Friday Link Dump
This list of the most common fonts installed on Windows machines is kind of weird. The only reason people would be missing any of the top dozen or so is because they uninstalled them, right? Who uninstalls Arial but leaves Arial Black? WTF?
The 10 Most Widely Used Fonts for Newspapers. Is it me or is this is just completely made up?
I don’t think these 300 Essential Fonts for Designers are actually essential (or in most cases even good), but I figure if I post this link people will stop emailing it to me. Snarkiness aside, there are some good fonts in this collection, but be prepared for some monumentally bad ones.
9 Comments
Wes Rand / April 15, 2005 @ 10:38 am
I can believe that the newspaper list is true. I see those same fonts all over various newspapers with only the occasional unique choices.
Vad Solmrof / April 15, 2005 @ 10:43 am
Be warned.: The GoodFonts site contains various bootlegged, illegal copies of commercial typefaces.. ( If I were you I would remove the link as soon as possible.. )
Andrew Dupont / April 15, 2005 @ 11:53 am
Though I do wish they’d said how they collected that data, I do agree that the list of popular newspaper fonts is completely believable. In addition to being a typography dork, I was a designer at my college newspaper, and we had brief flirtations with several of these fonts. Also, Poynter is very well-respected when it comes to journalism research, so I trust their methods.
Laura / April 15, 2005 @ 12:18 pm
I’ll second Andrew Dupont on Poynter’s reputation. As far as the Poynter list goes … I worked with four of those typefaces at my last newspaper job. *shrug*
Stephen / April 15, 2005 @ 11:05 pm
goodfonts.org is lame. It shows how far one can get with a good domain name. But it’s worse than that - it’s the type of archive that gives new designers a false sense of a good font’s value. As Vad says, most of the stuff are knockoffs or blatant copies. Use those fonts and your work will show it.
Stephen / April 15, 2005 @ 11:07 pm
I love the footer:
How convenient.
joey / April 15, 2005 @ 11:17 pm
i thought fontleech.com was the ultimate proof of how far one can get with a good domain name?
Mark / April 17, 2005 @ 1:17 pm
The newspaper font list on Poynter is the result of a survey performed by the Ascender Corporation, a font developer in Illinois. Apparently they examined the front pages of nearly 100 newspapers and using PDF versions of the newspapaer with font information embedded.
It seems to be a legit list. No real surprises for newpaper front pages, although I think Bodoni should recieve an honorable mention.
dan hartung / April 17, 2005 @ 11:57 pm
Who uninstalls Arial but leaves Arial Black? WTF?
Most likely this reflects the small number of Windows 3.0 systems (or, perhaps, incomplete upgrades) still out there. Arial was not a standard font until Windows 3.1, replacing the .FON version of Helvetica.
Arial Black is there because it was a decorative font included with many versions of Office. Thus, you can have no Arial and yet have Arial Black.
Also, as far as the newspaper fonts, two of those top 10 are in use at my local paper — as Poynter reported. They consulted the Font Bureau, and I see no reason why there isn’t a “zeitgeist” of fonts. Or are you saying you disagree with the ranking?
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