like, so much wisdom, man and now, bitch, nobody can fuckin' draw a pentagon anymore, the fuckin' society is all fucked up. Shit." Neuland Inline is like, "Hsssssssss. Hsssssss." Ransom Note is like, GOOGLE RON PAUL. The 2012 Olympic font is like, "my mother never held me when I was young."

By: justkevin

justkevin — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:16:32 -0800

I'm confused. This is how this article's font looks on my computer. Is it supposed to look like that? Is this meant to be ironic?

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:19:49 -0800

Youch. I think theres a checkbox for antialiasing somewhere you badly need to click.

By: delfin

delfin — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:21:06 -0800

Kibo swore by Zany as the world's worst font, with Mecanorma Plumpy as a close runner-up. I tend to believe him.

By: delfin

delfin — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:22:25 -0800

K, no idea why the Plumpy link borked, but it should be this.

By: Jehan

Jehan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:27:00 -0800

I think it's worse when something like Arial or Times New Roman is blown up to massive size and used as a headline/cover font. It just looks horrendous. I don't want to be hyperbolic but my local parish newsletter/notice board is an offence to humanity on that front (oh and using about 50 fonts on one page) I took over editing my local magazine because the design annoyed me so much. I'm hardly a designer at all, but it was so outstandingly bad that it hurt even my untrained eyes.

By: FatherDagon

FatherDagon — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:32:01 -0800

So it turns out that once you see that the Olympic logo looks like Lisa Simpson performing fellatio, you can never unsee it. Sure you can... once you realize the coloring more matches another Simpsons character. I apologize for ruining your mind. to be fair, it looks like you're not the first to come to that visual conclusion, however

By: kinnakeet

kinnakeet — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:35:53 -0800

Okay, maybe it's not so popular anymore, but Dom Casual used to give me nightmares. Having to typeset ads without number in this hideous mess, with its awful kerning and impossibly ugly proportions, will do that to you. That Olympic thing is an abomination though.

By: chemoboy

chemoboy — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:44:38 -0800

There is no way I can unsee that Lisa Simpson thing. I am going to be giggling through the whole olympics.

By: Blazecock Pileon

Blazecock Pileon — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:30:27 -0800

Tannenberg Fett is the worst in its own way. Interestingly enough, Nazi Germany actually transitioned the country away from Fraktur typefaces, to using Roman type. This makes the use of Fraktur in video games and movies kind of funny. Some German authors used these typefaces again after WWII as a statement of breaking with the country's troubled past.

By: Glinn

Glinn — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:38:20 -0800

Don't care. Still like Papyrus. I guess I'm just totally uncultured. But so are all the people who complain about it just because other people complain about it. Which is likely some of you.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:45:41 -0800

You should open a Thai resteraunt!

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:02:33 -0800

Don't care. Still like Papyrus. It's not just that it's bad. It's really only mediocre, but it's horribly over-used. I'll admit to not totally minding it, before I saw it on every damn jar at the grocery store & every cultural event flyer for the last 10 years. It's become a lazy stereotype go-to font for anyone wanting to denote some "ethnicity" to anything.

By: MiltonRandKalman

MiltonRandKalman — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:04:17 -0800

WHAT?? NO REMEDY?? How do you expect the neighbors to announce their 7-year-old daughter's birthday pool party? If you use Giddy-Up they'll expect ponies! WHEN THEY DON'T SEE PONIES, THE CRYING STARTS! PINK CUPCAKES CAN NOT STOP THE TEARS! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?! No, of course not, use Remedy.

By: The ____ of Justice

The ____ of Justice — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:12:38 -0800

I unfortunately assumed "worst fonts in the world" meant "worst fonts in the WORLD" and expected to see crappy but intriguing fonts for Chinese, Arabic, etc. I has disappoint. I guess I'm the only one who was really annoyed by the English-centric title?

By: MiltonRandKalman

MiltonRandKalman — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:13:56 -0800

Don't care. Still like Papyrus. I want to be there when lawyer reads your aunt's will and announce you've inherited her stationary, wicker knick-knack and hand-made soap store. I wanna see that light in your eye fade out.

By: Artw

Artw — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:14:53 -0800

I has disappoint. I guess I'm the only one who was really annoyed by the English-centric title? Probably. But I would be interested in seeing examples of non-latin fonts that suck.

By: i_am_joe's_spleen

i_am_joe's_spleen — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:26:04 -0800

I loved the jibe about crackled Letraset on a school magazine. You have to be a certain age for that to really hit home.

By: carping demon

carping demon — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:46:29 -0800

In answer to nobody above, I've loved alphabets since before I could read. When I was nine or ten (I could read by then) I saw Brush Script in a book of alphabets in a stationery store (I also loved stationery stores) and was quite taken with the cap T. I've used it to sign my name ever since. 30 years later I spent a decade setting ad type, so I saw plenty of it. It was/is far from the worst (I'd rather see my own blood than another word in Mystral). Type went to shit with the advent of the PC in the 80s. Everybody thinks they're a typefounder. I watched a craft and an industry die, and seldom see type worth looking at anymore. /bitterness

By: Sauce Trough

Sauce Trough — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:59:12 -0800

It's (Papyrus) not just that it's bad. It's really only mediocre, but it's horribly over-used. I've been enjoying Your Aunt Diane much more since I made a custom stylesheet that displays it in Papyrus.

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:07:07 -0800

Your Aunt Diane & Friend From HS are about the best gag Twitter accounts out there. That one should totally be in Comic Sans.

By: Sassyfras

Sassyfras — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:09:57 -0800

I'm Comic Sans, Asshole . . . nice to see comic sans getting a little respect.

By: ardgedee

ardgedee — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:11:36 -0800

I've been told that since Cooper Black is getting a little too much attention to be cool any more, the hipsters are turning to Hobo to sate their need for fontographic irony. I hope this is not true.

By: Glinn

Glinn — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 15:20:45 -0800

It's not just that it's bad. It's really only mediocre, but it's horribly over-used. I'll admit to not totally minding it, before I saw it on every damn jar at the grocery store & every cultural event flyer for the last 10 years. It's become a lazy stereotype go-to font for anyone wanting to denote some "ethnicity" to anything. Yeah, yeah. I'll probably change my *%&^!* banner. It just seems that I've seen far more grar about the idea of the font, than the actual font in all these million places it's supposed to be. I don't really doubt that it's true, but I haven't seen it so much, or it isn't noteworthy to me. And I do think some people get all up-in-arms about it because they're supposed to, rather than because they've been made nauseous by its prevalence.

By: oneswellfoop

oneswellfoop — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 15:40:13 -0800

Here's a new contender (all caps, extreme steampunkery, probably unreadable at anything below 500 point)

By: Doleful Creature

Doleful Creature — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:06:51 -0800

"You know what really gets my goat? Novices and/or lazy designers." Yeah, you tell'em! This article is the worst. SEO linkbait to the fucking max. It's pretty simple, friends: the right tool for the right job. The best designers understand this well, and they don't talk much about it because they're too busy doing good work. But hey! Since lists are so popular on the web these days, here's my list of favorite typefaces (i.e. typefaces I, a non-designer, have actually paid for because I love them so much): 1. Meta (for technical documents at work) 2. Futura (for postery stuff, especially Futura Bold) 3. Borges (for long booky stuff) 4. Tartine Script Black (for logo-y stuff) 5. Din Condensed (posters, again) 6. Gotham Rounded (for cute stuff) 7. Phaeton (my Papyrus alternative)

By: joshwa

joshwa — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:21:10 -0800

To me, nothing will ever top Algerian. ("Hey, look, I'm old-world!") Once you start seeing it, you'll start seeing it everywhere. Curlz is a close second...

By: 4eyes

4eyes — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:31:15 -0800

(To me, the 2012 Olympics logo looks like Maggie Simpson playing Space Invaders.)

By: mippy

mippy — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:46:47 -0800

This article is the worst. SEO linkbait to the fucking max. It's taken from a book on fonts by Simon Garfield, who's an acclaimed non-fiction writer (The Nation's Favourite is a fabulous book, though perhaps only if you lived in Britain from about 1970-1995) - it wasn't actually written for the web. Though the idea of SEO in printed books amuses me - I'm picturing an acknowledgements page that spells out CIALIS with the first letter of every sentence.

By: oneswellfoop

oneswellfoop — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 18:03:43 -0800

All this font talk...

By: The ____ of Justice

The ____ of Justice — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 21:35:13 -0800

Speaking of fonts, iotic made a lovely font that averages out all the fonts on his/her computer. A Mefi project. I wonder what averaging out all the crazy fonts listed above would look like.

By: PinkMoose

PinkMoose — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 22:36:11 -0800

I love cooper black, because it reminds me of slightly broken down, worn out, threadbare pleasures from the 70s. You know, like plastic furniture, disco cuts, thousand island dressing, key parties. i like to see it used with super graphics of rainbows.

By: pmcp

pmcp — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 22:50:13 -0800

Rather than dad dancing I see the 2012 Olympics font as equivalent to Jeremy Paxman talking to Dizzee Rascal.

By: fearfulsymmetry

fearfulsymmetry — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 02:11:09 -0800

To me, nothing will ever top Algerian. ("Hey, look, I'm old-world!") Once you start seeing it, you'll start seeing it everywhere. Oh yes, the font of a thousand self-pub/small press steampunk novel/rpg covers

By: Grangousier

Grangousier — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 04:41:46 -0800

The official font family is in the same angular vein but is properly crafted by a real type designer, Gareth Hague. It's still not very nice, is it? The ultimate example that points out that Times (NR) isn't ideal for headlines is the Patrick Troughton Dr Who title sequence. Otherwise I'm getting tired of people endlessly pointing out "The Ten Worst Whatevers Evurr!" and really only gave this the time of day because it was Simon Garfield.

By: Joe in Australia

Joe in Australia — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 05:52:45 -0800

Delfin wrote: Kibo swore by Zany as the world's worst font ... Oh great, now he's going to come post a comment.

By: Fleebnork

Fleebnork — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 08:39:23 -0800

It's pretty simple, friends: the right tool for the right job. The best designers understand this well, and they don't talk much about it because they're too busy doing good work. Some of us bitch about it because we have the misfortune of working for clueless managers who want things to "pop".

By: Diag

Diag — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 12:27:37 -0800

I have only recently discovered my typography fetish, but I do agree that it's more in the presentation than the actual typeface. This Weird Al Yankovic clip really floats my boat, and contains quite a few of the less loved typefaces (I an ironic context, I guess).