The Tiger Widget, Figlet, generates ascii text in about 9 different styles. You type in the word and it generates the ascii. It's fantastic. It offers the convenience of adding the text to your clipboard so all you need to do is paste it into your app.

 ___         _           _   _    
| __|_ _ _ _| |_ __ _ __| |_(_)__ 
| _/ _` | ' \  _/ _` (_-<  _| / _|
|_|\__,_|_||_\__\__,_/__/\__|_\__|
                                  

 _____                                
() |_  _,       _|_  _,   , _|_ o  _  
  /| |/ |  /|/|  |  / |  / \_|  | /   

Eye candy for letterpress fans.

http://elsa.photo.net/video/firefly-small.mov

Shhh. Don't tell anybody.

http://www.typophile.com/uppercase

Look for a formal announcement soon where we'll announce that all the past threads have been restored.

This may well be SSPam ( Shameless Self Promotion Spam :), but.:

Endless Summer Sale.: Buy 'formlos PlayR', a playful, experimental, trendy, smooth, futuristic techno display typeface, now, for only 5 Euros / 6 USDs ( ! ).. :)

> www.formlos.net/formlosTF/PlayR

SAVE FORMLOS ~ BUY A TYPEFACE
* Payable via PayPal.. Thank you..

Thanks to the blog option, i can have my own handpicked threads. This one falls under the category of "hot topic" as in watch out for all the flames. And without further ado:

http://typophile.com/node/9245

i must admit, a little heated discussion certainly makes for interesting reading. i'm just glad this one hasn't spiraled into the realm of personal insults. in between flares of personality, one can actually find an interesting line of discussion revisting topics including: the merits of revivals, interesting technological methods and the debate over the definition of "design." threads like this are the reason why i'd rather send my entertainment $$$ to typophile rather than the cable company.

I found a podcast I can actually recommend: Not Your Usual Bollocks (iTunes link requires v4.9 for built-in Podcast action) (or NYUB.net). It's a very tasty 30 to 45 minute block of various indie tracks with very little jabber from the London-based host. He plays some obscure stuff (at least to my ears) - some Brit electronica, German electronic. Then he mixes in just enough recognizable stuff from Kasabian, Autolux, Aphex Twin and others to keep it at least a tad familiar. The unpretentious deejay doesn't even mention his name.

It's so great to see what ad agencies mess up so bad that it really show that they're living in their own asses. When I saw that I literally uttered OMFG!

TypeOff has just produced its first T-Shirt, and I am giddy happy.

See the design here.

The design is an homage to Experimental Jetset, whose Beatles T-Shirt drove two members of our collective bonkers. Of course, the design is just as much of an homage to the four type designers whose names it bears:

Crazy. OK, let's try this out. Will people actually read this?

Getting excited about TypeCon? I'm getting my Type Gallery samples ready. Anyone attending TypeCon is entitled to display their recient fonts in the SOTA Type Gallery for free.

Wow, what some people will do for a free T-shirt.

Spike is showing Dr. No tonight. I stopped everything just to watch the titles. Why oh why can't we have more inspiration like that today? The Dr. No titles were designed by Maurice Binder and they make me smile. Down with shadows and blends and all that is 3D ... go back to analog and 2D design!

i love typophile. i really do. but sometimes it makes me more than a bit sad to see us attacking eachother on personal issues. i realize that type doesn't exist in a vacuum and that even type design is interconnected with languages, cultures, ideologies, politics, &c. Passion is what brings a lot of us to typophile--a passion for type. it would be ludicrus to expect that such passionate folks wouldn't be passionate about other things as well. likewise, it's unreasonable to to believe that we'll all see things the same way. this is what makes typophile so wonderful--to see the head-to-head comparison of ideologies concerning different aspects of type and type design.

*** NOTE: I am not wearing any hats but my own with this entry. ***

I am sick to death of comparisons that arise every year as we enter conference season. Specifically, the comparison of ATypI to TypeCon. Yes, both conference happen to share the topic of type. But, why compare? Why not just love? I guess I sit in a tough place. I love both. Some might say ATypI is more academic. Others say TypeCon isn't serious enough. I hate to break it to you people, but both conferences have both qualities. Where TypeCon is less expensive, ATypI gives you the opportunity to mill around during lunch and watch your heroes eat. Where ATypI bends toward specific corners of typographic theory, TypeCon gets to move into Type use in Graphic Design. Even these are gross generalizations. ATypI has three tracks, argued to be a good thing because you get choice. TypeCon has one track allowing us to not pine and winge over the speakers we are missing.

Well... I guess so. :)

It's live. Sorry it took so long, but, you know, life happens. ;-)

About the Fire Hydrant Incident -- I'll just plead momentary insanity. Hmmm... Actually that's a pretty permanent state of mind in my case. I wonder if they'll fall for that.

Ever had one of those days?

What not to do for your conference presentation: Stop your presentation before it kills again! (via InfoDesign)

What to buy if you are craving peanut butter and curry: PB Loco

What to read if you need a light in your life: WikiQuote on Hope

What to wear to your next client meeting if all is already lost: Very Necessar

From the May 1st edition of Bald Condensed:
"(...) They all seem to suffer from the same disease that plagues Hollywood, content with releasing the Next tired remake of a classic blockbuster, or clogging the market with corny genre faces."

This epitomises everything that's wrong with the current state of the type industry. I rest my case.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20050606-4974.html

Upside: The future could mean running OS X won't require Apple hardware. In other words, the ability to run OS X on any Intel box. It also means that a huge body of people with existing Intel hardware will be able to use OS X.

Downside: I may never get a G5 Powerbook, but will have to wait for the G6 in 2006.

I'm reading between the lines here a little. But the news is very interesting.

A small, but growing, collection of found 'Vintage Lettering' samples.:
> www.flickr.com/photos/formlos/sets/418907/

( 'Lettering', at Flickr.: www.flickr.com/photos/tags/lettering/ )

The new TypeOff website launched today. Although it is mostly in German, I still recommend a visit. Some posts are in english, for instance the site's dedication piece.* We reformatted the site; it is now a blog of sorts. All seven members of the collective act as authors. We are pleased to finally offer comments as a feature, even though the whole concept of comments and interactivity is so not new. Even those who cannot read German at all are invited to post comments. More interesting that way. We also added an RSS feed.

Anyway, let me know what you think!

http://www.typeoff.de

pffuf, another page to fill out? no. There is much better places to go to read interesting things.

I just got back from this year’s TYPO Berlin, the international conference organized every year at Haus der Kulturen der Welt by FontShop. TYPO Berlin may be Europe’s largest graphic design conference, and its theme this year was change, perhaps because after 10 years, Erik Spiekermann had announced that this would be his last round as one of the organizers.

Unlike 2004, I spent this year working inside the Linotype Library’s stand in the lobby. My whole review should be read with a grain of salt, as I only took time off from speaking with customers to see three of the lectures.

The Typowiki has been live for 2 weeks and already there are hundreds of entries. Mostly I'm impressed, not just by the quantity, but with the quality and the direction it's moving. Looks like the future is going to be open source.

Some exemplary posts so far:

Garamond
Bembo
Baskerville
Blackletter
Futura
X-height

Looking forward to seeing this thing grow.

I'm just going to make a short posting here, and see how long it hangs around for.

I seem to have an ability to make disappearing Wiki posts, so this'll be interesting.

blog thy name is crap
diary for the masses
typographic wind