Why is Appsliced the last site on the Internet that hasn't implemented font anti-aliasing?

wim

It's interesting that I don't see the problem in Safari/Monterey ... or anywhere else.

kidslow

@SevenSystems said:

@kidslow said:
Now please fix the problem with modals that has taken over modern web programming. I remember when banner ads were considered intrusive.

At least for the cookie alerts, you can blame the EU 😄 but seriously, most of them can be fixed with the AdGuard extension (available on pretty much every browser on every platform) and enabling one of the filter sets that includes "Annoyances".

Thanks man. I have AdGuard installed but that option is buried deep in the bowels and not on by default. Doesn't show in Safari Extensions preferences, only in the AdGuard for Safari standalone app.

To be clear, I have no problem with Cookie notices or GDPR. In general, I think the EU gets it a lot more right than most other regulators, and clamping down on flagrant violations of privacy by big corporations is not something I will complain about. Although it does get excessive and when I travel to Europe and go online there, the notices really are bonkers.

GUB

If you paid someone to design a site, and the display font looked like the one in my screenshot, would you be satisfied to leave it that way? Your answer I suppose would be yes. Because if you were to answer no, then you wouldn't now be suggesting that the appearance of the text didn't matter. Right?

That would make you one of few people (especially in this forum) who believe that functionality alone, and not aesthetics, "matter" in a user interface. And all those people are all showing up in this thread!

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@GUB said:
Why is Appsliced the last site on the Internet that hasn't implemented font anti-aliasing?

Do aliased fonts bother your eyes in any way, like you have a sight condition? If yes, perhaps reach out and write them a politely-worded email. If "no", and this is simply a matter of personal taste, does it really matter then? 🤔 Trying to figure out the exact point of this thread.

GUB

Interesting, thanks. And thanks for addressing my question instead of replacing it with one of your own!

@SevenSystems said:
The site in question uses a very strange CSS property for all of its text, which causes the artifacts that resemble aliasing:

They then realized that this looks bad on some browsers, but didn't understand why, and added this "-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased" property to try to work around it (obviously to no avail).

I have no idea why they're doing this, probably as an uninformed hack to slightly thicken the fonts. They've probably not been "spoon-fed knowledge" properly @GUB

wim

@GUB said:
That would make you one of few people (especially in this forum) who believe that functionality alone, and not aesthetics, "matter" in a user interface. And all those people are all showing up in this thread!

I'm one of those people who lean a bit that way. But I'm also someone who, very annoyingly I'll admit, has a grudge against simply venting rather than pursuing action to fix things.

This thread is fascinating in that it started as a "pointless" (don't get mad ... I mean no insult ... the poor reaction is on me) rant. But it has resulted in flushing out the real issue and narrowed down what could be fixed. It attracted a few snarky commenters. Thankfully I managed to not be one of them ... this time. 😂

(btw - I don't think that @jwmmakerofmusic was being snarky. I think he was genuinely interested.)

Anyway ... I kind of hope that the useful information distilled here is eventually reported to the developer. It's unlikely that they will care, since it seems to be a narrow set of browser situations that it affects. But at least there would be some constructive result from the exercise.

Don't mind me - I'm just a hopeless victim of my personality type. ✌🏼

McD

@GUB said:

Isn’t that just Lo-Fi with extra attention to adding noise? It’s an aesthetic.

@wim said:

Sterile.
There are two poles on a continuum.

I just watched a video that proves gravity doesn’t exist as a force. It’s just the physical manifestation
of time variations. Mind blown.

SevenSystems

@McD said:

@GUB said:

Isn’t that just Lo-Fi with extra attention to adding noise? It’s an aesthetic.

@wim said:

Sterile.
There are two poles of a continuum.

Good point actually 😄 I mean, they're essentially doing the image-processing equivalent of a Bitcrusher!

jwmmakerofmusic

@GUB said:
If you paid someone to design a site, and the display font looked like the one in my screenshot, would you be satisfied to leave it that way? Your answer I suppose would be yes. Because if you were to answer no, then you wouldn't now be suggesting that the appearance of the text didn't matter. Right?

That would make you one of few people (especially in this forum) who believe that functionality alone, and not aesthetics, "matter" in a user interface. And all those people are all showing up in this thread!

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@GUB said:
Why is Appsliced the last site on the Internet that hasn't implemented font anti-aliasing?

Do aliased fonts bother your eyes in any way, like you have a sight condition? If yes, perhaps reach out and write them a politely-worded email. If "no", and this is simply a matter of personal taste, does it really matter then? 🤔 Trying to figure out the exact point of this thread.

@wim is correct. I was genuinely curious if you had vision issues/disabilities. Apparently this isn't the case. If the aesthetic of a site was truly ugly (think early 2000s free Geocities websites), I could understand your point of view, but Appsliced's text appears perfectly fine in Safari on my Mini 6, iPadOS 16.6.1.

My only real complaint about Appsliced are the intrusive pop-over ads that make it practically unusable, but your mileage may vary.

And to return snark for snark, I honestly think this thread is one narcissistic ego-driven onanist rant about something absolutely insignificant if you're not actually vision-impaired.

GUB

I'm guess I'm funny that way. Just because I might like distortion applied to, e.g., a guitar tone, doesn't mean I want it applied universally. Distortion in a display font, in a photograph, or in the shape of a human skull -- these are not necessarily gonna work for me. I'm surprised this opinion is not broadly shared. I'm also delighted, because I like to believe I'm unswayed by groupthink.

@SevenSystems said:

@McD said:

@GUB said:

Isn’t that just Lo-Fi with extra attention to adding noise? It’s an aesthetic.

@wim said:

Sterile.
There are two poles of a continuum.

Good point actually 😄 I mean, they're essentially doing the image-processing equivalent of a Bitcrusher!

espiegel123

The issue seems to happen only for some people. The fonts appear anti-aliased on my iPad and iPhone in Safari and on my Mac in Safari and Chrome. Maybe some browser setting is relevant.

kidslow

Font nerds are a funny bunch. For some people the wrong font is like nails on a chalkboard and I don't begrudge them if that is the way they feel, but not everyone gets bent out of shape about font aesthetics.

wim

I'm happy to post a tutorial for how to view that site in Comic Sans MS if anyone likes.

wim

@kidslow said:
Font nerds are a funny bunch. For some people the wrong font is like nails on a chalkboard and I don't begrudge them if that is the way they feel, but not everyone gets bent out of shape about font aesthetics.

You have to admit that the way it appears in @Gub's browser is pretty egregious though. If it weren't such a seemingly small subset of cases, it would be a pretty big flub for sure.

kidslow

@wim said:

@kidslow said:
Font nerds are a funny bunch. For some people the wrong font is like nails on a chalkboard and I don't begrudge them if that is the way they feel, but not everyone gets bent out of shape about font aesthetics.

You have to admit that the way it appears in @Gub's browser is pretty egregious though. If it weren't such a seemingly small subset of cases, it would be a pretty big flub for sure.

Oh no doubt, but if I got upset and posted a rant for every egregious thing I found on the interwebs, I would spend 24/7 in a huff.

jwmmakerofmusic

@kidslow said:

@wim said:

@kidslow said:
Font nerds are a funny bunch. For some people the wrong font is like nails on a chalkboard and I don't begrudge them if that is the way they feel, but not everyone gets bent out of shape about font aesthetics.

You have to admit that the way it appears in @Gub's browser is pretty egregious though. If it weren't such a seemingly small subset of cases, it would be a pretty big flub for sure.

Oh no doubt, but if I got upset and posted a rant for every egregious thing I found on the interwebs, I would spend 24/7 in a huff.

😂🤣

NoiseHorse

@GUB said:

I don’t see a problem

GUB

The whole thread didn't start with a rant at all*, and so I don't really follow @wim's chronology of this thread, but I agree in principle with much of what @wim has to say.

Indeed I engaged in some snark, perhaps unfairly directed at @jwmmakerofmusic.

A couple of weeny passive-aggressive responses (e.g. how is this relevant? e.g why should I care?) is all it takes for me read further comments with a cynical eye when they don't bother to address my question.

So I admit, JWM's implication that unless I had vision problems, my interest in cleanly-rendered display fonts was somehow unusual... it didn't add up to me. My snarky response was a grumpy way of pointing out that everyone prefers well-rendered display fonts. Occam's razor. No visual disabilities need to be hypothesized to explain my preference for clean text. Really, now.

I made assumptions about @jwmmakerofmusic that I shouldn't have, perhaps. All is good. Thanks to everyone. My eyes aren't great, but they can read cruddy text. They rather wouldn't.

*rant | rant |
verb [no object]
speak or shout at length in a wild, impassioned way: she was still ranting on about the unfairness of it all.

jwmmakerofmusic

@GUB said:
The whole thread didn't start with a rant at all, and so I don't really follow @wim's chronology of this thread, but I agree in principle with much of what @wim has to say.

Indeed I engaged in some snark, perhaps unfairly directed at @jwmmakerofmusic.

A couple of weeny passive-aggressive responses (e.g. how is this relevant? e.g why should I care?) is all it takes for me read further comments with a cynical eye when they don't bother to address my question.

So I admit, JWM's implication that unless I had vision problems, my interest in cleanly-rendered display fonts was somehow unusual... it didn't add up to me. My snarky response was a grumpy way of pointing out that everyone prefers well-rendered display fonts. Occam's razor. No visual disabilities need to be hypothesized to explain my preference for clean text. Really, now.

I made assumptions about @jwmmakerofmusic that I shouldn't have, perhaps. All is good. Thanks to everyone. My eyes aren't great, but they can read cruddy text. They rather wouldn't.

All good mate. I'm sorry too.

I would suggest contacting them if need be. https://appsliced.co/contact Be polite of course as one attracts more bees with honey. Make sure you tell them your device, OS, and browser on which you're experiencing issues with aliased text. Perhaps they'll be open to solving the issue.

wim

Hey @GUB - when I mentioned snark, I was referring to people who were snarky to you, not you to them. Even though I personally wouldn't start a thread just to complain about a web site, not seeing how that accomplishes anything, I don't begrudge anyone else doing so.

It turns out that it turned into a productive discussion. Well, only productive from a learning perspective unless the feedback makes it back to the website developer. But close enough. 😉

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