alt Hacker NewsReuters calling the switch a "font" change instead of a typeface change is troubling, though consistent with a society that now casually refers to all pasta as "spaghetti". A typeface is the design; a font is its specific instance. This is basic knowledge, taught to children, houseplants, and most domesticated goats.
A simple correction would stop this spiral, but Reuters appears committed to forging a bold new era in which terminology is chosen at random, like drawing Scrabble tiles from a bag and declaring them journalism.
Replies
> A typeface is the design; a font is its specific instance. This is basic knowledge, taught to children, houseplants, and most domesticated goats.
I didn't know this, and this explanation isn't really helping. (I did know there's a difference between typeface and font, but no idea what).
Why would this be basic knowledge when all most people ever have to deal with is the font options in Word?
In my experience, "font" is the colloquial term referring to either. Programmers get to demand precision, for journalists it's a bit tougher. The de facto meaning of terms does, unfortunately, evolve in sometimes arbitrary ways. And it's tough to fight.
If all DoS documents are prepared with the same software or software suite (e.g. MS Office), isn't that a distinction without much of a difference? They've gone back to using TNR.ttf instead of Calibri.ttf (or whatever the files are actually called).
> Reuters calling the switch a "font" change instead of a typeface change is troubling
Come on, they're writing for a general audience, not a bunch of pedantic typographers and developers.
> a society that now casually refers to all pasta as "spaghetti"
I have never experienced this; in what contexts have you?
> taught to children
We were 100%, never taught this (in the UK).
> A simple correction would stop this spiral
It wouldn't, it would just mean fewer people understood what the story was about.
> This is basic knowledge, taught to children, houseplants, and most domesticated goats.
I’m a professional graphic designer, people in the industry use font, type and typeface interchangeably. No one goes “Umm Actually…” you should also tell that to who wrote css, because font-weight doesn’t make sense if a font is already a specific weight. Words mean something specific until they don’t and the meaning changes over time and that’s okay