alt Hacker NewsOur studio, LucasFonts, designed Calibri. Here are our CEO Luc(as) de Groot’s thoughts on the matter:
The decision to abandon Calibri on the grounds of it being a so-called “wasteful diversity font” is both amusing and regrettable. Calibri was specifically designed to enhance readability on modern computer screens and was selected by Microsoft in 2007 to replace Times New Roman as the default font in the Office suite. There were sound reasons for moving away from Times: Calibri performs exceptionally well at small sizes and on standard office monitors, whereas serif fonts like Times New Roman tend to appear more distorted. While serif fonts are well-suited to high-resolution displays, such as those found on modern smartphones, on typical office screens the serifs introduce unnecessary visual noise and can be particularly problematic for users with impaired vision, such as older adults.
Professional typography can be achieved with both serif and sans-serif fonts. However, Times New Roman—a typeface older than the current president—presents unique challenges. Originally crafted in Great Britain for newspaper printing, Times was optimised for paper, with each letterform meticulously cut and tested for specific sizes. In the digital era, larger size drawings were repurposed as models, resulting in a typeface that appears too thin and sharp when printed at high quality.
Serif fonts are often perceived as more traditional, but they are also more demanding to use effectively. While a skilled typographer can, in theory, produce excellent results with Times, using it in its default digital form is not considered professional practice.
Calibri, by contrast, incorporates extensive spacing adjustments and language-specific refinements. The digital version of Times New Roman, developed in the early days of computing, offers only minimal kerning and letter-pair adjustments. This is especially evident in words set in all capitals—such as “CHICAGO”—where the spacing is inconsistent: the letters “HIC” are tightly packed, while “CAG” are spaced too far apart. Microsoft cannot rectify these issues without altering the appearance of existing documents.
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May I ask what your thoughts are on fonts that prioritise legibility over everything else, like Atkinson Hyperlegible? IMHO Calibri has a better balance between legibility and a consistent/polished look. The Munich transportation company MVG wanted to set an example here and adapted this font for their information screens at subway stations, on trains etc. There's one catch though: because Atkinson Hyperlegible tends to have wider glyphs than the previous (also sans serif, of course) font they used, they had to reduce the font size to fit the same amount of information on the screens, so the increased readability is partly counteracted by the decreased font size.
I bet they want to get rid of Calibri because it was designed by a Dutch person. There's only two things I hate in this world, people who are intolerant of other people's cultures... and the Dutch.
(disclaimer: I am Dutch).
>Serif fonts are often perceived as more traditional, but they are also more demanding to use effectively. While a skilled typographer can, in theory, produce excellent results with Times, using it in its default digital form is not considered professional practice.
This reads like your CEO is mixing an argument against serifs with an argument against Times specifically. Later on they make a case against Times' lack of support for more modern features in digital fonts, which is a fine argument, but a question comes to mind: is the solution a sans-serif font?
It seems to me upon reading the article that Rubio's staff, or Rubio himself, is being overly specific with the font and I suspect that, being uninformed, what they really want is a serif font rather than Times New Roman, specifically. Maybe I'm wrong.
In any case, I'd like for you/your CEO to make it clearer, if you will: do you believe official government communications should use a sans-serif font altogether or is it just a problem with Times? Or both?
On a more personal note, is there any serif font you'd suggest as an alternative?
Thank you. (And sorry if I read this wrong.)
> Our studio, LucasFonts, designed Calibri.
Damn, the diversity of people one can meet here on HN continues to amaze me. Even after almost 13 years.
> The decision to abandon Calibri on the grounds of it being a so-called “wasteful diversity font” is both amusing and regrettable.
The cruelty (in this case, against people with visual impairments) is the actual point, as always, and the appearance of "going back to the good old times" is the visual that's being sold to the gullibles.
I love how emphasize is given to accessibility for older adults, such as the orange man. But I guess he gets his printouts with few words and big fonts anyways.
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I think we all can agree that Comic Sans MS reflects the current US government best, both spiritually and aesthetically.