See all those green ‘f’s?
It’s just a plain old Arial at 14px. Apparently cleartype does not like this font very much. There are similar artifacts at other sizes too. And, of course, it’s nothing new. Only today I’ve stumbled upon a so clearly visible example.
And one more thing – I *love* cleartype. It just hurts to see when it goes bad.
This is another great quote by Pablo Picasso. And another one that is not easy to understand. This is just one possible explanation:
Picasso hardly meant that great artists steal popular designs whose original source is known to everyone. What Picasso did mean was that great artists rummage through the great junk heap of lost, bypassed, and forgotten ideas to find the rare jewels, and then incorporate such languishing gems into their own personal artistic legacy.
(via Joel On Software forum)
Ed shares this story with us, via a friend of Pablo Picasso.
I was staying with Picasso in his studio. Every day, dealers would come by to authenticate paintings they were trying to sell… they would ask the painter if the painting was real or a fake.
A dealer came by one day, Picasso glanced at it and without hesitating said, “fake.” Later that day, two more were identified as fakes.
The second day, a different dealer came by. Picasso hardly looked up. “Fake!” he bellowed.
After the dealer left, I couldn’t help myself. “Picasso, why did you say that painting was a fake? I was here, in this studio, last year when I saw you paint it.”
Picasso didn’t hesitate. He turned to me and said, “I often paint fakes.”
(via Seth)
One possible explanation (via Rabbi David Gaffney):
The notion that a person is creating fakes when they fail to live up to their capacity has far-ranging artistic implications. The contention that the second-rate is second-rate, even when it is executed by first-rate people, is particularly worth proclaiming in an age when geniuses are discovered and proclaimed weekly. There is always room for the near-miss and for the clearly second-rate. But the standard for outstanding accomplishments must inevitably be lowered if no one bothers to distinguish the good from the not quite good enough.
