mivox - 4:54 pm on Jun 21, 2002 (gmt 0)

Hehehe... why are baggy nylon pants with racing stripes and snap closures down the side cool? Why were avocado green and harvest gold ever cool colors for interior decorating? Why were giant shoulder pads and ripped-up neon clothing cool in the 80s?

Tiny fonts aren't so offensive when you look at them in the overall historical context of "cool" are they? ;)

But really, most of the "tiny type" sites are probably designed by young people with good eyesight, and aimed at a general audience of young people... I see that style used most often on young, hip "design for design's sake" sites, and artists' sites. Various people have been complaining about art being inaccessible to the "average viewer" for a long time, so I don't see why the web should change that. hehe

Personally, while I can totally understand the problems many people had with pixelsurgeon's 9px type and low-contrast colors, I had no trouble reading it whatsoever. I use a 17" monitor at 1024x768, and I have LOUSY eyesight...

Keep in mind that some of the people complaining about the 9px fonts were using monitors set to statistically unusual resolutions (1600 on a 19" monitor for example, which would make my eyes bug out of my skull!). I don't think we should all design our sites for people using ultra-high resolution monitors when the majority of surfers use 800x600 or 1024x768... and more people probably use those two resolutions on 17" monitors than even own a 19"

I think the issue with font size really needs to be centered around the specific target audience of each individual site. If you want to reach a mass audience sucessfully, I'd recommend against 9px type... If you're targeting an audience with huge, ultra-high resolution monitors, I'd probably advise against it as well. In most cases, I'd probably advise against it.

If you're designing for the artsy crowd though (which many tiny type "design" sites are), or trying to build a "cool/young/hip" entertainment type site... I'd rather present a site that looks like pixelsurgeon than one that looks like useit.com. ;)