The Font Wars

It’s more than just Arial versus Helvetica
‘Helvetica’ is a sans-serif typeface developed by Max Miedinger, with Eduard Hoffmann, at the Haas type foundry in 1957.  It was originally called Neue Haas Grotesk.  The intention was to create a neutral typeface of great clarity which could be used widely for signage.  The design was revised and expanded into a full font family when it was taken up by Linotype.  It was renamed Helvetica, meaning ‘Swiss’, in 1960.  Since then a number of people have been involved in redesigning and developing Helvetica variants – it now exists as a family of 4 fonts in 2 weights and 1 width and related scripts in more than 10 languages.  Helvetica is used widely in commerce, e.g. 3M, BMW, Toyota, Panasonic, Apple iPhone and so on.  It is also used by the US Government including NASA and NYC’s MTA (Metropolitan Transportation Authority).  Helvetica was rated No. 1 on FontShop Germany’s list of “Best Fonts of All Time”.

‘Arial’ is a sans-serif typeface and computer font, packaged with Microsoft software applications and Apple OS X.  It was created by Robin Nicholas and Patricia Saunders for Monotype in 1982.  Arial is a typeface family that consists of a number of variants and related scripts in several languages.  It was originally called Sonoran San Serif until it started being included in Windows 3.1 by Microsoft in 1992.  It was one of the core fonts in all subsequent versions of Windows until Vista, when to intents and purposes it was replaced by Calibri.  Arial is a contemporary design with soft, full curves making it less ‘industrial’ than some other designs and extremely versatile.  Arial is nearly identical to Helvetica although some consider Grotesque 215 to be one Arial’s true parents.  Others think Arial is more like Univers than Helvetica.  The designs of the Arial letterforms and the spacing between the characters were intended to make the typeface more readable on screen and at various resolutions.  The inclusion of Arial with Windows and Mac OS has caused it to be one of the most used and widely distributed typefaces in the world.  

There are many people, including professional typographers and type enthusiasts who are not particularly fond of Arial due to its similarity to Helvetica and Microsoft’s role in its development and distribution.  They see the creation of Arial as a means of avoiding the payment of royalties or giving credit to Helvetica.  Monotype Imaging is the copyright holder for Arial, owning all rights, title and interest in and to the Arial font software.

If Arial is to be criticised as a Helvetica clone, then Helvetica can be said to rip-off Akzidenz Grotesk.  Both of these typefaces are derivatives of earlier Grotesque faces thereby making the entire debate fairly subjective.  That the font wars continue, and have expanded, can be seen in an article and small poll conducted in September on ShinyShiny (http://www.shinyshiny.tv/2010/09/poll_helvetica_vs_times_vs_calibri.html).  Readers were asked which font they preferred: Helvetica, Times New Roman and Calibri.  The results as at 19th November were:
Helvetica                                       73 votes    (37.82%)
Times New Roman                          41 votes    (21.24%)
Calibri                                           61 votes    (31.61%)
I write everything in Comic Sans    18 votes    (  9.33%)
                                                 _____________________
                                                   193 votes    TOTAL
                                                 _____________________

'Comic Sans' seems to be particularly out of favour at the moment, probably due to its misuse and overuse.  It was designed by Vincent Connare, a commercial photographer with a master’s degree in typography.  He has designed other well-known fonts including Trebuchet MS (the type I chose for the main text of this blog.).  David and Holly Combs’ “Ban comic sans - Putting the Sans in Comic Sans” campaign has been railing against the font since the late 90s (http://bancomicsans.com/main/) and it’s even the butt of jokes: “Comic Sans walks into a bar; bartender says, “We don’t serve your type.”. 
Listen to an interesting discussion between Vincent Connare and Dave and Holly Combs go to the BBC World Service “Font wars: should 'Comic Sans' be banned?” from 23 April, 2009: http://bancomicsans.com/main/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/bancomicsans_world_update.mp3.
And from passiveaggressivenotes.com: “Elsewhere in Seattle, “office professionalism” seems to have no bearing on freedom of speech…as long as you use the right typeface, of course.”
 

The 53rd Annual Punctuation Posse Round-up, July 19th, 2010, http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/2010/07/19/the-53rd-annual-punctuation-posse-round-up/.
When IKEA changed its signature typeface in 2009 from a customised version of Futura to Verdana complaints were received from all over the world.  Some of the fuss was because Verdana, a propriety font from Microsoft, was intended to be used on screen and not in print.  Designers are critical as they say Verdana has no elegance of Visual rhythm and has been dumbed down and over used.  Others point out that the Futura original was a better fit with IKEA’s design philosophy whereas Verdana is used all over the web.