Comment by tptacek
1 day ago
No, those things aren't comparable. Truffles have a functional role in a dish. A typeface does not have a meaningful functional role in a document, compared to the high-quality freely-available alternatives. This is like complaining about some kind of specially-carved or dyed truffle.
I respect you a ton (genuinely, I think you're the most interesting writer in the tech space), but you have a profound misunderstanding of the importance of typography if you think the only reason you'd need a paid typeface is the same reason you'd need a Hermes bag. I know you're a curious person, so hopefully you take this as an opportunity to open your horizons on the importance of it.
I'm a typeface nerd. Bringhurst is one of 3 books on the end-table next to me right now. I spend a stupid amount of money for Hoefler fonts for my dumb blog.
This to me is like the Menswear Guy on Twitter, who will explain in very great detail to you why the Hermès product is significantly better than the generic alternative. He's right, but he also understands that you buy the Hermès product to make a statement. Spend money on that statement if you want --- I do --- but don't try to pretend you have a right to it.
(i don't mean i own any hermes products; just stupidly expensive typefaces)
I usually like your takes, but where I disagree today is when you say: "Truffles have a functional role in a dish." but fonts don't.
Either both do have functional roles or both are luxuries like Hermès.
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Then we aren't disagreeing. I never said anything about stealing or piracy; I agree with you that not being able to afford something doesn't give you the right to take it.
I think we're responding to different things. You're upset the original person mentioned piracy, whereas I took their rant to be more about licensing changes being yet another way companies are creeping up prices from one-time-purchase to rent-forever. You used to be able to pay for a font and use it in a magazine, but now you have to pay per impression.
And moreso, I'm annoyed by most of the comments saying that the free fonts on your computer should be enough.
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Typefaces do have functional roles, they {exude} a point in culture and time (the fonts that HN supports certainly time-stamps it).
edit: HN won't allow Fraktur[1] characters, even though they are in the unicode standard. Yet more evidence that font matters for the tone of the message you deliver.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraktur
> A typeface does not have a meaningful functional role in a document
100% incorrect. There are fonts that are made specifically to increase legibility for a dyslexic audience. If that's not a functional role than I don't know what is.
One dyslexia font was tested and found to have the same legibility as normal fonts:
"Dyslexie font neither benefits nor impedes the reading process of children with and without dyslexia."
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11881-017-0154-6
I'm skeptical that any of these fonts actually make a difference. (Although if you like Comic Sans, you might as well continue using it; it doesn't do any harm.)
Oh for God's sake. You also can't set an instruction manual entirely in DIN Grindel Milk. The implied subtext was the functional equivalence of free and unfree display fonts. The most popular dyslexia font in the world is free.
Ah that's my bad, I read the first statement without seeing that you prefaced it with "as compared to free alternatives".
1 reply →
The truffle, and the font, add _essence_
> Truffles have a functional role in a dish
Cheap "truffle oil" can fill that role as much as a free font can fill the role of a premium one. The real truffle and the premium font have a functional role for the few people who can tell either apart. For the rest maybe anything works, just put something on the plate or screen.
Not without adding fat