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So, one font doesn't render quite right at a certain size in a certain browser? Not sure I'd call that a disaster. "I don’t have a clue how they expect to make

So, one font doesn't render quite right at a certain size in a certain browser? Not sure I'd call that a disaster. "I don’t have a clue how they expect to make money from this or why they wanted to create the directory in the first place" I'll tell you why: To encourage the use of plain text instead of images. Every time a webmaster uses Google's font directory instead of resorting to an image file, Google's job gets easier.

silentOpen 16y ago
It also puts a Google resource hit on lots of pages -- Google gives you fonts, you give it usage data. Edit: This is probably not useful to them, actually, due to caching. However, it is their prerogative at any time to change their resource behavior and start receiving every request.
- randallsquared 16y ago
  However, it is their prerogative at any time to change their resource behavior and start receiving every request. Anyone concerned about this will just copy the result to their own server, right?
- petervandijck 16y ago
  Man this argument gets really old, particularly when you have to use some old crappy expensive analytics tool because "we don't want to give Google our data", or when corporate IT doesn't allow you to use Google docs (it's the same argument). Just cranky.
arnorhs 16y ago
Actually, that wasn't a carefully selected size. I tried a few fonts in a few sizes, but all of the ones I tried looked like that in smaller sizes. They look fine for headings and such, but not when used for readable text.
pilif 16y ago
it's not one font. It's all of them under windows. Google does something to the fonts so that the Windows font rendering system isn't able to properly anti-alias them any more. On the mac it works fine.
VMG 16y ago
There could be other motivations. One more sinister is that they use it to track even more visitors, one more altruistic is that they just do it to improve the web.
- petervandijck 16y ago
  How about just getting bonus points from developers? That's a strong motivation, I do heaps of stuff to just get some extra bonus points from my wife, same principle. Neither sinister nor altruistic, just plain old what's-best-for-google. And the way they aligned themselves with the web, what's-best-for-google tends to regularly be good for us too, although not always.
lwhi 16y ago
No decent front-end web-developer would use an image to display text without making use of an image-replacement technique. This is a platform demo - in the same vein as Typekit. If the model and platform works, Google will be able to sell typography direct to developers.
- scott_s 16y ago
  And how much of the web is built by "decent front-end web-developer[s]"?
  - lwhi 16y ago
    I can see the benefit Google gains from increased usage of plain text - but I can't see how this can be a main driver for their decision to launch this platform. The web is progressing towards native support of @font-face. This is an intermediate step that will get us there - and, imo, it's also a way that Google could potentially experiment with selling font IP as a service. I say this largely because it would possibly dovetail with their efforts to sell IP via their recently announced app-store. I don't think many websites display their text solely using images (without use of image replacement techniques) - though maybe I'm wrong? Even non-decent front-end developers have an incentive to use IR; largely because Google's desire to index corresponds with most site owner's desire to be found.
bd 16y ago
Disaster is probably too strong word, but given current browser and operating system share Google's new fonts are much less useful than they appear to be. Despite what it may look like according to most vocal people on the web, great majority of people still use Windows. New Google fonts look noticeably worse than default fonts on all browsers in Windows XP/Vista/7. Well rendered old fonts are still much nicer than ugly rendered new fonts. Which means if you will use these new Google fonts, user experience for majority of your visitors is going to be worse than before (unless your visitors are heavily skewed toward OSX or Linux).

silentOpen 16y ago

It also puts a Google resource hit on lots of pages -- Google gives you fonts, you give it usage data. Edit: This is probably not useful to them, actually, due to caching. However, it is their prerogative at any time to change their resource behavior and start receiving every request.

randallsquared 16y ago
However, it is their prerogative at any time to change their resource behavior and start receiving every request. Anyone concerned about this will just copy the result to their own server, right?
petervandijck 16y ago
Man this argument gets really old, particularly when you have to use some old crappy expensive analytics tool because "we don't want to give Google our data", or when corporate IT doesn't allow you to use Google docs (it's the same argument). Just cranky.

arnorhs 16y ago

Actually, that wasn't a carefully selected size. I tried a few fonts in a few sizes, but all of the ones I tried looked like that in smaller sizes. They look fine for headings and such, but not when used for readable text.

pilif 16y ago

it's not one font. It's all of them under windows. Google does something to the fonts so that the Windows font rendering system isn't able to properly anti-alias them any more. On the mac it works fine.

VMG 16y ago

There could be other motivations. One more sinister is that they use it to track even more visitors, one more altruistic is that they just do it to improve the web.

petervandijck 16y ago
How about just getting bonus points from developers? That's a strong motivation, I do heaps of stuff to just get some extra bonus points from my wife, same principle. Neither sinister nor altruistic, just plain old what's-best-for-google. And the way they aligned themselves with the web, what's-best-for-google tends to regularly be good for us too, although not always.

lwhi 16y ago

No decent front-end web-developer would use an image to display text without making use of an image-replacement technique. This is a platform demo - in the same vein as Typekit. If the model and platform works, Google will be able to sell typography direct to developers.

scott_s 16y ago
And how much of the web is built by "decent front-end web-developer[s]"?
- lwhi 16y ago
  I can see the benefit Google gains from increased usage of plain text - but I can't see how this can be a main driver for their decision to launch this platform. The web is progressing towards native support of @font-face. This is an intermediate step that will get us there - and, imo, it's also a way that Google could potentially experiment with selling font IP as a service. I say this largely because it would possibly dovetail with their efforts to sell IP via their recently announced app-store. I don't think many websites display their text solely using images (without use of image replacement techniques) - though maybe I'm wrong? Even non-decent front-end developers have an incentive to use IR; largely because Google's desire to index corresponds with most site owner's desire to be found.

bd 16y ago

Disaster is probably too strong word, but given current browser and operating system share Google's new fonts are much less useful than they appear to be. Despite what it may look like according to most vocal people on the web, great majority of people still use Windows. New Google fonts look noticeably worse than default fonts on all browsers in Windows XP/Vista/7. Well rendered old fonts are still much nicer than ugly rendered new fonts. Which means if you will use these new Google fonts, user experience for majority of your visitors is going to be worse than before (unless your visitors are heavily skewed toward OSX or Linux).