Soundtrack: It’s Crazy by Drag The River
Wired Magazine is a unique entity. Not only is it a successful print magazine, it is a wildly successful web site. Recently they underwent a design overhaul. A new identity combined with a new front page layout has given the stalwort media dispenser a fresh look, but not everyone who trolls the world wide web is a fan. Among the many negative comments are posts such as “To which middle school art class did you farm this out?” and “No. No. No. Bad Wired. Surely this is some cruel joke because you withheld pizza and caffeine from the html coders, yes?”.
It is not a cruel joke, and I am not quite sure what people are complaining about. Apparently it is hard to read, but when I view the site in both Firefox and Safari, I see a well designed site with great visual hierarchy. The designers do not need to tell you what parts are the most important with subheadlines. Everything speaks for itself. In fact, it almost reminds me of the way an actual print magazine table of contents might be laid out.
Here’s what I think has happened. People on the whole do not respond well to change in the area of things that they are familiar with. Wired had the same layout on their front page for years and years, and people were used to it. They could scan through it easily and find what it was they were looking for. And then the folks at wired had the audacity to overhaul their own front page... how dare they! Well the world changes, folks. All of you out there in hinternet land are going to need to get used to that. Sometimes it is hard.
On the other side of the coin, it is not necesarily a good thing for a buiness to alienate their customers, and especially not good for a magazine to alienate it’s readers. There are going to be the folks like me who continue to read Wired regardless of the change. There are going to be the readers like me who like the change better. There are going to be new readers, and there are going to be people who leave because they do not like the way the new front page looks. What remains to be seen is whether the people who leave outweigh the number of faithful as well as new readers. Here's looking at you, Wired. Good luck, you’re gonna need it.
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Friday, March 16, 2007
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
A Microsoft Type Thing
Soundtrack: “Identity Theft” by Vaux
I know I complain about Microsoft a lot, but I don't want people to get the impression that I indiscriminately hate them. On the contrary, in fact. I do enjoy many of their products and innovations. OpenType has to be my favorite of these innovations, but as someone who deals with web design daily, ClearType is a close second.
To be honest I am surprised that Microsoft came up with it and not someone else. I don't know, maybe I shouldn't be surprised, but ClearType is a literally a new way of looking typography in the way that it allows digital type to be more readable on the screen. Microsoft in the past has done some things for web design that have been innovative as well as some things that have been annoying. Microsoft FrontPage is one of the annoying things they've come up with, but on the Typography front they have been somewhat helpful. Since Windows 95 was first released Microsoft has been releasing a steady stream of web and screen friendly typefaces like Georgia and Verdana. I am not a huge fan of Verdana's clunky stature, but Georgia is perfect as a screen font. In fact, as you read this blog you are enjoying Georgia’s pleasant proportions and large x-height.
This brings me back to ClearType. Microsoft’s screen fonts were a great step forward in pushing design for the computer screen forward. But Microsoft’s typography division was not satisfied. So for several years now they have been working on a new of way of rendering screen fonts called ClearType.
The story goes like this: the main reason that Microsoft has been pushing forward in the area of digital typography is pretty simple. The majority of typefaces are designed for print. Helvetica and Arial, Times New Roman, Garamond, Futura, Optima, even Lucida... they are all designed for print. That means they look great on paper. Books, flyers and posters, packaging, and everything else you can print. And many of them translate well to the screen at larger weights. But once you get below about 10 point, the elegant figures of a typeface like Garmond become hard to read because of resolution. See, print has a high resolution. Your average laser printer prints at 300 dpi, or dots per inch. Your average screen resolution is 96 ppi, or pixels per inch. This means that a laser printer has over three times the resolution of your computer monitor. No, junior, not even your “high resolution” LCD screen can compare. And so Microsoft has invented ClearType, which uses what is called sub-pixel rendering to make typefaces look good. Now spindly script typefaces won’t look like pure crap. Elegant faces like Garamond will show up halfway decent on screen. But Microsoft didn’t stop there. They didn't just want a new way of rendering type, they wanted to show it off.
What do people who care about typography do so that the default typeface looks good in both print and web? Commission a whole slew of new fonts that do just that. And that is what Microsoft has done. And they developed these new typefaces in conjunction with ClearType, so they are guaranteed to look good. I have to say, as a typography nut they look really good. I was impressed. No clunky Verdana. No old and tired Courier. Just six really solid typefaces. Wanna see them? Sure you do.
The crazy thing about this is that ClearType has been around as long as Windows XP has. A few years back Mister Usability himself, Jakob Neilsen wrote about how ClearType has the potential to save a company an average of $2000 dollars per employee per year. But you have to turn in on.
I know I complain about Microsoft a lot, but I don't want people to get the impression that I indiscriminately hate them. On the contrary, in fact. I do enjoy many of their products and innovations. OpenType has to be my favorite of these innovations, but as someone who deals with web design daily, ClearType is a close second.
To be honest I am surprised that Microsoft came up with it and not someone else. I don't know, maybe I shouldn't be surprised, but ClearType is a literally a new way of looking typography in the way that it allows digital type to be more readable on the screen. Microsoft in the past has done some things for web design that have been innovative as well as some things that have been annoying. Microsoft FrontPage is one of the annoying things they've come up with, but on the Typography front they have been somewhat helpful. Since Windows 95 was first released Microsoft has been releasing a steady stream of web and screen friendly typefaces like Georgia and Verdana. I am not a huge fan of Verdana's clunky stature, but Georgia is perfect as a screen font. In fact, as you read this blog you are enjoying Georgia’s pleasant proportions and large x-height.
This brings me back to ClearType. Microsoft’s screen fonts were a great step forward in pushing design for the computer screen forward. But Microsoft’s typography division was not satisfied. So for several years now they have been working on a new of way of rendering screen fonts called ClearType.
The story goes like this: the main reason that Microsoft has been pushing forward in the area of digital typography is pretty simple. The majority of typefaces are designed for print. Helvetica and Arial, Times New Roman, Garamond, Futura, Optima, even Lucida... they are all designed for print. That means they look great on paper. Books, flyers and posters, packaging, and everything else you can print. And many of them translate well to the screen at larger weights. But once you get below about 10 point, the elegant figures of a typeface like Garmond become hard to read because of resolution. See, print has a high resolution. Your average laser printer prints at 300 dpi, or dots per inch. Your average screen resolution is 96 ppi, or pixels per inch. This means that a laser printer has over three times the resolution of your computer monitor. No, junior, not even your “high resolution” LCD screen can compare. And so Microsoft has invented ClearType, which uses what is called sub-pixel rendering to make typefaces look good. Now spindly script typefaces won’t look like pure crap. Elegant faces like Garamond will show up halfway decent on screen. But Microsoft didn’t stop there. They didn't just want a new way of rendering type, they wanted to show it off.
What do people who care about typography do so that the default typeface looks good in both print and web? Commission a whole slew of new fonts that do just that. And that is what Microsoft has done. And they developed these new typefaces in conjunction with ClearType, so they are guaranteed to look good. I have to say, as a typography nut they look really good. I was impressed. No clunky Verdana. No old and tired Courier. Just six really solid typefaces. Wanna see them? Sure you do.
The crazy thing about this is that ClearType has been around as long as Windows XP has. A few years back Mister Usability himself, Jakob Neilsen wrote about how ClearType has the potential to save a company an average of $2000 dollars per employee per year. But you have to turn in on.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Who is Jerry?
Soundtrack: “Bayonetwork: Vultures In Vivid Color” by Norma Jean
I get that question all the time. You see, I have a lovely little Apple PowerBook adorned with many stickers. One of these stickers says [ this is jerry ].
So who is Jerry? This is Jerry. He's quite the internet celebrity.
I get that question all the time. You see, I have a lovely little Apple PowerBook adorned with many stickers. One of these stickers says [ this is jerry ].
So who is Jerry? This is Jerry. He's quite the internet celebrity.
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