Nerds. (Helveticafilm.com)

Typography is still for nerds

BY JOSH KELLER, MAR 09, 2008

For a moment there, I thought typography might actually become really popular. I had just dragged several of my friends to a movie theater in San Francisco to see Gary Hustwit’s Helvetica. They had initially been skeptical of the entertainment value of a film about a single typeface, even after I told them that it was “the most popular typography documentary of all time.” But after seeing the film, they seemed transformed. One friend, Erik, whose e-mail signature was long set in the ignoble Comic Sans, claimed after seeing the film that he would “begin looking at letters in a new way.” And then there was the Double Jeopardy round of November 7, 2007, which included a category called “Knowledge of Fonts.”

My mind raced. Perhaps we were entering a new era of typographic understanding, one in which the typography of cell phone contracts, dry cleaning storefronts, and office PowerPoint presentations would matter. Perhaps the forms of the lowercase g would become a suitable subject for casual dinner conversation. Perhaps the makers of computer monitors, taking pity on graphic designers, would redesign their products to display at magnificently high resolutions.

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