Small caps and the numeral 1

Filed under: Typography
2 Comments

John Gruber at Daring Fireball has been linking to various posts having to do with the use of small caps in typesetting.

For example:

  • Gore's choice explains Al Gore's request that the numeral 1 in a particular font be made to look more like a 1 and less like a capital I.
  • In response, fawny Joe Clark [see comments below] rants about the evils of small caps. ("Use of small caps for acronyms and abbreviations is a surefire indication your compositor is a snob.")
  • Aegir Hallmundur at Ministry of Type responds that small caps are not bad per se; it's more a question of how and when to use them appropriately.

2 Responses to “Small caps and the numeral 1”

  1. Joe Clark

    Yes, and Ægir Hállmundur’s point boils down to “go right ahead and use them despite the evidence.”

    I do have a name, you know, and it ain’t “fawny.”

    reply

    • Jed

      I apologize; I didn’t know your name. I looked at that page of your blog, and saw no name on it. I now see that way down at the bottom it has your name next to a copyright notice, but that wasn’t at all obvious from looking at the entry itself. So I figured that the word “fawny” at the top of the page, in large print, was the nom du Net of the page author; I see more unusual Net names all the time.

      reply

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