My fonts changed.

October 20, 2009 11:27 AM

My fonts changed.

Everything looked different and I couldn't figure out why until I looked at my profile. I normally have both fonts set to "sans-serif" but for some reason today they had both changed to "serif".

I changed them back and it's fine now, but I wondered why they changed in the first place.

posted by Mwongozi to bugs at 11:27 AM (51 comments total)

It's a trap.
posted by carsonb at 11:39 AM on October 20

Font gnomes. There's big profit in that business. No idea why or how, but there's big profit.
posted by yeti at 11:40 AM on October 20 [1 favorite]

Hadn't you heard? There's a new serif in town.
posted by zamboni at 11:43 AM on October 20 [104 favorites]

Now waitasecond, waitasecond. In order for us to figure out what happened here, you're going to have to be very, very precise. Now, tell me, did it change to a serid font or a "serif" font?

Don't understimate the importance here. The difference between a Baskerville and the Frank Pick version of Johnson can be a matter of life and death.
posted by Astro Zombie at 11:44 AM on October 20

Er, serif or "serif."

Fuck it, I can't top that "new serif in town" line.
posted by Astro Zombie at 11:44 AM on October 20 [4 favorites]

As an Elder American (36) whose main occupation is lawn maintenance, I have my font set to "sans-a-belt".
posted by DU at 11:54 AM on October 20 [3 favorites]

Maybe...your fonts changed you.
posted by m0nm0n at 11:56 AM on October 20 [2 favorites]

If you love your font, let it go. If it comes back, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was.
posted by iconomy at 11:59 AM on October 20

This is a test of the Emergency Helvetica System. This is only a test. If this were a real emergency, the mods would have switched the site over to Comic Sans.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:02 PM on October 20 [2 favorites]

Oh fuck me. I just changed to serif and you guys all turned so UGLY. Wow.
posted by dirtdirt at 12:10 PM on October 20

Something did change in the font style. I had to drop down a couple of points to get back to, relative, normalcy.
posted by eyeballkid at 12:17 PM on October 20

Also I feel I need to raise a question about your devil-may-care attitude to the possessive apostrophe in this post.
posted by Jofus at 12:25 PM on October 20

DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN
posted by shmegegge at 12:29 PM on October 20

Also I feel I need to raise a question about your devil-may-care attitude to the possessive apostrophe in this post.

Fonts is plural!
Font's plural.
'Fonts' is plural!

Shit. None of that even sounds like a sentence anymore.
posted by Solon and Thanks at 12:35 PM on October 20

I shot the serif.
posted by Rhomboid at 12:42 PM on October 20 [3 favorites]

I think your Yahoo! mail did this.
posted by mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey at 12:47 PM on October 20 [3 favorites]

Hey, I have no serif/non-serif option! I am outraged! I demand my $5 dollars back!
posted by Kattullus at 12:56 PM on October 20

My fonts look fine. You're all a bit weird though.

posted by blue_beetle at 1:06 PM on October 20

Wait. Not possessive apostrophe. The other one. The shortessive apostrophe.
posted by Jofus at 1:08 PM on October 20

I'm sorry?
posted by fiercecupcake at 1:14 PM on October 20

Imma let you finish, but Thomas Aquinas had one of the best serifs of all time! Of all time!
posted by Dumsnill at 1:19 PM on October 20 [2 favorites]

My fonts changed.
I changed them back and it's fine now.

That would make a great entry for the dullest blog in the world.
posted by iconomy at 1:21 PM on October 20

Also I feel I need to raise a question about your devil-may-care attitude to the possessive apostrophe in this post.

Wait. Not possessive apostrophe. The other one. The shortessive apostrophe.

Is your quaetion, by any chance, "Why did you use it correctly like that?"
posted by Sys Rq at 1:21 PM on October 20 [3 favorites]

quaetion

IT'S A WORD
posted by Sys Rq at 1:21 PM on October 20 [5 favorites]

I blame hotmail.
posted by terrapin at 1:47 PM on October 20

I'm rocking 12pt Verdana. Is this something I set when I was drunk one night, or is it the default?


I didn't even realize you could change it.
posted by cj_ at 1:53 PM on October 20

I shot the serif.

But I didn't shoot the Helvetica.
posted by never used baby shoes at 1:53 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

No no no.

It goes:

"I shot the serif

But I did not shoot Gill Sans MT"

credit to It's Raining Florence Henderson.
posted by mesh gear fox at 2:41 PM on October 20

The Times New Romans, they are a changing.
posted by UbuRoivas at 2:56 PM on October 20

Sorry, I really shouldn't try so hard to be a comic, sans talent.
posted by UbuRoivas at 2:57 PM on October 20 [3 favorites]

Wait wait wait wait wait, we can change fonts? Now every day can be Comic Sans day!

No wait, that's incredibly irritating. I wish there was a way to make only certain users' comments Comic Sans though. There are a few people whose comments consistently make me shake my head in disgust, an it would go down a lot easier if their comments were presented in such a ridiculous font.
posted by yellowbinder at 3:00 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

groan
posted by lazaruslong at 3:00 PM on October 20

My font has changed = My font's changed

We use the present perfect for events in the past where the time is unspecified or unimportant and the focus is on the current result of the past events.

Americans, who do not correctly understand the grammar of the English of language, will often substitute the simple past in these cases so watch out they will think the 's you use is a grocer's apostrof and get all freaky about it.
posted by Meatbomb at 3:12 PM on October 20

I changed mine to a baptismal font.
posted by fixedgear at 3:17 PM on October 20 [3 favorites]

I set up MetaFilter to display in ACME Explosive, yeah baby, EXPLOSIVE! And when I'm REALLY manic, I use BadaBoom! They are both BLAMBOT free fonts. Yeah, baby, free the fonts! Blam baby blam!
posted by evilmidnightbomberwhatbombsatmidnight at 3:18 PM on October 20

Actually, my fonts did the same thing yesterday. I had them set to Verdana but the text-box got cleared out so the browser was using the default instead.

Oddly enough, the size didn't get cleared.
posted by Dipsomaniac at 3:23 PM on October 20

Ⓘ ⓗⓐⓥⓔ ⓝⓞ ⓘⓓⓔⓐ ⓦⓗⓐⓣ ⓨⓞⓤ ⓐⓡⓔ ⓣⓐⓛⓚⓘⓝⓖ ⓐⓑⓞⓤⓣإ
posted by not_on_display at 3:45 PM on October 20 [10 favorites]

We use the present perfect for events in the past where the time is unspecified or unimportant and the focus is on the current result of the past events.

Police spokesmen in Australia are always using the present perfect whenever talking to the media ("the alleged offender has been seen absconding in an easterly direction...") and such mangled grammar has now become a signifier for official media releases.

Just the other day, the Premier of Victoria said (I mean, has been saying):

"There has been a group of individuals in balaclavas that have run through a group of students and assaulted them in an unprovoked way and there is nothing, I think, that is more un-Victorian than that - it just offends all of our values in this state"

I give him extra points for converting the singular "a group" into a plural ("have run") within the space of two words.
posted by UbuRoivas at 4:04 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

We did make a couple changes behind the scenes yesterday that could have affected your custom font choice. First we changed the default stylesheet to a new file, and we changed the way your default font choice is listed inline. Starting yesterday, custom fonts are now listed in the CSS font stack without quotation marks if your font choice does not contain a space. So let's say your font choice is "Verdana", it used on the page like so:

.copy{font-size:11pt;font-family:Verdana,sans-serif;}

Now let's assume your font choice is "Gill Sans MT". It would be used in the CSS like this with quotes:

.copy{font-size:11pt;font-family:"Gill Sans MT",sans-serif;}

Prior to this, all custom font choices were automatically enclosed in quotation marks. So if you had a custom font entry that wasn't working when enclosed in quotes, it could have suddenly started working yesterday when the quotes were taken away (or vice versa). There's no reason to include quotes when you set your custom font, so we're now stripping quotes when you update just in case you include them.

I hope that helps explain what happened, and sorry about the inconvenience.
posted by pb at 4:05 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

I changed mine to a baptismal font.

That must be Vatican, right?
posted by UbuRoivas at 4:06 PM on October 20

ⓦⓗⓐⓣ

wow.
posted by GuyZero at 4:28 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

ǝɹǝɥ ɯǝʃqoɹp ɐ ǝʌɐɥ ǝʍ ʞuıɥʇ ı ,qp
posted by cj_ at 6:18 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

qp bp pb dq bq pq qb bd qd pd
posted by june made him a gemini at 6:25 PM on October 20

My font has changed = My font's changed
There are two fonts in the profile settings.

My fonts have changed = My fonts changed.

He's right.
posted by fightorflight at 8:25 PM on October 20 [1 favorite]

My fonts changed.

I'm really terribly, terribly sorry.
posted by doctor_negative at 12:03 AM on October 21

Don't go changing.
posted by Meatbomb at 12:23 AM on October 21

*comments in 14pt purple Papyrus just to put things in perspective.*
posted by qvantamon at 3:14 AM on October 21

june made him a gemini: how u make that inverted b?
posted by qvantamon at 3:16 AM on October 21

Meatbomb: Don't go changing.

I have several questions about Billy Joel's particularly awful performance of one of my least favorite songs, which you have linked:

Why does Billy's piano sound like a sad 80s organ?

Why does Billy sing "Don't go changin' / To try and pleeve me" ? It actually sounds cooler than the normal lyrics. Yes, I know people do that sometimes to avoid the hissing caused by a hard 's.' If that's what Billy's doing, the song is boring again; it's much more interesting if he's trying to keep a woman from pleeving him. Sounds Zappa-y. "Why are you PLEEVING me? Stop PLEEVING on me!"

Could that saxophone player be any more shit? I mean, seriously. He'd have to take long lessons with Kenny G, and even then he'd be only mostly shit, whereas he seems to have completely mastered the art of being a SHIT SAXOPHONE PLAYER. He sounds like a kazoo or something. He is the kind of sax player who would have caused my quiet college friend Dave, who played the sax very well but was generally too shy to play in public, to destroy bookshelves and things. Argh. This man is actually harming my ears.

posted by koeselitz at 3:53 AM on October 21 [1 favorite]

koeselitz, this should be the antidote. I changed the font a little.
posted by not_on_display at 10:56 AM on October 21 [1 favorite]

comic sax ms
posted by flabdablet at 12:13 PM on October 21