Colored Text

[Merton9999]

Except it's not really being read, because it's annoying to do so. Using small text with a hard to read color is just being a unique little snowflake for the sake of being a snowflake.

Know who else is a snowflake? Rosina.

I agree. Coloring your whole post is like dressing like Bjork. It's just for attention. It took computer designers 20 years to figure out that despite all the neato colors easily available on a computer screen, there's a reason why every business and school project is written/typed/printed on off-white paper with black text. It is, hands-down, the easiest to read across the board.

As far as drawing attention via colors, that generalized statement is not a graphic design principle. The graphic design principle is the bolded "not" in the previous sentence. You accentuate specific details amongst a larger text set to draw attention to those pieces. If you color the whole thing you're defeating the purpose.

If you want proof hop over to dribbble.com. It's a site where professional graphic designers post their work for critique and recognition. The site itself uses a neutral background with neutral contrasted text, reserving color for the thumbnails of contributor projects. Also, if you browse the contributions, you'll notice the vast majority of site designs use neutral backgrounds and neutral text when they want you to read and comprehend an informational paragraph. Color is used for a reason to draw attention to pictures, links, headers, advertisements and other specific pieces that just need to grab you for a second away from the text.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Except it's not really being read, because it's annoying to do so. Using small text with a hard to read color is just being a unique little snowflake for the sake of being a snowflake.

Know who else is a snowflake? Rosina.

Can't you just set your preferences so it comes out black and standard regardless?

[Modoru]

Honestly? Comparing me to Rossina over a font color and type size change is a huuuge fallacy. Why should it suddenly bother everyone, when there hasn't been a single complaint in over a year? Honestly -- this is not a contest to "stand out", but why would you make it seem that way? Just ignore my posts, if it truly is as cumbersome as you make it out be. I'm sure there's a middle ground, but at this point I'm pretty sure everyone' just nitpicking for the sake of having something to complain about.

[Demon6324236]

Honestly? Comparing me to Rossina over a font color and type size change is a huuuge fallacy. Why should it suddenly bother everyone, when there hasn't been a single complaint in over a year? Honestly -- this is not a contest to "stand out", but why would you make it seem that way? Just ignore my posts, if it truly is as cumbersome as you make it out be. I'm sure there's a middle ground, but at this point I'm pretty sure everyone' just nitpicking for the sake of having something to complain about.

I honestly don't know either, I think everyone is just getting dumber on here.

[Trumpy]

you've been posting that tiny ass ugly green txt for a year? have you not been postin much cause i have only noticed this in the last few weeks. and its annoying to lean in closer to the screen jsut to read ur crap.

[Arcon]

Honestly? Comparing me to Rossina over a font color and type size change is a huuuge fallacy.

Only if your interpretation is unreasonably shallow. In terms of wanting to stand out for something irrelevant it does compare.

Honestly -- this is not a contest to "stand out", but why would you make it seem that way?

We're not making it seem that way, you are. What other reason could you possibly have to use a different font? Because rationally there is none. In fact, rationally there are several reasons against it. You may have noticed my post suddenly looking like ass as well. That's not my doing. I'm specifically didn't bother erasing your ugly-ass font when I started my post to prove a point, because that's what everyone quoting you partially will have to do. That's just one of the problems, that your font brings. Aside from that, both the size and the color are harder to read than the regular font, it may actually physically hurt some people with certain eye-related disabilities.

It carries zero intellectual information, only cosmetic information. And cosmetic information is, by default, only useful to look pretty. And what possible reason could you have for wanting your forum posts to look pretty (disregarding the fact that most people seem to disagree with you on its effect in the first place)?

[..] at this point I'm pretty sure everyone' just nitpicking for the sake of having something to complain about.

This is the FFXI forums. Trust me, the people on here have more than enough things to complain about. I wouldn't be writing any of this if I didn't have a reason to disagree. There are only reasons against it and no reasons for it (aside from personal ones). That makes your posting style factually bad.

Edit:
Note that I have nothing against formatting text for a specific purpose. It's a good feature for highlighting certain parts of a post or when used to convey some sort of information in a specific way. But I don't see any reason why everything you say has to be of a certain format. And for the same reason, I don't get why people format their instant messenger text either, but at least I can override all of those.

[Modoru]

Posting from phone so I'm screwed for pretty-making, but I did say earlier: "I like teal and smaller font feels more clean and concise for me". And I forgot the rest 'cause I can't quote. ;;
I'll get back to you tomorrow when I can read your post calmly.

[Kristal]

I have decided to adopt more colorful language in light of the (lack of) conversation good ole' #C35617

Did you know there is a color called #FFDEAD? Sounds more like a twitter feed then a color to me...

You could just set your web browser to override the color scheme of every page it displays anyway. I didn't even realize anyone was using different colors here, as my computer is set to force high contrast, so all my web pages use bright green text on a black background.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v3...SEMembers1.png

For some reason, green-on-black makes me want to gouge out my eyes... it pierces the soul like a million tiny needles >_<


I don't much care about colored posts, as long as they stick with darker colors so it doesn't become a pain to read. I get more annoyed by size tags... size=ant just invites the boot stomping all over it...

[Dragoy]

Modoru, et al,

I have transferred here from another topic, mostly unchanged.
So very nice to meet you all!

Due to the discussion sparked over there by this post I believe, I felt like posting something about this topic as well!


If you post merely for your own delight, it's of course perfect the way you best like it!

However, if you consider being a part of this community, and actually receive complaints (mainly talking about valid, well mannered ones, not so much about the 'complaining just to complain and/or to be rude' ones), it would be courteous to at least consider if something could be done to enhance their reading experience as well (could think of it as customer service of sorts, from user to another). Just because you can read it fine, doesn't mean everyone else can, obviously, which I'm sure everyone would agree with. ^^;

Surely everything is readable, whatever it is, where ever it is.
The question is, by whom, and where, as well as how?

But yeah, if only thing that matters to you is your personal experience, that is, as they say, that. I just figured I'd share my tiny opinion on that since someone had quite a valid request: “could it be slightly larger in size?”

Personally, the colour Modoru uses is quite pleasant for my eyes, but user experience will vary, just as does eyesight, which might be not so perfect more often than it is. The same font is a little bit too tiny in my opinion as well, but I can still read it OK (though I do sit perhaps relatively close to my display), and don't really care what people do with their text either way!

I don't think there has been any such colour that has been really annoying to me. Not even the clever white ones. I guess I still have better things to do, than to get annoyed not to mention angry about frivolous stuff. \ö/

As also mentioned, one can always override the user-settings if one really wants to do something about it. I, for one, don't mind it, really, and I do agree with Rosina that it can add some amount of personality to a user.

Just a few thoughts on that. I have to say that it was rather funny to see this thread as I had been more or less expecting something like this to happen soon... So if nothing else, at least it made me nearly smile a little.

As a conclusion: Forum features like to be used. I wouldn't be surprised if this one would be the next one to go, though.

Oh and that green on black is surprisingly OK to me.
I imagined it would be quite terrible indeed before I saw the picture. :S


And that is, as they say, a hat.


Edit:

Oh and as for it being the General Discussion forum, one might say that this topic has very little to do with FINAL FANTASY XI itself, as topics here should be, according to the welcome-thread though I guess it can be a little bit open for interpretation, heh. Well, at least it has something to do with the forum. ^^

[Modoru]

I have absolutely no problem seeking for a middle ground in which we could all agree on, that much is sure -- but calling my style "eye-cancer", among others, is hardly the way to do it.

If you don't like it, discuss it with me in a more tranquil way, there's no reason to get ad hominem on the matter. I'll gladly take suggestions that don't involve any more arguing. As I said twice before: "I like teal and smaller font feels more clean and concise for me". So please, take that into consideration before you pin it down as a form of standing out for attention. Send me a message if you so feel inclined.