What folks dont realize is that in 1994, the comic sans font would have appeared as huge on the typical computer screen of that time period. The letters are wider than almost any other common font at 10pt size. Its OK to call it a bad font.
12
Comic Sans is the font of choice for those who are about to be arrested.
9
Comic sans has a place. I use it sometimes when printing t-shirts for younger children.
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It's not a big deal to me.
17
How people use the fun font is the problem not the font! I’ve only used it for “fun” emails like wishing someone a happy birthday or congratulating someone on the birth of their child!
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Legal documents are usually written in Times New Roman, not Courier.
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You mean they didn't use a ding bats font to reply? Well, they're obviously attempting to tell us how sophisticated they've become.
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Just think of the variety of personalities that could be revealed if this comment section allowed the selection of any font the commenter wanted!
...hmm or maybe not...
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"manspreading across paper " Really ?
You've got the folks who complain that somehow, Trump can be brought into any & every conversation. Now, we got the #MeToo/White male hatred being brought into everything. So soon Comic Sans hate will be included too ? Why not just forget any content until everything is just hate & bile ? That seems to be where this sad nation is heading ...
(Oh, pardon me. Did I get those 3 little dots properly positioned?)
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Growing up reading comics, I have a fondness for Comic Sans. It's readable, and that's really all that counts. Whatever meaning it has or emotions it engenders are due to culture, which can change in a heartbeat. Who knows what seminal work, published in Comic Sans, will suddenly make it respectable or auteurish or taboo?
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Everyone seems to be forgetting that sometimes it's just fun to hate things, especially something trivial like font. The outrage over the outrage is hilarious.
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@Sonja
It's easy and the stakes are so low.
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This article should be in comic sans.
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When I designed my produce graphics and box labels, I thought a great deal about the messages different fonts might subliminally send as well as readability. My farm name I placed on the boxes in New Century Gothic - a truly "modern antique" font - and for pure readability I used Comic Sans on the labels. Quite a contrast, but one that I think works well.
I like that fonts exist and that there are choices for us to use. Are there fonts I personally would never use? Of course! Are there fonts that I don't like much? Of Course! Would others use them? Naturally.
So, aside from encouraging others to check out New Century Gothic, I am just happy that people read and I think it is funny that people get so incensed about small things in life.
Live Life.
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I am a graphic designer. There’s nothing wrong with Comic Sans. It’s designed to be an unrefined, childish font. However, it’s being used in situations where one should use a more traditional font. Comic Sans is not the only offender. All haters of Comic Sans should take a class in typography and understand the basics of design instead of dog piling on this font because it’s trendy thing to do.
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The font is not the problem, it's use is. It's perfect for informal stuff or maybe ironic use, not so much in an official business year report (where I once saw it as well)..
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One of Connare‘s years-ago (maybe mis-remembered) quotes about Comic Sans was: ‘If you like Comic Sans, you don’t know what you are talking about. If you don’t like Comic Sans, you don’t know what you are talking about.’ That summed it up for me. And I like the font.
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@ThePB
I heard it as:
"If you like Comic Sans, you don't know much about typography. If you hate Comic Sans, you need to get a life."
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I like Comic Sans. I think it's easy on the eyes. As a college instructor, I use it for all of my handouts, as well as for my emails.
I would say that this is making me feel bad, but it's not. It's a font, people.
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@Anne Ross
Go ahead, but make no mistake, people are silently judging you. It's not an appropriate font for someone who wants to be taken seriously. Your ignorance of the connotations of Comic Sans is really quite surprising in an educator.
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I commented to a friend on his use of Comic Sans. He (former professor of computer sciences) pointed out its usefulness for having distinctly different "l" and "1", two characters confusingly alike in other fonts.
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I never really got the hatred. It's an informal typeface that looks a bit like handwriting (as was obviously intended). It's kind of like clothing. Swimming trunks are probably not appropriate for a funeral and a tuxedo is not right for the beach club. Get over it.
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After reading this, I think I'm going to endeavor to use Comic Sans more often. Maybe I should change my email typeface to Comic Sans.
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It’s only a font, one of hundreds if not thousands. Pick one you like and say what you want to say.
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Yeah, but I can actually read that memo, two pages side by side, on my iPhone
8
Sigh...I love the informality of Comic Sans and used it when I worked in a nursery school for everything, from brochures to our newsletter to our handbook.
I once got trashed recently for using it on my phone in a screenshot on a message board. Really? All those Comic Sans haters have nothing better to do?
If it were hard to read, maybe, but I like its informality. And, as someone over 55, like it's readability.
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I don't get it; I like Comic Sans. Is it OK to use Comic Neue? It's not proprietary. It's open source. Whee!
16
This piece should be on the front page, three days in a row.
There is something comic about Giuliani and Trump. It gets amplified when the two appear in tandem.
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@Jason -- Bingo! Thank you. I was looking for a reference to Trump in the comments section. Times readers never let you down.
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If people are talking about a font, any font, that means they're READING (which I would have italicized font, not capped, but this forum lacks that font option)... and that's a good thing.
For anyone with a true interest in typeface, there's a 2007 documentary called Helvetica. Yeah, the font got its very own movie. I think you can stream it for free. https://documentarylovers.com/film/helvetica/
Maybe Comic Sans is destined to star in a film someday...
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@D Price
A much maligned star in a one-star flick.
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@D Price
An alternative to CAPPING, which always gives the impression of SHOUTING, you might try to *emphasize* using *asterisks* around the words.
This is wildly understood in many text based messaging systems, to point, where some of them, e. g. WhatsApp show the enclosed text bold faced.
@Times: might make for an nice addition to the comment section...
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@D Price
It is a good thing that people are reading, but everyday beauty and appropriateness are important. It applies to other areas, too, like architecture. If I have a choice between going through Grand Central and Penn Station, it's not a difficult decision.
5
"At least one user recommended the lawyer be disbarred."
Heh.
If my attorney displayed such disdain for me, treated my case so frivolously, and was so contemptuous of the judicial-type proceedings as to use Comic Sans I would fire said attorney in a heartbeat.
Not to mention the fact that "via e-mail" strikes me as an egregiously inappropriate method for transmitting highly confidential legal documents. (_That_, rather than using Comic Sans, is the disbarment-level offense, in my opinion.)
26
I admit, I did come across one legitimate, acceptable use for the otherwise-unconscionable all-caps Comic Sans: the instruction manual for the Sentinels of the Multiverse board game, which is indeed written as a comic book. Because it's a game based on classic comics.
4
I used to use Comic Sans in my PowerPoint presentations as a grad student and postdoc. It was easy on the eye and bold, making it easy to read from the screen. I thought it was more interesting than the other sans fonts everyone used. I had no idea it was so maligned. It seems to me that spending time and energy hating a font suggests a serious lack of meaning in one’s life, as does creating a font to be ironic. There are pressing problems in the world that could use some of that attention. People are strange.
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@Sandy, no worries. I still use it in my research presentations, and I have tenure. It's easy to read even at the back of a large room, and it visually lightens an already-dense scientific presentation. The students love it for lectures (or maybe they're just too busy whining about the exams!) To the detractors, lighten up.
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@Susan
Tenure indemnifies a person to all sorts of... things.
OTOH & IMO, if you want to lighten the mood (and you use Apple's products) why not go with their Marker Felt fontface?
9
@Sandy Many years ago, I discovered that one of my oldest friends -- a very cheerful person who did a wonderful job teaching little kids in Sunday school -- would read The New York Times website on America Online in Comic Sans font. It just boggled my mind.
5
How about a large, clear example of C.S? Not all of us are knowledgeable about such vital matters.
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@Elliot Podwill : Search for
John Dowd letter Comic Sans
and when your results pop up, sort by IMAGES -- then just click on one.
You could also click on the Twitter message reproduced above, which contains the letter. but after you do, move your cursor all the way to the side, to avoid losing that particular tweet and instead defaulting to the Twitter account.
2
I hosted a symposium last week and a presenter I was on the other side of a legal dispute from 20 years ago used Comic Sans for his slides (the font of my supervisor those 20 years ago). I thought it was pretty funny. The levels of reference could have cascaded indefinitely if I cared to put that much thought into it...
3
The letter utilizes Comic Sans in lower case. It is is eminently readable. It gives a clear, precise character flow. Not a bad choice for an informal message.
The upper case is where the hatred begins. In this example, the only use of all caps is the word MAIL, at the very top of the page. That is one ugly word.
So don't go evil on the font... use the lower case for text and pair it with a nice sans serif when you need some display.
12
Isn’t Helvetica the gold standard for easy reading? Comic sans is a poor substitute.
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@Linda Simpson I think Times Roman or Minion are the gold standards for readability.
1
I get that it's not for official, formal documents, but I find Comic Sans the easiest font to read.
31
How and when did Comic Sans dethrone Papyrus? You guys! The trail of orthographic tears generated by CS feels trivial compared to the eschatological dimensions of visual carnage leveled upon us over more decades by Papyrus, which is for example, used by some entire city governments out here in CA
32
@DK The undertones of Undertale.
1
Purists reserve their hatred for Arial, a bastardisation of Helvetica created for the people in Redmond WA so they wouldn't have to pay royalties. Not a terrible font per se, but pickled in the juices of intellectual-property theft.
30
Hmmm, this reminds me of the NSFW mcsweeneys article: I’m Comic Sans...
3
People need to get a life, as the world decays daily this is an issue? I use it in my Nursing care plans because that is what was there when I took the position. When the state audits my work not once has the font been mentioned....Nobody cares unless you have too much time on your hands, which seems to be the case.
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@PPP. I see this type of argument and dont buy it. Of course one can always say there is "world starvation and war" so we should not care about anything else but "important" things. It is a knee-jerk dismissive retort.
9
Enjoyable reading as I don't obsess over fonts while reading excessively.
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